School education hurt by northen conflict

An estimated 25 percent of children of primary school age in war-affected northern Uganda are out of school despite the government's free primary education policy, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has said. In a report released on Tuesday, UNICEF said the education sector was one of the casualties of the 19-year-old conflict that has ravaged Uganda’s northern region. "Sixty percent of the approximately 1,200 primary schools in [the northern] Gulu, Kitgum, Pader, Lira and Apac districts have been displaced due to insecurity," the agency said. On average, it noted, only two percent of children aged between three and five had access to early childhood development sites, with services constrained by the low capacity of northern communities to initiate and sustain the sites. UNICEF said its supported education interventions, which aim at increasing access to education for all children, would equip and support the construction of 40 temporary learning centres and 200 early childhood development sites. However, the agency said this would only be in relatively secure internally displaced persons’ (IDP) camps. UNICEF said it would also embark on the development of catch-up education programmes for out-of-school children and the training of teachers in psycho-social support skills. The armed conflict - which pits government forces against the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) - has perpetuated a severe humanitarian crisis in northern Uganda, marked by rampant violations of human rights. The LRA mainly targets children and women, and the protracted and brutal conflict has denied the population basic health services, water, primary school education and physical security. UNICEF said over the past three years, the number of vulnerable IDPs in conflict-affected districts had risen from about 550,000 to 1.4 million due to insecurity and fear. Some 80 percent of northern Uganda’s war-affected are children and women. Out of an estimated 25,000 children abducted by the LRA since the conflict began, UNICEF reported, approximately 7,500 were girls, of whom 1,000 had conceived children during captivity. "Each night, an estimated 40,000 children and some adults in Gulu, Kitgum and Kalongo towns abandon their homes for the relative safety offered by urban centres and centres of the larger IDP camps... in a striking community response to insecurity and in particular to the abduction of children by the LRA, " the July report stated. "The average journey for the "night commuters" is about three km, but some children are commuting - mostly on foot - up to eight km each way," it added. The agency noted, however, that not all children who stayed on the streets and town centres at night were fleeing LRA terror. "Assessments in Gulu indicate that as many as 25 percent of child night commuters are leaving their homes nightly due to family issues, rather than the specific fear of LRA abduction," it said. "High-risk coping mechanisms to secure livelihoods and personal security remain common, including transactional sex." The report also mentioned reports that hundreds of boys had been voluntarily recruited into the ranks of Local Defence Units - militia groups that operate under the national army to fight the LRA. Problems were also found in the follow-up of children attending psychosocial services at centres in the region. "A recent evaluation at the Gulu Support the Children Organisation reception centre for formerly abducted children found that only 30 percent of the children passing through the centre had received comprehensive follow-up and monitoring, in addition to the basic healthcare and psychosocial counselling services available," the report noted.