Ekiti releases 10 pupils arrested for hawking during school hours

Ekiti State Commissioner for Women Affairs, Mrs Sola Fafure, said on Wednesday that 10 children of school age arrested by officials of the state government for contravening the state Child’s Right Law had been released.

Fafure said parents of the children signed an undertaking that they would take care of the children and ensure they were in school at appropriate times.

The State’s Child’s Right Law provides that all children must be given access to education.

Fafure said that the pupils were picked up from different locations in Ado Ekiti, the state capital, on Tuesday during school hours contrary to existing government law.

She said, “The children were found loitering about or seen hawking with or without school uniforms on them when they were supposed to be in school.

“One of the pupils apprehended was a 10-year-old pupil whose father allegedly signed him up as an apprentice, knowing fully well that the child was still of school age,” she said.

The commissioner said the exercise to rid the state of school pupils hawking or roaming during school hours would soon extend to the 16 council areas.

She, however, called on all parents and guardians to key into the free education programme of the Dr Kayode Fayemi administration.

Fayemi had while speaking recently at a sensitisation programme for school enrolment for the 2019/2020 academic session, warned that parents who kept their school-age children out of school in the state risked being prosecuted.

The governor had said, “Let it be known that we have a Child’s Right Act in Ekiti which prohibits parents from disallowing their children of school age to be out of school during school session.

“In order to ensure that we implement that law, we have a family court in the state that takes responsibility for children that are not in school and parents who fail in their responsibility,” Fayemi had said.