mass of this number comes from Borno, Adamawa, Yobe, Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Zamfara, and other northern states.
In Kano, there are about one million out-of-school children in the state. This is according to Peter Hawkins, the UNICEF representative to Nigeria, who disclosed this at a four-day workshop organised for commissioners and permanent secretaries from the 19 northern states in August 2019. Also, Mojisola Adeyeye, director-general of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control , revealed that 70 percent of the youth essentially, the young boys, abuse illicit drugs in Kano.In June, 2019, the federal government said it was considering proscribing the Al-majiri system of education in order to tackle insecurity.
But what happened when the government revealed its intention to ban this atrocious system? There was a piercing outcry from the north that it was an attempt at a religious ordinance they hold dear. Muhammad Sanusi II, the gadfly emir of Kano, whom I regard as the John the Baptist of the north for his vociferous condemnation of this disequilibrious status quo, is alone in his advocacy against irresponsible polygamy, Al-majiri and child marriage – practices the northern elite espouse.