A Minna-based civil society organization, the Esteemed-Hub Foundation (EHF), has warned that thousands more children are at risk in Niger State’s mining communities following the deaths of 37 detainees in the custody of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) in Minna. The foundation’s Executive Director, Princess Doosugh Agbadu-Adu, said that between 2021 and 2023, the foundation implemented the International Labour Organisation’s ACCEL Africa programme in Kuchiko, Kukalo, and Nakupe in Shiroro and Suleja Local Government Areas, as well as Galadima Kogo in Shiroro. She noted that children as young as school age were already working in the pits alongside adults, missing out on education and childhood in exchange for meager earnings from illegal mining sites. The EHF insists that this long-running crisis must not be overshadowed by the recent custodial tragedy.
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