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The Pandemonium: a short story.

 THE PANDEMONIUM Standing at the doorway of our house, I knew the temperature was rather cold but my armpits were sweating continuously. My left hand was somewhere resting somewhere in my white jumper pocket. The other one was hanging at the other side squeezing itself.  I was trying to figure out how to avenge. That was the thought that came to my mind when we had just heard the news of my father’s death.  When the news struck my mother’s ears, she let go of the knife she was slicing okra with. She tried to control herself but to no avail. Okra was father’s favorite.  ‘Arna, the infidels, have killed him’ was the statement of the person who brought the sad news. I came out shortly after the man had left.  ‘Wallahi I must avenge,’ I soliloquized,  even though I knew father would not have wished me to avenge his death. I knew, too, that it was impossible to control myself against it. ‘Revenge has never pleased the soul and so I will never,’ my father once sa...
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THE PROBLEM WITH ALMAJIRI EDUCATION IN NIGERIA.

THE PROBLEMS WITH ALMAJIRI EDUCATION IN THE NORTHERN NIGERIA
TAMEEM Y GARGA
 HAFYDOF
BRIEF HISTORY
The word ALMAJIRI is derived from the Arabic word Almuhajirun which means the migrants.  I think the word was first used, in Islamic history, to mean the Muslims who migrated along the Prophet from Maccah to Madina. Since then, the term has been used in the Islamic organizations, schools and other Islamic institutions.  I think there was an Islamic organization called Almuhajiroun in the Uk until 2005 where the Government of UK named it as a terrorist group which led to its official banning in August 2005.
Almajiri is used since the establishment of Islamic schools in Borno since 11th century; that is, approximately, 500 years after the inception of the terminology in Islam. The terminology enjoyed more popularity with the advent of Usmanu bin Fodio toward the middle of 18th century. 
Just before the coming of the Britishers (colonialists) Islamic school was solely under the control and management of the Hausa rulers.  There was a special consideration for the Almajiris from the public treasury. In the precolonial north, the Almajiris mostly lived with their parents. At that time the system was maintained by the public treasury helping the teachers and their pupils. They were supported by the social welfare: Zakkat and Waqaf (DEDICATION)
NOW THE PROBLEMS
The real problem stared with the colonial conquest when such schools were formally abolished. The Emirs lost total control the Almajiri system as they were indirectly been conquered.   Since then till today, the pupils and their teachers live on what the students begged on the streets. The students wander in the market places begging for survival. They spend a lot of their time in the marketplace waiting to the travelers to give the Sadaqah rather than learning.
According to a journals I read, there are more than 11million beggars in the north. Out of these 11 million, over seven million of them are Almajiris. Out of these seven million Almajiris, over five million of them are under 15.  Again, it is also said that almost all of them became victims of one sort of disease or the other. Furthermore, according to my personal contact with these children, I bet, almost 80% of them lack fundamental knowledge of Islam compare to their counterparts who in formal, modern Islamiyya.  
That is how our beloved brothers became mendicants alongside their teachers. Today, they have become homosexuals in the hands of bestial politicians.  Some of them became political thugs, rituals, miscreant, thieves and even arm robbers.  
   
SOLUTIONS
1.       Government should include the system in its Educational budget
2.       Zakkat should be directed to the less privileged ones
3.       Government should enforce free and compulsory education
4.       There should be agency that would monitor the system holistically
5.       There should be campaign awareness  by the nongovernmental organizations like HAFYDOF
  


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