By Gambo Jagindi
March 01, 2021
Peace Corps Boss appeals to NASS to fast track passage of
Peace Corp Bill
Prof. Dickson Akoh, National Commandant Peace Corps of Nigeria has appealed to the leadership of the National Assembly to fast track the passage of the Bill for an Act to establish the corps.
He made the appeal at a news conference on Monday in Abuja while decrying the spate of banditry, kidnappings and abduction of especially school children.
Akoh said though the country was passing through unprecedented security challenges, the situation was not insurmountable.
He explained that the primary focus of the corps was to secure educational institutions from intruders and also combat all forms of social vices to create a peaceful and conducive learning atmosphere.
He added that this was also part of the functions the Bill for an Act to establish the Nigerian Peace Corps currently pending before the 9th National Assembly was seeking to address.
“In view of the heightening insecurity challenges in our country, I strongly appeal to the leadership of the National Assembly to fast track the passage of the Bill and for Mr President to assent to it.
“This will indeed, enable the peace corps to deploy its officers to educational institutions,”he said.
According to him, officers of the corps had been adequately trained and oriented to serve as supporting agents of social order by providing a second line of public safety.
He added that the officers could adequately address insecurity in schools by upholding bottom up surveillance.
Akoh further added that this could be achieved through monitoring, observation, evaluation, detecting, collating and analysing intelligent data on matters that may likely cause breach of peace and security within school communities.
He said every findings would be properly transmitted to appropriate security agencies for preventive actions.
“However, as serious as the situation may be, this is not the best of time to either trade blames or embark on divisive tendencies.
“Rather, our collective commitments should be on how all and sundry can come together and form a strong bond against banditry and terrorism under any guise,” he said.
He urged the Federal Government to come up with a conscious and deliberate policies geared towards protecting, securing and safe guarding institutions of learning from further attacks by bandits.
Akoh stressed that the time was ripe for government to fortify security measures within and around educational institutions in the country.
“Such arrangements, besides securing educational institutions against intruders.
“Is also to guarantee the safety of students and keep track of movement around institutions of learning with a view to properly transmit incidents of strange movement of people to appropriate security agencies for pre-emptive measures,” Akoh said.
He noted that in other climes, every aspect of social life had its specialised security network.
He condemned the spates of attacks, banditry, kidnappings and abduction especially in secondary schools in parts of the country for ramson.
He notes that in the past, kidnappers focused their attack on elites and political office holders to ventilate their anger and frustrations.
“But now, redirecting their attention on innocent youths and students, being soft targets, is to say the least an act taken too far,” he stressed.
Akoh added that the development calls for drastic measures to be put in placed if the war against banditry was to be won.
He further noted that banditry and the attendant horror being visited on schools, if not urgently addressed, would instil psychological fear on students.
This, he said, was capable of creating a disconnect in the educational system, with grievous implications on national development