CHAPTER ONE

1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

“Almajiri” is a hausa word meaning immigrant children in search of search of Qur’anic education. The children are sent out early in life to seek Islamic knowledge outside their environment. They are placed under Islamic teachers known simply as ‘mallam’ under whom they are supposed to learn the rudiments of the religion.

Khalid (2000), describes almajiranci as seasonal migration of school age male children from rural to urban areas in northern Nigeria in search of Qur’anic education. In this contemporary era, Almajiranci has degenerated to the extent that it has now greatly exposed the children to various types of moral or social hazards. Many of these children metamorphasize into drug addicts, dropouts, street beggars etc. they seldom go back to their villages or home towns.

The Almajiri system of education during the pre-colonial days, pupils hold with then parents for within the immediate environment from where the pupils came from (Junaid: 2004). The Danfodio revolution brought with it some modifications, the establishment of an inspectorate of quranic literacy, the inspectors reported directly to the emir of province, concerning all matters relating to school.

Shehu (2004), states that the colonialists specifically came up with policies aimed at destroying the traditional Qur’anic schools and replacing them with the western style school. Some people in protest of ave their children in trust to the Qur’anic schools wama to go to the village or its outskirt to teach them Qur’an. It was after independence that serious efforts were made to improve the system of Qur’anic schools. Islamic scholars and organizations like Jama’atul Nasril Islam (JNI) struggled to establish and maintain the schools. Sir, Ahmadu Bello Sardauna of sokoto’ established Quranic schools in muslim localities, this effort gave birth to Ishuyyats.

1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

The Almajiri pupils brought to learn the Qur’an, some dropout along the way and become a problem to the society. Most pupil withdraw due to hardship that is endured during the training, also with the growing complex nature of the society. People tend to complain at the act of begging which is becoming unpopular and unacceptable. In some cases, the very resourceful among the pupils do menial jobs (such as washing, grass cutting, farming and water barrow pushing) to earn their livelihood (Abdulkadir: 2003)

Shehu (2004), viewed that the greatest havoc of begging is of how it expose the children to a number of environmental hazards psychologically it instills in the children a sense of inferiority, dependency, rejection and all sorts of negative psychological dispositions. In the social sphere their limitless movements and interactions exposes them, and in many cases gets them induced in a number of social vices, they easily come across various kinds of dangerous juvenile and adolescent peers. Indeed they come across all sorts of people and experiences in the society the good, the bad and the ugly. As juveniles, they can hardly discern right from the wrong, especially if they see people that are assured committing them.

The problems mentioned above, led to my research on the ‘Almajiri system of education, its implication on child, family and nation.