Almajiri System May Lead To Greater Societal Problems—Don – TheNigerialawyer

Zaria (Kaduna State) – Dr Ahmad Jibril-Suleiman of Department of
Public Law, Ahmadu Bello Univesity, Zaria, on Thursday says the
collapse of the Almajiri system of education is a symptom of a
bigger disease affecting the fabric of the society, which must be
addressed holistically.

Jibril-Suleiman made the disclosure in an interview with
journalists on the sideline of a public lecture organised by Doguwa
Local Government Students’ Association (DOLSA) held at ABU main
campus, Samaru, Zaria.

His paper was titled: “Transforming Almajiri System: Is the
North ready?” Jibril-Suleiman stressed there was need for
collective efforts of all stakeholders to not only address the
problem of the Almajiri system, but also the collapse of moral
values and others norms that communities responsible to each
other.

“The summary of my presentation is that the Almajiri system is
more than it appears to the eyes, there is the need to think deeply
upon these problems. “We have not been thinking over problems we
have in the society, and any society that fails to think for itself
will end up being a pawn on the chessboard of other societies that
think for themselves,” he said.

The don recalled that previously in Northern Nigeria, every
family took pride in the number of Almajiris it trained and took
responsibility of, unlike today. “These are the things that have
made the society to collapse. No matter how we think we are
reforming the Almajiri system, we have to take so many things into
consideration,” he said.

Jibril-Suleiman said the Almajiri system should be used to woo
hesitant parents to allow their children to study the Qur’an
side-by-side western education. He said that the more people were
educated the better for the society. Jibril-Suleiman said that the
problems associated with the almajiri system was significantly a
pointer of how the hitherto close knit society was crumbling.

According to him, the society has lost its useful and important
norms, values and tradition of correcting children whenever they
are wrong. “Just as I pointed out in my paper, some of you who are
50 years and above knew that formerly when we were children,
everybody in the society takes care of errant children, does that
happen now? It doesn’t.

“What this means is that the Almajiri that finds himself around
now, wanders without any moral upbringing except when his teacher
happens to be closer to him which is dangerous.

“And that is why we have negative developments; some of them are
being recruited into terrorist activities and other
criminalities.

“The Almajiri system needs to be reformed, but the reformation
should not just come from restructuring the system; the Northern
society needs to also look at itself,” Jibril-Suleiman said.
(NAN)