“Burkina Faso has just surpassed the dramatic mark of one million children affected by the closure of schools due to the security crisis,” said the NGO Save the Children, in a press release it released, clarifying that 5,709 schools have been closed.
More than 5,700 schools have been closed in Burkina Faso due to lack of security, jihadist attacks, depriving one million students of access to education, the non-governmental organization Save the Children said on Wednesday.
“Burkina Faso has just passed the dramatic mark of one million children affected by the closure of schools due to the security crisis,” the NGO said in a press release, clarifying that 5,709 schools have been closed.
This is twice the number announced by the government of the African country at the beginning of the year.
Since 2017, jihadist organizations have targeted teachers and schools in Burkina Faso, among others, because of their opposition to both Western-style education and state institutions.
The closed schools “represent about 22% of Burkina Faso’s education infrastructure” and the affected students are “1,008,327”, according to Save the Children, citing data from a technical committee on education in emergencies. government body.
According to the Ministry of Education, over 28,000 teachers are also affected by the school closures.
“At this time, given the state of emergency, the key is for governments, donors and the humanitarian community to find and fund immediate alternatives to mitigate the risks associated with this situation,” said the director of the annex of Save the Children in Burkina Faso, Benoit Delchart, speaking of a “dramatic situation”.
“Besides depriving children of their right to education and their intellectual development, closing schools exposes them to numerous other risks that threaten their well-being and future,” Mr. Delsart pointed out.
For more than seven years, Burkina Faso has often been plunged into mourning, due to the increasingly frequent and deadly attacks carried out by jihadists, mainly in the northern and eastern sectors of the country. The action of organizations that swear allegiance to either Al-Qaeda or the Islamic State has claimed the lives of thousands of people and uprooted some two million residents from their land.
Captain Ibrahim Traoré — sworn in on October 21 as interim president by the constitutional council, following the September 30 military coup that ousted Lt. Col. Paul-Henri Santogo Dhamiba — has said the goal of the new military regime “is nothing but the recovery of territories occupied by hordes of terrorists”.
It was the second military coup in Burkina Faso in eight months, with the coup plotters citing the worsening security situation both times.
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