Former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, on Tuesday, stated that the Federal Government can boost its capacity to protect academic institutions if police officers currently engaged in non-essential guard duties for individuals are reassigned to schools.

This comes after the Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba, on Monday alerted that the FG can’t protect all from bandit attack, urging all to be vigilant and report suspicious activities to appropriate security agencies.

Reacting to Nwajuiba’s comment on his verified Twitter account, Atiku highlighted the means with which the government can secure all schools from bandit attacks.

“The FG may think they cannot protect all schools, but in actual fact, they can. It is a matter of leadership priority. Children are our greatest asset.

“If we reassign police officers currently engaged in non-essential guard duties for individuals to schools in the affected states, the object can be achieved.

“Recent figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics reveal that Nigeria now has an all-time high unemployment rate of 33.2%, up from 8.4% in 2015.

“Rather than think we cannot secure all our schools, let us kill two birds with one stone and massively recruit more police officers to provide the needed security,” Atiku said.