Educational Behaviour of Residents living in Inter-communal Conflicts Zones of Southwestern Nigeria

Abstract

This paper examines the influence of inter-communal conflicts (IC) on the educational behavior of residents with focus on the children/wards’ that were of school age in southwestern Nigeria. It purposefully selects eight communities with recurrent IC in the region for questionnaire administration, and systematically samples 593 (10%) household heads for questionnaire administration. Findings reveal that most of the respondents are literate but reflects a low level of educational interaction among those living in discrete neighbouring communities. Study further shows that there was no significant difference between residents’ proximities to places where their children/wards schools’ were located during and after the conflicts. In the contrary, about half of them claim that their children/wards could not gain access to their schools during conflicts. In addition, one third of them also claim that these schools were not functioning during this time. In both ways, the figure dropped to 10% and 27% respectively after conflict.  An examination of the critical effects of conflicts on residents’ education through attendance of children/wards’ schools during conflict by the socio-demographic characteristics of respondents reveal that respondents’ settlements, age and educational status of their children/wards are statistically significant at P≤0.05. The study establishes that conflicts do affects residents’ educational interaction, children/wards’ functionality of and accessibility to schools durinf and after conflicts in southwestern Nigeria. This is meaningful information to policy makers and international organizations who are interested children education in relation to conflicts in Africa and beyond.