Street Begging Ban : Ganduje Reacts To Opposition, Inspects Tsangaya Schools

Kano State Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje on Sunday visited some Tsangaya schools in Kiyawa town of Bagwai local government, Kanwa town of Madobi local government and Bunkure, in Bunkure local government.

According to him, “The visit was as part of the final touch for the full-scale take-off of our banning of street begging in the state. Begging is banned and will remain banned. We hate telling these beggars to leave begging forever. And we are committed to see to the implementation of this.’’

He said all arrangements are concluded for seeing that all Almajiri schools and Almajiris comply with the state policy on free and compulsory education, adding that  “When we capture these beggars we take them to these facilities and take good care of them, we give them education, feed them and look after their living condition.”

A statement issued and signed by Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Abba Anwar on Sunday and sent to Solacebase.

The statement said each of the facilities visited by the governor would accommodate thousands of Almajiris and there are 12 similar facilities across some local governments in the state. Each facility has dormitory, hostels, cafeteria, toilets and staff quarters among others.

‘’What would be taught in Tsangaya schools in the spirit of Tsangaya integration, apart from English and Mathematics, Arabic languages would also be taught to children, so that they would begin to understand the meaning of the Holy Qur’an they study under their Malams, ‘’said Ganduje in the statement.

According to the statement, for total compliance of free and compulsory education, the governor said all out-of-school children must go back to schools. “We employ over 8,000 teachers recently that would be sent to such schools. These children would also be given training on skills acquisition. So that they would become self-independent.”

‘’On the Tsangaya integration system with the free education policy he discloses three strategies for that. Firstly he said “Those begging in the street as we take them off the street we will take them to those newly established Tsangaya schools.’’

‘’We keep them there give them Qur’anic education, English language, Mathematics and Arabic language for them to understand the meaning of the what they are reading, the Holy Qur’an.”

In the statement, Ganduje explains further that, “The second strategy is, those that are under their guardians, we will enrol them into nearby primary schools. And after finishing their primary education we will take them to secondary schools also.”

‘’While the third strategies is that “Those with thousands of Almajiris would be integrated also into out free and compulsory education system. It is also part of the reasons why we employ, just recently about 8,000 teachers.’’

‘’While at the same time government will continue to provide the schools with foodstuffs and some amount of logistics for them to take care of the children. That we have already started with some pilot Almajiri schools. And we are improving the facilities to be healthy.”

‘’Those kicking against our policy are anti-development and anti-people. Or they even lack the proper understanding of the position of Islam on begging,’’ said Ganduje.