Security at schools: University engaged local hunters

By Ezurike Ugochukwu

As schools and universities have become the target of kidnappers and bandits owing to the high rise of insecurity in the country, the University of Jos (UNIJOS) has hired local hunters to beef up security within and around the campus.

The vice-chancellor of the university, Prof. Sabastine Maimako stated this on Tuesday during the valedictory session to mark the end of his five-year tenure at the university.

Mimako

The don said his administration took the step in order to secure lives of both students and staff

Maimako said: “It is no longer news that the security situation in the country is quite tenuous. This is why under my administration we made frantic efforts to ensure that all lives and property within the University are adequately protected.

“When we got a security report that we were the soft targets, we closed our hostels for almost two weeks and suspended lecturers eventually.

“Now before we could reopen, we were given a condition that we must employ the services of local hunters to help us secure our hostels, particularly at night.

“Today, this is where we are but thanks to God the Director of Peace and Conflict Studies looking at the happening, he has offered to train these hunters on the rule of engagement in their working in the University.”

He noted the institution has collaborated with various security experts for a significant drop in crimes on campus while some staff were recruited to address the deficits in security personnel.

He said his administration initiated and completed 85 projects which have been commissioned.

The VC explained out of the 75 programmes, which the institution was to run, 43 have full accreditation status while 30 programmes have interim accreditation status.