By; BAYO AKAMO, Ibadan
The Nigeria Association of Social Workers (NASoW) on Monday tasked the federal, state and local governments to deploy social workers to all educational institutions across the country immediately.
NASoW made the call in a statement signed by its National President, Alhaji Mashood Mustapha stressed that doing this will go a long way in steaming the tide of bullying in schools.
According to the umbrella body of professional social workers across the country in the statement made available to journalists in Ibadan by its Public Relations Officer of the union, Mr. Musliudeen Adebayo, social workers have roles in providing emotional support to the students by giving them a helping hands to overcome challenges.
” Governments at all levels need to employ and deploy social workers to schools especially boarding schools, the social workers will provide psychosocial support for students at trying period to avoid what happened to Sylvester Oromoni”, he said.
NASoW added, “we need to be proactive enough to avoid future occurrences. NASoW is concerned with the incidents of bullying, oppression and victimisation of students by their colleagues in schools across the country.”
“We are disturbed by the spate of violence in our educational institutions. It is a social problem that required the intervention of social workers, and the best to handle it are school social workers. As social workers, we have the capacity to provide intervention programmes to students in our educational institutions”.
NASoW stressed ” Social workers are trained to provide social and emotional support to students in schools. We represent the interest of the and the vulnerable. That underscores the importance of school social workers .
On the Nigerian Council for Social Work establishment bill 2020, the NASoW called on the National Assembly to re-pass the Nigerian Council for Social Work [Establishment] Bill 2020.
“On this premise, I wish to again, call on National Assembly to please expedite action on the passage of social work bill. Our bill, Nigerian Council for Social Work Establishment Bill 2017 has earlier been passed by the National Assembly, but President Muhammadu Buhari in 2018 declined to assent the bill due to some grey areas.
“The bill which has now been perfected has been sent to the National Assembly for passage. The bill is now in the Red chamber. We appealed to the National Assembly to speed up the passage for President Muhammadu Buhari to append his signature.
He maintained that “Social Work profession is yet to be codified in Nigerian Law. It is pertinent to mention that our noble profession – Social Work is yet to be codified in Nigerian Law. Permit us to also appeal to the ninth National Assembly to speedily re-pass the Nigerian Council for Social Work [Establishment] Bill 2020’’ for Mr. President’s assent”.
