For years,\nNigerians have questioned the Almajiri practice that sees hundreds of thousands\nof children inducted into a system by local preachers purportedly to teach them\ntenets of their religion but in actual fact, are used to beg for alms to\nsupport the religious clerics. Governments of several Northern States have\ncondoned the system for no real reason, other than the religious. Critics have\npointed out the danger of using these children for this purpose, as several of\nthem are abandoned by their parents to religious folks and experience no other\nform of teaching or education. These children grow up with no education,\nunemployable and really ready tools for extremist religious sects. It would\nappear that the biting economic atmosphere around the country, exceedingly high\nlevels of insecurity and terrorism is beginning to create a rethink, especially\nwith the chicken coming home to roost. The COVID-19 pandemic has indeed brought\nfull realisation across the country to the unsustainability and danger of\ncontinued practice of the Almajiri system. Several States across the country\nhave announced a ban of the system with Northern States Governors announcing\nits abrogation. Painfully however, several of these children are now left on\ntheir own and governments of several of the Northern States of Nigeria are\nbeginning to play \u2018ping-pong\u2019 with them. So against the Constitution and the\nlaws, these young children Almajiri citizens of Nigeria are being deported back\nand forth between States that have now disowned them to States where they are\npurported to be indigenes of. And as the Almajiri children are being thrown\nback and forth, the Constitution suffers. Under Nigerian laws and the\nConstitution, every person is entitled to live in any part of Nigeria that they\nchoose and no State is entitled to deport any Nigerian. While States trample on\nthe rights of their citizens, the Federal Government watches helplessly. Or\neven nonchalantly, making no effort to restrain State governments who are\ntrampling on the rights of citizens, returning children to their States of\norigin supposedly to curb the spread of COVID-19. There is a call to action on\nthe Federal Government to act decisively to halt this anomalous situation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The House of\nRepresentatives called on the Federal Government to intervene and halt the\nrepatriation of Almajiris to their respective States of origin, as part of its\nresolutions formed at plenary on May 12. Hon. Aisha Dukku who made a motion to\nthis effect expressed concern over the mode of transportation the children are\nsubjected to, which she described as dehumanising, and argued that the order\nfor their repatriation violates their fundamental rights to reside in any part\nof Nigeria. The House also resolved to enjoin Northern Governors to include the\nAlmajiri children in the Universal Basic and Technical Education System. Many\nobservers have called for a review of the Almajiri system. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For years, Nigerians have questioned the Almajiri practice that sees hundreds of thousands of children inducted into a system by local preachers purportedly to teach them tenets of their religion but in actual fact, are used to beg for alms to support the religious clerics. Governments of several Northern States have condoned the system for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1433,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[68],"class_list":["post-1425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-the-almajiri-conundrum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1425"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1440,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1425\/revisions\/1440"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}