Kano, Nigeria — Authorities in northern Nigeria’s largest city have begun evacuating more than 5,000 street children, seen as a “security threat” and a growing concern as an economic crisis forces more of them to fend for themselves. The Hisbah, a regional police force responsible for enforcing Islamic Sharia law, has carried out midnight raids in car parks, markets and street corners in the regional capital, Kano, since the start of the year, evacuating people children while they were sleeping.
“We have so far removed 300 of these boys from the streets and taken them to a camp provided for their reintegration,” Hisbah general director Abba Sufi told AFP. “Their continued life on the streets poses a huge social and security threat, as they constitute potential recruits for criminals. »
“This is a time bomb that must be urgently defused with tact and caution,” Sufi said.
In November, Kano State Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf established a committee to rid the city of street children, most of whom are boys. Many sleep in the open and have no access to education or parental care.
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With the highest divorce rate in Nigeria, according to official figures, Kano faces a rise in the number of children from broken homes.
Largely left to their own devices, the boys roam the city, begging, selling items at traffic lights, and collecting scrap metal to resell to get money for food.
The West African economic powerhouse is facing its worst economic crisis in decades, with inflation hitting 34.6 percent in November, leaving many people struggling to eat.
Nigeria has 18.5 million out-of-school children, including 1.9 million in Kano State, the highest rate in the country, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in a survey. 2022.
Kano’s figure represents 39% of the total number of children living in the state, according to the 2022 Nigeria Multidimensional Poverty Survey.
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Officials told AFP that a large number of children in Kano town came from neighboring states.
“Some of them are from Kano, while others are from other states,” Hisbah Commander Aminu Daurawa said. “The first step is to profile them and identify where they are coming from. »
Some were sent from villages to learn to read the Quran at informal Islamic religious schools called almajiri. Residents said many students at Koranic schools beg for food and alms between classes.
Attempts by local authorities and groups to intervene and support the centuries-old almajiri system have been opposed by traditional clerics.
Hisbah police plan to provide “psychosocial” support and counseling to children before enrolling those who show interest in school, Sufi said, adding that others will receive seed capital to start the profession of their choice.
Daurawa told AFP that children living outside the state will be repatriated after rehabilitation.
Previous attempts to rid the city of street children have failed.
Between 2017 and 2018, the Hisbah evacuated some 26,000 children and reunited them with their parents in and outside Kano, but they returned to the streets after a lull, according to Daurawa.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Kano authorities closed Almajiri schools and transported the students to their state, but they returned when the schools reopened.
“We want to avoid a repeat of the past experience, which is why we changed our approach by camping the children and rehabilitating them before returning them to society,” Sufi said.