Guardian

WORRIED over the poor state of Islamic education in the North, members of the Zaria Education Development Association (ZEDA) have expressed regret for not paying attention to the issue of Almajiri system of education after 20 years of existence, as promoter of both Western and Islamic education in the region.

ZEDA, a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) which parades prominent Northerners as members, however pledged to turn over a new leaf towards the education welfare of the Qu’aranic students by mobilizing other well meaning Nigerians to support the initiative so that they could study in healthy environments, pointing out that the pupils are currently studying under non-conducive atmosphere.

Besides, addressing journalists yesterday at a press conference, Chairman of ZEDA, Dr. Abdul Alimi Bello said the association, as part of activities to mark its 20th anniversary, would promote awareness and generate interactions among Zaria indigenes and their friends for the purpose of uplifting educational standard of the area.

On the effort of the association to encourage remedial programmes, Bello said no fewer than 2,000 students benefitted from the exercise which enabled most of the students to secure basic number of credits in senior secondary school certificate examinations that enabled them gained admission to tertiary institutions.

He added that over 20 teachers were engaged since the programme started in 1993.

“For now, ZEDA has not actually started addressing the issue of Almajiri system of education. The education industry as a whole is a very big industry, and the issue of Almajiri, of course is another very big issue, and it is partly so because of religious coloration.

“I think that one of the things that ZEDA will consider in due course is to mobilize the people that will support the Almajiri school so that these young boys will study the Qu’aran under very conducive atmosphere.

“But over time, people that fight for issue of Almajiri have encountered a lot of challenges because the Mallams themselves don’t even think of the difficult environment these Almajiris are studying. Now that our association has reached 20 years, we have not done anything in that regard, but I think as part of our assessing ways of moving forward, maybe we will look at it, not really intervening directly, but to do some advocacy,” he said.