School head teachers in various communities in Gombe State have appealed to the state government to provide better toilet facilities to avoid open defecation, ensure a hygienic environment, and safeguard the health of school children.
They made the appeals in separate interviews with journalists after training workshops on safety of schools and children organised by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
According to most of the interviewees especially in villages, none of their schools have more than three toilets which they said are inadequate to cater for the male, female pupils and teachers, hence some children resort to open defecation when in distress, thereby making the schools unsafe hygienically.
One of the head teachers Musa Mohammed from Malam Sidi Central Primary School said their school is safe as it is fully fenced but lamented lack of adequate toilets despite the fact that they host two other schools.
“We have only two latrines, one for males and the other for females which are too insufficient in view of the magnitude of pupils and students in this school,” he pointed out.
Also, Hajara Simon, a headmistress from Yamaltu Deba local government, said they learnt to prevent all things that make schools unsafe for children such as dangerous play, severe punishment by teachers and bullying by fellow pupils in their schools.
She said she was going to ensure that such things were avoided in her school after the UNICEF training.
The UNICEF’s Bauchi field office education specialist Mr Abdulrahman Ibrahim Ado said the programme aimed to support the implementation of safe school initiatives.
He tasked the trained head teachers to set up safety committees in their schools that will identify threats, disasters as well as receive complaints on abuse, any form of violence in the schools, and report and respond appropriately.
Our correspondent reports that the head teachers trained were drawn from Gombe, Yamaltu-Deba and Kwami local government areas.
