Garissa County Commissioner Boaz Cherutich has urged area residents to work closely with security agencies in the area as government steps war on the Somalia based Al-Shabaab militants.
Cherutich asked residents to take a leading role in ensuring that they provide information on suspicious characters in their midst.
Speaking yesterday at Garissa High during the school’s education day celebrations the County Commissioner said that the government will continue working round the clock to ensure that the region is peaceful, locals too have a big role in actualizing the same.
“Security has badly affected the education sector in the region, which has in turn affected results in national exams. We must all come together and join hands in eradicating the Al-Shabaab menace in the region. It’s possible and we can do it,” Cherutich said
On security of teachers, Garissa Township MP Dekow Mohamed who was the chief guest challenged the residents to take upon themselves the responsibility of protecting the tutors saying that when they are attacked it is their children ‘who lose’.
“Security is paramount. Its absence means that our children will not go to school. They will not have teachers to teach them. This will bring forth a generation that will be challenged in coping with the modern world. Let us jealously guard our security,” Dekow said.
Garissa KNUT Secretary Abdirizack Hussein on his part said the issue of teachers’ security should not be left to the security apparatus alone saying that all community members should be involved in ensuring that they are ‘safe and secure’.
“The security of our teachers should not be taken lightly. It should be a combined effort between the parents, the national government, the teaching fraternity and everybody else to see how best we can be able to secure the lives of our teachers,” Abdirizak said.
“If the teachers’ lives are under threat, then I don’t think we will be able to go forward as a region, we will lose big time as a community we will be doomed,” he added.
Last week’s killing of a local teacher in Mandera County has reignited calls for more protection of non-local teachers amid sustained attacks by the militants in the region.
During the two attacks in Wargadud and Iresuki in Mandera South, two police officers and a non-local teacher were killed. A Safaricom mast was also destroyed.
Leaders who spoke among them politicians, clerics, security officials and education officials all emphasized the urgent need to ensure the safety of non-local teachers especially those working in remote areas.
By Jacob Songok and Latifah Hassan
