Kano State Government says it will continue to strengthen its system of Arabic and Islamic Education through full integration into conventional education.
Speaking at the opening ceremony of the one-day stakeholders sensitization and interactive meeting organized by the National Board for Arabic and Islamic Studies (NBAIS) and hosted in Kano, Kano State Commissioner of Education, Umar Haruna Doguwa explained that when the present administration of Abba Kabir Yusuf came into power, there were serious challenges facing the entire system of Qur’anic and Islamiyya Education which need to be addressed.
Doguwa represented by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Bashir Baffa Muhammad disclosed that while responding to these challenges, the state government had settled over 70% of 2023/2024 examination fees of SIS/SAS final year students to NBAIS inherited from the previous administration.
“Not only that, this government had recruited more teaching staff and sent them to many Arabic and Islamic Secondary schools under the Arabic and Islamic Education Department that lacked enough manpower. In fact, no state in Nigeria is having more Arabic teachers like Kano,” he said.
He hinted that NBAIS Schools in the state were provided with the opportunity to have in their curriculum Art and Commercial subjects and also be integrated into to conventional system of education, stressing that plans were also under way to introduce science subjects into their curriculum and make sure that NBAIS students could obtain admission at any University in Nigeria.
The Commissioner said… ” a memorandum of understanding was reached with the Egyptian government in which they agreed to give AIED five (5) Arabic teaching staff three of whom were already with us and started discharging their primary assignment and we are still anticipating the arrival of another batch of seven Arabic teachers all from the same country to complement our effort of strengthening teaching of Arabic and Islamic education.
“Just recently, the Kano state government under the leadership of Engr. Abba Kabir Yusuf had secured admission vacancies for fifty students and awarded them scholarships to study at AZHAR University, Egypt- Cairo to boost Arabic and Islamic Education in the state.”
Doguwa who described the NBAIS program as the central area of impacting moral training for the youth, urged the participants to come up with fruitful ideas that could help the government in improving the system.
In his Keynote address, the Jigawa State Commissioner of Education, Professor Isah Yusuf Chamo represented by Dr. Mubarak Abdulwahab announced that the state is giving more priority to Arabic and Islamic schools by ensuring a conducive learning environment.
He said, that Jigawa state has established the Tsangaya Education Board with the Executive Secretary and Special Advisers representing three senatorial zones of the state.
“Presently, Jigawa is constructing three mega Tsangaya schools across the three senatorial zones and spent over N1.5 billion on this project” he disclosed.
The Special Adviser to Kano State Governor on Education, Hon. Tajuddeen Gambo maintained that the state had set up a committee on voluntary schools which was given the mandate to come up with new ways of improving voluntary schools across the state, pointing out that 95% of these schools came from Arabic and Islamiyya Schools.
Tajuddeen Gambo explained that already Kano State Government has already begun the integration exercise of Qur’anic and Islamiyya Schools into the conventional system of education under the Qur’anic and Islamiyya Schools Management Board, noting that a committee was set up to ensure the success of the program.
Earlier, the registrar of NBAIS, Professor Y. S Imam, explained that the meeting was aimed at bringing the stakeholders together to brainstorm on the role of NBAIS in the integration of Qur’anic and Tsangaya education into the conventional system of education.
In his presentation at the sensitization meeting on the ‘Role of NBAIS in the integration of Tsangaya/Zaure system of education; Almajiri and out of school children entrepreneurship and skill acquisition as solutions’, Dr. Muhammad Mujtaba Abdulkadir outlined possible solutions for minimizing Almajiri Bara (begging) through entrepreneurship and local business.
Others who spoke at the sensitization program include the Executive Secretary of Kano Senior Secondary Schools Management Board, Dr. Kabir Ado Zakirai, and the Acting Executive Secretary State Agency for Mass Education.
Participants expressed what would be their expectations at the end of the one-day stakeholders’ sensitization and interactive meeting.
