School Or Street? Akwa Ibom Moves Against Truancy & Child Hawking
By ARIT OTONG UBOK
THE Akwa Ibom State Government plans to establish a special monitoring task force to tackle truancy, street hawking by school-age children and the non-enrolment of children in schools.
Commissioner for Education Ubong Umoh announced the proposed measure in a statement dated 14 October 2026. He said the ministry had observed children roaming the streets and engaging in commercial activities during school hours despite the state’s free and compulsory education policy.
Under the proposed arrangement, the task force will intercept pupils who arrive late at school or leave their classrooms during lessons. It will also engage parents and guardians who fail to enrol their children or wards in school.
The ministry defines school hours as 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. on weekdays. According to Umoh, the initiative aims to keep children in classrooms, improve their safety, reduce classroom distractions and protect them from potential abuse.
Moreover, the government hopes that stricter monitoring will strengthen compliance with its compulsory education policy. However, the commissioner did not announce when the task force would begin operations, how authorities would constitute it or what penalties parents might face for non-compliance.
The announcement comes amid concerns about the state’s education outcomes. In September, a report placed Akwa Ibom 36th among Nigeria’s 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory in the 2026 National Examinations Council Senior School Certificate Examination. It reported that only 37.42 per cent of candidates secured at least five credits, including English Language and Mathematics.
The state government subsequently disputed the figures, arguing that results from 83 of 214 public-school examination centres had not been released. However, the government had yet to publish the official data it said supported its position.
Earlier, on 7 October, Governor Umo Eno declared a state of emergency in the education sector and approved the recruitment of 2,000 additional teachers.
The proposed task force therefore adds school attendance enforcement to the government’s wider education response. Its effectiveness will depend not only on monitoring pupils but also on addressing the circumstances that keep children away from school, including household economic pressures and inadequate access to educational support.
