Leadership (Abuja)
13 May 2008
Over 300 children took to major streets of Port Harcourt yesterday in protest of rising cases of kidnapping of children and women with a call on the state government to find a lasting solution to the menace.
The children, some of whom were accompanied by their parents with various placards, expressed fears over the insecurity situation in the state.
Some of the children who spoke to our correspondent during the protest march noted that the problem would not be as threatening as it is now if government had provided enough job opportunities for the teeming youths in the state.
One of the protesters, Precious Obasi told Leadership that she and her numerous peers in the state had visited the state governor to intimate him on the need to do something about the rampant threat of kidnapping in the state.
"We have appealed to the governor severally to put an end to kidnapping, that he should provide schools and job opportunities for the drop-outs. He should provide job opportunities for graduates that don't have jobs.
"He should also put an end to prostitution, some children now drop out of school and go for prostitution. He should also put an end to child abuse.
"What has a three month old child do wrong to be kidnapped? Why will kidnappers not leave innocent children alone", Obasi queried.
But in a swift reaction to what the children referred to as" kids turned merchandise in the hands of kidnappers", the secretary to the state government, Magnus Abe, apologised to the children for the panic situation they have found themselves, which he said was the fault of the adults who have failed the system for a long time.
"What we are seeing today was not like that before, when we were children we did not have to come and carry placards for people not to kidnap us and for us to have led the society to such a situation where children like you now become so afraid that you have to carry placards to come to government house to beg the governor for the sole reason of going to school in peace, I want to say, on behalf of all of us who are older than you that we are sorry that we have put you in this situation and God will help to put a stop to it", he said.
He said the state government was going to do everything within its powers to make sure that the menace is finally stamped out from the state for the peace and security the children have sought.
Abe then highlighted the programme of the state government to make sure that peace and security returns to the state, adding that the children and their parents also have a role to play in the effective policing of the state.
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