The Almajiris Children - Empowering them to secure the FUTURE

The Child Rights Act 2003 seeks mainly to re-enforce the rights of the child to education, among other fundamental rights. Although rights abuse is not restricted to the girl-child, theirs is a precarious situation given their peculiarities and some misconceived and obfuscating variables with religious and sociological denotations.
The Almajirins syndrome or destitution, and religious misnomer have necessitated concerted efforts at tackling the factors militating against girl-child education, particularly in the northern part of Nigeria.
Child destitution, otherwise known as 'Almajiri', is another social problem in most parts of the north and has posed an obstacle to girl-child education, which is an integral part of the Child's Rights Act. The National Council for the Welfare of Destitutes in Nigeria says there are about seven million children and teenage beggars - or Almajirai, in the north of the country. Kano State accounts for more than a million. This classless homesapiens fall squarely into Frantz Fanon's classic: "The Wretched of the Earth". The World Health Organization says over three percent of this group suffers sexual abuse and neglect.
"Almajiri" is derived from the Arabic word "Al-muhajirin", meaning a seeker of Islamic knowledge but in Nigeria, Almajiri is any child or adult who begs for assistance in the streets or from house to house even though Islamic teachings strongly prohibit begging except in special circumstances when a man losses of property in a disaster, or when a man has loaned much of his money for the common good, such as bringing peace between two warring parties.
Children in their dozens are not only found roaming the streets in the north especially in Kano state which is the largest state in Nigeria with the population of about 14 million people and the state with the largest number of the Almajiris children; some of these innocent children have also been "exported" to other towns around the country as house helps. Car parks, sidewalks, filling stations and other public places have since been taken over by such children who are deprived of any form of formal education or skill acquisition to ensure successful adulthood. Health workers say they are vulnerable to diseases and social crimes. These beggar children are found on major streets in Kano city. In order to survive, they beg from dusk to dawn everyday. After begging, they return to their makaranta, or school, or are left on the streets.
“The Almajiri child is present only as a begging street child. People of the society have used the Almajiri system to abuse the right of these innocent children, to traffic the children for child labour, sometime use for rituals; these children are vulnerable to all source of diseases, unsafe conditions and to some extent expose them to terrorism, thuggery and other menaces, to be used as social destructors, and to some extent also be used as sex hawkers or homosexuals in particular.
The privileged ones among them have a few hours of Quranic recitations with their Mallams, or Islamic teachers, in a traditional Islamic schooling system called Tsangaya. Unlike in western school systems, Almajiris are taught how to recite and memorize the Holy Quran and Hadiths.
Education has been recognized as the most potent weapon used by man to conquer his environment and chart his destiny and even that of others.
Efforts by governments, international agencies like ENHANSE and non-governmental organisations at redressing the trend have not been quite successful. The senate is pushing a bill seeking to establish a national commission for the eradication of child destitution. The Bill aims at creating an agency of government charged with the responsibility of formulating policies and strategies from the eradication of child destitution in Nigeria. It is also to be mandated with the task of modernizing the "Almajiri" system of education.
Sponsor of the bill, Senator Umaru Tafidan Argungu (PDP Kebbi North), with 31 other senators from all parts of the country, argues that the menace of child destitution has become an embarrassing spectacle in our country. True, the menace of having children roaming the streets begging is not an attribute of a nation that targets to join the league of world industrialized nations in the next 12 years. There could be another BARRACK OBAMA in this neglected group.
“If the Almajiri system is reformed, that means the social and security threats will also be minimized. There’s also the issue of economy. If people are dependent on others, they become unproductive; they don’t contribute to the economy of a given society.