A total of 178 vulnerable children have been returned to school even as some women have equally been enrolled in adult literacy programmes to enhance their economic survival chances.
This is the assertion of Afri-mission and Evangelism Network (AMEN), a non-governmental organisation.
The President of the organisation, Pastor Oscar Amaechina, disclosed this at the Back-to-School and Women Empowerment Programme in Abuja on Monday.
The event was held with the theme, “Every Child and Every Woman Deserves to Learn and Survive”, with the president saying that the programme, which initially targeted at 200 out-of-school children, was designed to support vulnerable children and women.
“The vision of Afri-mission is to help the helpless and to help the marginalised, the downtrodden.
“And then when we saw that there’s a lot of children out-of-school, we decided to embark on this journey.
“And we are grateful to God that today it has become a living reality.
“Initially we planned to take up to 200 out-of-school children back to school. But today, we can say that we have counted, and then we have around 178 of them. So, and this is an ongoing project,” he said.
He said the beneficiaries were identified through a needs assessment conducted in Anka, Ajata, Jikwoyi, Kurudu, Orozo, Karishi and Sabon Gari communities.
According to him, some beneficiaries were displaced persons whose parents had lost their livelihoods, while others were children of widows who could not afford to send them to school.
Amaechina said the organisation had invested about N12.5 million in the initiative, with support from partners, particularly Ignited Family in Lavonia, Georgia, United States.
He said the programme would continue with another batch, adding that the organisation’s desire was to ensure that no child was left uneducated.
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The Afri-mission president said the organisation was also supporting vulnerable women with soft loans ranging from N300,000 to N500,000 at 10 per cent interest.
“We give loans to vulnerable women. And we give N500,000, but the least we have given is N300,000. And they are only to pay 10 per cent.
“It’s a soft loan; we call it Jesus Loan. And this is just to enable them to find their feet and then to be economically independent,” he said.
Amaechina said some women were also enrolled in adult literacy programmes because they lacked basic reading and writing skills required to participate in the organisation’s skills acquisition programme.
He said the adult literacy programmes would serve as a foundation for the women to subsequently undergo vocational and skills training.
