NEWS

FG plans Western, Islamic education’s integration, inaugurates Kaduna centre

214views

In an effort to tackle the almajiri problem in the north, the Federal Government on Wednesday commissioned the Tsangaya Centre aimed at integrating Western education with the Islamic studies.


The Tsangaya Centre is one of the legacies of the former President Goodluck Jonathan administration in 2014.

Several centres were built to take care of ‘almajirinci’ system of acquiring Qur’anic knowledge.

The almajirinci system is the migration of itinerant children in quest of Qur’anic knowledge in some part of the northern states.

The centres were, however, abandoned shortly after the former president was defeated in the 2015 polls.

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, over 3,000 almajirai were repatriated from Kaduna state alone to their respective states of origin.

While inaugurating the centre at the National Board for Arabic and Islamic Studies in Nigeria’s headquarters in Kaduna on Wednesday, Minister of Education, Malam Adamu Adamu, said the centre was established to train teachers on different skills to transfer knowledge to students of the ‘tsangaya’ system for self-reliance.

According to the minister, the NBAIS has over the years successfully carried out its mandate of mainstreaming Arabic schools and curricular.

The minister, represented by a former Executive Secretary of the National Board for Technical Education, Dr Mas’udu Kazaure, said the Federal Government committed enormous resources in building the centre.


He said the centre was aimed at integrating both the Islamic studies and Western education.

“It is our hope that the NBAIS will reach to states, UBEC and other relevant stakeholders for collaborative activities that will make it very functional,” he said.

Also speaking, the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad lll, said the centre would go a long way in revitalising the tsangaya system.

The Sultan, who was represented by the Emir of Zazzau, Alhaji Ahmad Bamalli, added that the idea of the centre was commendable.

Acting Registrar of NBAIS, Prof. Muhammad Abdullahi, had said the idea of establishment of the centre for tsangaya and general studies by the education minister was to initiate and create solutions to tsangaya education.

Leave a Response