Paul Nwosu, the state commissioner for information, stated that some parents continue to bring their kids and children to the streets to beg for alms despite Governor Chukwuma Soludo’s free education scheme in Anambra.

On September 11, 2024, a Wednesday, Nwosu said in a statement, There is absolutely no reason why these kids shouldn’t be in schools instead of milling under Aroma flyover and our other city centres in seeming vagrancy.”

The commissioner referred to this as troubling stating that the practice impedes the Anambra Government’s endeavors to modernize and revitalize the state.

The statement reads, “It is so troubling seeing healthy children who ought to be in schools being used as beggars at the bus stops, road intersections, and along our streets.”

“It’s time all the unrepentantly incorrigible parents who release their children for this unhealthy practice are stopped in their tracks.

“This is a smear on Governor Soludo’s sustained effort to regenerate our major cities and urban centres.

Nwosu emphasized that the kids should be receiving a free education in schools and that state agencies will soon begin pursuing parents whose kids beg on the streets.

He said, “Parents and syndicates who send these minors to go and beg for them on the streets must be reminded that there is a law prohibiting child begging and prostitution and so on.

“Henceforth, a more coordinated action would be taken by relevant government agencies to get to the root of the matter so that an effective stop will be put to it.

“The children deserve to be in the schools enjoying the free education guaranteed by governor Soludo instead of being on the streets, begging for alms they eventually give to the adults.”

Speaking in May 2024 at the 2024 Children’s Day celebration in Awka’s Alex Ekwueme Square, Soludo said that Anambra State had the lowest percentage of Nigerian children between the ages of 6 and 15 who are not in school.