Unarguably, issues of gender inequality in education, particularly in developing countries such as Nigeria, have become subjects of debate among stakeholders. Stakeholders, at various points, have also raised concern over a wide disparity in the choice of who gets what standard of education between the boy-child and the girl-child.

According to them, many girl-children in Nigeria have no access to adequate education compared to their male counterparts. In the same vein, educationists argue that greater percentage of school-age girls is needlessly out of school compared with the ratio applicable to boys of same age grouping.

This situation, they note, is perhaps, aggravated by patriarchal practices which give girls no traditional rights to succession and preference accorded the education of a boy-child than a girl-child. They observe that the development has translated into fewer women in certain professional fields, thereby making the men folk to dominate such fields.

Similarly, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), states in its recent report that girls between the ages of six years and 11 years, mostly from the northern part of Nigeria, make the chunk of number of girls who do not attend primary school. The UNICEF report lists Kwara among the six states that were mostly affected in the baseline study on girls' education.

According to the report, 30 per cent of pupils in Kwara drop out of primary school while only 54 per cent transit to Junior Secondary School. The report identifies child labour, economic hardship, early marriage for girls and the distant to schools locations, as most of the factors responsible for the high rate of schools-drop-out in the state.

n the light of this, Actionaid Nigeria, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), in partnership with Centre for Community Empowerment and Poverty Eradication (CCEPE), another NGO in Kwara, recently organised an interventionist programme aimed at improving girl education in three rural communities of Kaiama Local Government Area of the state.

At the event, Mr Sulaiman Kareem, the Chief Executive Officer of CCPE, said the programme entitled: "Strengthening Women Empowerment to Deepen Girl Education'" would boost girl education in many communities.

He said communities such as Gatte, Tunga Maje and Tenebo in the local government area, participated in the programme which highlighted some of the factors that restrained the girl-child from getting access to appropriate education.

According to him, the aim of the organisation is to address the challenges and chart a new course in deepening girl education in the area. Stating some of the challenges, Mrs Zainab Yahaya, a participant from Tunga Maje, said that many parents could not afford school fees and other basic education materials such as uniform, exercise books and textbooks, among others.

In the same vein, Mrs Habeebah Usman and Malam Mohammed Umar from Tenebo and Gatte communities respectively, expressed concern on how children were always trekking a long-distance from the communities to access secondary education in the neighbouring towns.

In response to this, Mr Yakub Ango, the Executive Secretary, Kaiama Local Government Education Authority, said that the local government authority would notify the state Universal Basic Education Board.

He said that the authority would write a letter through his office to the board, requesting for location of schools within the communities. But Mrs Tassalah Chibok, the Head of Programme, Actionaid Nigeria, said that the cause of some of the challenges was poverty.

"Women and girls need to be empowered to deal with immediate poverty related issues that keep girls out of school. "They also need empowerment to mobilise and solicit policies that will better their lives both at local, state and national levels.

"This is why the theme of the programme is developed with the goal of contributing to the quality basic education of girls through empowerment of women, she said. Chibok assured the participants that Actionaid Nigeria would empower the women groups in the communities with small and medium business enterprises to support girls' education.

She recalled that the NGO had built a block of classroom at the Tungan Maje School, an office for the head teacher, library, separate toilet for male and female pupils and hand-pump borehole, among others. According to her, Actionaid is also renovating blocks of classrooms in Gatte and Tenebo and the organisation will focus more on giving grants to women and youths and encouraging them on vocational skills acquisition.

Appraising the contributions of the non-governmental organisations to the development of the girl-child education in the communities, Mrs Omolewa Ahmed, wife of the governor of Kwara, said the programmes and the facilities provided would enhance teaching and learning in the area.

Represented by the Permanent Secretary in State Universal Basic Education Board, Malam Musa Dazuki, she noted that the public-private partnership in developing education in the state was achieving good result. "No government can single handedly finance education. I believe it is in this spirit that the Actionaid has embarked on various projects.

"I commend the gesture of the Actionaid and urge other non-governmental organisations that wish to carry out impactful social services to see the state as a safe haven", she said.

She, therefore, urged residents of the communities to take ownership of the facilities donated to them, maintain them and use them for the purpose of boosting girl-child education in the communities.