No fewer than 91 officers of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) are undergoing training on effective protection of schools across the country by security experts.
The 2-day training kicked off on Monday at the NSCDC Headquarters, Abuja.
NSCDC Commandant-General (CG) Ahmed Audi, said that the experts were drawn from the Armed forces, Department of State Services (DSS), NSCDC amongst others.
He said that the National Safe Schools Response Coordination Centre (NSSRCC) is determined to develop capacities of instructors for the safe school training programmes.
Audi represented by Deputy Commandant-General (DCG) Nnamdi Nwinyi, in charge of Crisis Management, said the workshop was a train-the-trainer workshop, intended to enhance the competencies of instructors and facilitators.
Audi said that another safe schools coordinators course is slated for senior officers of the Corps in the North-East Zone from Sept. 6 till Sept. 8, 2023.
“North Central Zone is for Sept.18 till 20 while arrangements have also been completed for a similar training in all the other geo-political zones.
“This arrangement is in deliberate attempt to decentralised the training from Abuja to states and local government areas were majority of schools are situated.
“This will also allow host communities of schools the opportunity to participate in the trainings and be better equipped to join in the fight to protect schools in their domain,” he said.
The CG reiterated that the programme is developed by the Federal Government to enhance protection of schools and host communities against violence and attacks .
“Some of the responsibility of the Centre amongst others includes advocacy, awareness creation and capacity development of critical stakeholders.
“It is imperative to mobilise synergy among security agencies and to build security resilience with other relevant stakeholders,” he said.
According to him, all participants had been carefully selected after putting into consideration their level of knowledge, experience and past contributions in drill and arms handling.
While addressing the participants, he hoped that at the end of the workshop, they would be better informed and prepared to deliver on the mandate of preparing their subordinates for better service delivery.
In his remarks, NSSRCC Commander, Tersoor Shapeera, said that participants would be taught the basics of safe schooling and how to get host communities and schools identify how to protect schools nationwide.
The commander said that instructors would be trained on how to educate schools to get registered with the corps to promote visibility.
He said that the School Protection Response Squad that had been launched by security agencies would help in tackling reports of insecurity in schools.
“The responsibility of the centre is to alert the squad when the need be to either tackle kinetic or non- kinetic crisis,” he said.
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