The Voices for Inclusion and Equity for Women (VIEW), a coalition of prominent northern women leaders, has condemned the closure of schools in Kebbi, Niger and other northern states, describing the decision as “panic dressed up as policy” and “a surrender to violent actors.”
In a strongly worded statement issued on Tuesday and signed by leading advocates — Asmau Joda, Maryam Uwais, Mairo Mandara, Aisha Oyebode, Fatima Akilu, Kadaria Ahmed and Larai Ocheja Amusan — the group said the mass shutdown of schools amounts to abandoning children instead of protecting them.
VIEW said it was “horrified by Nigeria’s deepening security collapse,” insisting that what the northern region is facing “is no longer insecurity but terror.”
The coalition recalled that only last week it urged the government to adopt urgent and strategic measures to rescue the girls abducted from Government Girls Comprehensive Senior Secondary School, Maga, Kebbi State, as well as the more than 300 schoolchildren and teachers kidnapped from St. Mary’s Catholic School, Papiri, Niger State.
Rather than respond with coordinated action, VIEW accused authorities of embracing fear-driven decisions.
“The announcement that all schools in Niger and Kebbi states have been shut down, along with unity schools across the North, represents not security but surrender,” the statement read. “Protect schools, don’t close them.”
The group warned that shutting schools in a region already battling the country’s worst levels of female illiteracy will have devastating long-term consequences.
According to VIEW, every school closure “widens inequality, deepens fear and strengthens the hands of violent groups seeking to keep northern girls uneducated and powerless.”
It added that depriving children of learning because the state has failed to provide security is “not protection; it is abandonment.”
The group said the children of Maga and Papiri, like those taken in Chibok, Dapchi, Yauri and Jangebe, deserve more than “hollow assurances and reactive closures,” insisting that the government must demonstrate real capacity to anticipate, prevent and respond to attacks on schools.
VIEW demanded a national emergency response anchored on intelligence-led rescue operations, daily public briefings and a serious overhaul of Nigeria’s security architecture.
“Nigeria cannot continue this cycle of violence followed by retreat,” the coalition stated. “Schools must be protected, not emptied. The future of our region must not be surrendered to fear.”
The women’s coalition reiterated that education remains non-negotiable and that the government must act with courage and strategy to safeguard children rather than “punish them for the State’s failures.”
VIEW describes itself as a coalition representing the North Central, Northeast and Northwest regions, committed to promoting equitable and inclusive societies for women across Nigeria.
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