Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 brill.com/jlrs Between the State and the Malam: Understanding the Forces that Shape the Future of Nigeria’s Qur’anic Schools* Nasir Mohammed Baba Department of Curriculum Studies and Educational Technology, Faculty of Education, Usmanu Danfodio University, PMB 2346, Sokoto, Nigeria babanasirm@gmail.com Abstract The present paper attempts to answer the question: what accounts for the persistence of Qur’anic schools as separate schools operating at cross-purposes with the Nigerian state in the provision of education to millions of Muslim children officially reported to be “out of school?” To answer this question, the paper traces the long years of mutual isolation between the state and Islamic institutions, particularly in northern Nigeria, that was at first a product of colonisation, but subsequently a reflection of state failure to meet its obligations toward a people struggling to come to terms with the loss of their cultural and religious values as western influences became pervasive. The paper suggests that by remaining faithful to those values, ideas, and practices that hold together the cultural-religious essence of life, Qur’anic schools and their owners fill a void that neither the new religious elite nor the post-colonial Nigerian state has been able to recognize. The paper expresses concern, however, that although culturally-relevant, the bond between Qur’anic schools and their communities further isolates young generations of Nigerian Muslims from constructively engaging with the state. An inclusive state policy on education based on constructive engagement with the hidden clients of Nigeria’s submerged Qur’anic schools is what the country needs if these schools are to play any future positive role in education. Keywords malam; Qur’anic schools; Northern Nigeria; Islamiyya; Madrassas; state * This paper is part of an ongoing research work for a PhD degree in Curriculum Theory at the University of Jos, Nigeria, undertaken by the author with a fellowship grant from the American Council of Learned Societies, ACLS, New York. © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2012 DOI 10.1163/22124810-00102002 98 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 Introduction Qur’anic schools are what remains of an old system of Islamic learning that has witnessed transformations since Nigeria’s encounter with colonialism. Defying efforts aimed at their reform, they exist very much in their prototype forms characterized by their exclusive focus on the Qur’an as the content of study, mnemonic pedagogies, and lack of linkages with the state. Because they are the only schooling experience a large number of Muslim children have access to, Qur’anic schools have caused concerns among scholars, civil society, and the state as hindrances to the attainment of Education for All (EFA) goals in Nigerian states with large Muslim populations. Scholars have associated the persistence of these schools among rural dwellers and the urban poor with poor delivery of public education in Nigeria,1 but the power influence of the Qur’anic school teacher/proprietor (malam in Hausa)2 in mediating the relationship between the state and those marginalized by it has not received much attention. By providing a form of education that is valued for its religious and cultural relevance to a people with limited access to public education or little confidence in it, the malam and his school function as strategic alternatives to the state in the provision of a vital social service. In making its argument, the present paper pursues a definition of malam that differentiates him3 from the power bloc of elite Islamic scholars (or ulama), which has a more visible public presence but is often isolated from the intellectual, spatial, and socio-economic remoteness of Qur’anic schools and their clients. The paper argues that whereas many of the ulama have acquired formal qualifications, modernized their schools, and organized themselves into associations that facilitate their engagement with the state, malammai of Qur’anic schools are marginalized from state 1 Abd-el-Khalick et al.. EQUIP1, Educational Quality In Islamic Schools: Nigeria (2006), available at http://www.equip123.net/docs/e1-nigeriapilotstudy.pdf; Muhammad S. Umar, “Education and Islamic trends in Northern Nigeria: 1970s–1990s”, 48 Africa Today (2001), 127; USAID, Policy and Program Coordination, Strengthening education in the Muslim world (2004), http://repository.berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/040401USAIDStrengthening EducationMuslimWorld.pdf. 2 The plural form is malammai. All subsequent translations provided are in Hausa language unless otherwise stated. Hausa is the predominant language of communication in Northern Nigeria. 3 I retain the masculine voice in reference to this word throughout the paper because the presence of females in the public domain of this knowledge production is rare among the Hausas. N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 99 bureaucracy by their inability or unwillingness to adapt their curricular practices to the changing reality of Nigeria’s education, economy, and polity. The post-independence Nigerian state, similarly to its colonial predecessor, has largely paid lip service to the predicaments of Qur’anic schools, their malammai, and their pupils (almajirai), while at the same time its educational policies and practices amount to a systematic exclusion. The State and Islamic Education in Nigeria Nigeria is a Federation of 36 states4 and a Federal Capital Territory, FCT. States in the Federation are divided into 774 Local Government Areas (LGAs). Thus the country has three administrative units: a federal government at the center, and state and local governments at the periphery. Education is on the concurrent legislative list of the Nigerian constitution, making it the joint responsibility of the federal and state governments.5 Therefore, both federal and state legislatures make laws regarding all levels and types of education, but LGAs bear substantial responsibility for managing primary education. Since the constitution declares that Nigeria is a secular state, religious education does not fall within the above parameters; it is recognized only as an academic subject of study at various school levels. But because Nigeria’s secularism is contested and varied in its application,6 states often adopt different postures toward religion, including religious education. On a general note, religious groups in Nigeria can be said to have considerable degree of autonomy in establishing and managing their schools. Except for those groups that want their schools to have linkages with the state, this autonomy can mean the absence of state regulation and control, as in the case of Qur’anic schools. But the interaction of the state and religious education, like the implementation of constitutional provisions regarding Nigeria’s secularism, has had a long history of fluctuations and 4 States in Nigeria are grouped into 6 geo-political zones: North Central, North East, and North West (comprising Northern Nigeria), South East, South South, and South West making up Southern Nigeria. North East, North West, and South West are the zones with the highest concentration of Muslims. North East and North West are commonly referred to as the “Muslim North” because their populations are predominantly Muslim. 5 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999. 6 Abiodun Alao, Islamic radicalisation and violence in Nigeria, http://www.securityanddevelopment.org/pdf/ESRC%20Nigeria%20Overview.pdf. 100 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 adaptations. This section of the paper describes how Islamic education has evolved in response to these developments. Nigeria’s first contact with Islam dates back to the 11th century through the activities of Islamic scholars and merchants along the famous transSaharan trade routes that linked cities and states in what is today called northern Nigeria with notable centres of Islamic learning and commercial activities in North Africa and neighbouring West African states.7 In most of these states, however, it was the linkages that prominent ulama forged with existing political and commercial elite that prompted the widespread growth of Islam and Islamic scholarship in these areas.8 These linkages afforded the ulama political patronage and an enabling environment for their preaching and scholarly pursuits, while the ruling elite relied on the ulama to provide the intellectual support that conferred legitimacy on their rule.9 The system of Islamic learning that became established in precolonial northern Nigeria from the 16th century onward had a two-tier structure: Qur’anic schools operated at the elementary level and schools for higher studies (or ilm schools) dispensed advanced knowledge in various branches of Islamic sciences.10 The two types of schools laid the foundation of an Islamic system of education that provided the basis for scholarly activities and the pre-eminence of some Northern Nigerian cities as notable centres of Islamic learning. The traditional ruling elite in these areas did not evolve a programme or policy for a sustained support for Islamic education despite close linkages with the ulama.11 But even if they had wanted to, not all the ulama wanted to associate with the political class; the ulama’ul sunna (righteous scholars), as they were called in Arabic, preferred to maintain their distance from state interference and control.12 At the beginning of the 19th century, an ulama-inspired jihad (holy war) against the traditional ruling elite in the Hausa states of Northern Nigeria led to the establishment of the Sokoto Caliphate that effectively transferred political power to the ulama class. Having provided the intellectual and organizational bases for the conduct 7 Peter B. Clarke, West Africa and Islam (1982). 8 Peter Easton & Mark Peach, FSU, The practical applications of Koranic learning in West Africa (1997), available at http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNACJ812.pdf. 9 Kenneth Blakemore & Brian Cooksey, A sociology of education for Africa (1981). 10 Babas A. Fafunwa, History of education in Nigeria (NPS Educational ed., 1991). 11 S. Khalid, “State and Islamic education in northern Nigeria: an historical survey”, 2 Al Nahda: A Journal of Islamic Heritage (2002), 18–23. 12 Umar, supra note 2. N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 101 of the jihad, ulama’ul sunna, the erstwhile opponents of ulama-state engagement, took over leadership of the traditional power structures they had initially avoided.13 Unfortunately, the leaders of the jihad, despite their prolific scholarship and individual capacities, did not evolve a state policy on education or take over the control of Qur’anic schools and implement an educational program.14 This failure is often attributed to the confederate nature of the caliphate, which meant that there was no centralized control over its 36 constituent emirates. As a result, the model of education established since the 14th century, based on the study of jurisprudence, theology, mysticism, grammar, rhetoric, and exegesis remained largely unchanged long after the establishment of the caliphate, and even to the present day.15 The integration of Islamic schools into the socio-cultural frameworks of local Hausa communities by the late 19th century, when Christian missionaries began making inroads into the Muslim majority hinterlands of Nigeria, owes more to the efforts of individual members of the ulama than to any conscious state policy. Although Christian missionaries met some local resistance to their evangelical work in Muslim communities of Northern Nigeria, the state lacked a cohesive response to the challenges the missionaries posed to the Islamic schools. Indeed, it was the British colonial state that restricted missionary activities in these areas. Therefore, while missionary activities expanded with military conquest and the spread of colonial rule over territories in Southern Nigeria, the same could not be said of the North where the colonialists were bent on maintaining existing political arrangements for their policy of indirect rule.16 Although the colonial state restricted the growth of western education in Muslim areas, it did not offer sustainable support or encouragement to existing Islamic schools, and was slow in establishing state-sponsored alternatives.17 Although the British contemplated several proposals for handling 13 Id. 14 Alhaji M. Abdurrahman & Peter Canham, The ink of the scholar: the Islamic tradition of education in Nigeria (1978); G.V. Ardo & M.I. Junaid, “Education in the Sokoto Caliphate: Continuity and Change”, in Ahmad Mohammad Kani & Kabir Ahmed Gandi (eds.), State and Society in the Sokoto Caliphate (1990), 291, 291–299. 15 Ardo & Junaid, supra note 15. 16 Clarke, supra note 8. 17 Masooda Bano, Engaged yet Disengaged: Islamic Schools and the State in Kano, Nigeria (Wolfson College, University of Oxford, Working Paper No. 29, 2009), available at http:// www.religionsanddevelopment.org/files/resourcesmodule/@random454f80f60b3f4/ 1256735712_working_paper_29.pdf. 102 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 Islamic education in the Muslim territories in the North, constraints imposed by limited finances, a weak educational administrative structure, and a general fear of what too much Islamic education could do to people’s attitudes toward British imperial rule meant that little was achieved in this respect.18 In particular, the colonialists feared the fragile, harmless looking but highly mobile malammai more than they feared the more established ulama for their ability to stir up anti-colonial feelings among the people.19 The British fear of malammai was justified because these were well connected with their local communities. By remaining faithful to their traditional function of transmitting Qur’anic literacy and nothing of the alien culture of the Europeans, Qur’anic schools and their malammai reflected popular sentiments against colonial occupation. Therefore, in the early period of colonial rule, it was a common practice for Muslim parents in Northern Nigeria to entrust their children to malammai, who would take the children on study tours to villages far away from the reach of the colonialists.20 USAID contends that this practice was to set the stage for a pattern of school avoidance associated with these schools that persists in some instances to date. Throughout colonial rule, British colonialists adopted a policy of neither engaging nor openly opposing Qur’anic schools.21 While the neglect may have stunted their growth and influence, Qur’anic schools emerged from colonialism firmly in the controlling power of their malammai as symbols of resistance to colonisation and westernization. The regional system of governance comprising Eastern, Western, and Northern regions that was adopted for Nigeria in 1939 was maintained by the country up to independence. The Northern Region exercised administrative control over all of Northern Nigeria, where Qur’anic schools were widespread, leading to some efforts made between 1962 and 1967 to restructure, fund, and bring Qur’anic schools under state control.22 But the replacement of regional governance with smaller, semi-autonomous administrative units or states in 1967 led to the discontinuance of this program and the loss of a centralized authority for northern states to evolve a common response 18 J.P. Hubbard, “Government and Islamic education in northern Nigeria (1900–1940)”, in G.N. Brown & M. Hiskett (eds.), Conflict and Harmony in Education in Tropical Africa (1975) 152, 152–167; Blakemore & Cooksey, supra note 10. 19 Clarke, supra note 8. 20 USAID, Nigeria Education Data Survey 2010 (2011), available at http://nigeria.usaid.gov/ sites/default/files/NEDS%20FINAL_Report_5-23-2011.pdf. 21 Bano, supra note 18. 22 Khalid, supra note 12. N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 103 to a shared problem. Instead, each of the northern states reacted to developments in Qur’anic schools on an ad hoc basis, without developing a common framework for coordinating or regulating their activities. A few of the states, Kano and Sokoto for example, devised legislation intended to curb some of the excesses of Qur’anic schools and of their malammai, particularly in relation to licensing and child welfare.23 In the end, these measures produced scant results because, as Andre and Demonsant24 observed in relation to Senegalese Qur’anic schools, their informal nature makes controlling them through legislation ineffective. In the 1970s, we witnessed the most ambitious attempts to date by the Nigerian state to expand its presence in the education arena by launching a Universal Primary Education (UPE) program in 1976 and a new National Policy on Education (NPE) in 1977. But it was the takeover of missionary and other private schools by the state that served as the litmus test for the relationship between the state and religious groups in the provision of education. Understandably, Christian groups that controlled the largest number of such schools were the loudest to voice oppositions to the move throughout the period of its implementation, between 1970 and 1983. For example, the Roman Catholic Mission of Eastern Nigeria was very active in questioning the legitimacy of the state action to deny the church the right to establish schools, and parents the right of choice of schools for their children.25 But the takeover left neither Christians nor Muslims satisfied with the outcome because the two religious groups constantly argued with one another or with the state over issues such as the scope of religious content in the curricula, the choice of school uniforms, and the conduct of devotional services at morning assemblies.26 Each was loudest in its criticism of prevailing practices in states where it was in a minority. The takeover also revealed the weaknesses of the relations between the federal and state governments, and even when the FGN abandoned the policy in 1983, some 23 Id. 24 Pierre Andre & Jean-Luc Demonsant, Qur’anic schools in Senegal: a real barrier to formal education? (Nov. 22, 2009) http://www.parisschoolofeconomics.eu/IMG/pdf/JobMarket2ndpaper-ANDRE-PSE.pdf. 25 S.O. Igwe, Education in Eastern Nigeria, 1847-1975: Development and Management : Church, State and Community (1987). 26 P. Williams, “Religious groups and the politics of national development in Nigeria”, 7 Research Review (1991), 32, available at http://archive.lib.msu.edu/DMC/African%20 Journals/pdfs/Institue%20of%20African%20Studies%20Research%20Review/1991v7n1&2/ asrv007001&2005.pdf. 104 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 states of the South West continued with it.27 The controversy continues to date because whereas some states of the Federation have returned some of the schools to their owners (mainly Christian missionaries), other states, facing oppositions from Muslim groups and organized teacher unions, have not returned theirs.28 While this controversy raged on, Qur’anic schools remained in the margins because their exclusively religious curricula had little attraction for the state. Note that the attitude of the state toward Qur’anic schools with regard to policy formulation, support, or regulation has not changed significantly in the past decades. But recently the Nigerian state has made attempts to influence the contents taught in Qur’anic schools by developing for them curricular packages that offer non-formal versions of regular school curricula. One such program is the FGN/UNICEF Non-Formal Education Curriculum developed in 1999 for use in Qur’anic schools across the country. Although similar packages have been developed by other agencies of the state, the FGN/UNICEF curriculum is unique because it has obtained the approval of the body responsible for educational policy formulation in Nigeria (the National Council on Education) in 2001. The curriculum, reviewed in 2003, requires that Qur’anic schools teach secular contents of the official program of study alongside their unique religious content, over which the state has no influence or control.29 Although the curriculum was designed as an educational program applicable nationwide, participation by Qur’anic schools is voluntary and depends on the disposition of each malam toward any contact with the state. This makes the influence of the state over Qur’anic schools only partial in a way that reinforces the dominance of the malam in charting the future directions of these schools. Qur’anic School Malam: A Heritage of Scholarship and Tradition The contemporary usage of the word malam in Hausa language refers to any learned person, teacher, or simply male adult. The word has an Arabic origin (mu’allim), and before the advent of western education among the Hausa, it was used only in reference to the attainment of a certain level of 27 Alao, supra note 7. 28 Williams, supra note 27. 29 FGN/UNICEF, Situation and Policy of Basic Education in Nigeria, National Report (2003). N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 105 Islamic scholarship.30 It has now assumed a place in Hausa lexicon as a commonly applied title of respect. Its feminine form is malama, and the plural form, malammai, is generic, used in reference to both sexes. But even in its technical (religious) sense, malam identifies a person of learning but does not qualify the degree of such learning. In this non-distinctive sense, a malam could therefore refer to someone as high as a prominent Islamic scholar or as low as a young adult male at advanced stages of Islamic learning but also responsible for instructing others in matters of Islamic beliefs and conduct. This is a reflection of the informal and personal character of Islamic education, which provided space for many to participate in the transmission of religious knowledge that would not ordinarily be reckoned among the educated elite.31 In the realm of practice, therefore, to be a malam does not necessarily require the possession of deep religious knowledge, as the term may appear to suggest. Male adults of varied educational qualifications may bear the title and the associated responsibilities of a malam by the practical act of establishing and managing a Qur’anic school. This act is facilitated by the fact that establishing and managing such a school in Nigeria does not require any formal qualification from the intending malam apart from the experience of having attended one himself.32 Therefore even those possessing only the basic mnemonic knowledge of the Qur’an (or gardawa; sing = gardi) can independently establish their own schools as long as they are assured of the goodwill of the community, expressed by its willingness to send their children to the school and to support it with charity or sadaka.33 Lacking any serious supervision from the religious or official establishment, a malam enjoys a considerable degree of autonomy in managing his school because once established, each school exists in its own right.34 Although a 30 A.M. Bunza , “Mallam: A study on Hausa perspective on qualities and personality of a teacher (Trans.)”, 1 Al Nahda: A Journal of Islamic Heritage (1998), 88–103. 31 Jonathan P. Berkey, “Madrasas Medieval And Modern: Politics, Education, And The Problem Of Muslim Identity”, in Robert W. Hefner & Muhammad Qasim Zaman (eds.), Schooling Islam: the Culture and Politics of Modern Muslim Education (2006), 40, 40–60 available at http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/crcc/private/ierc/papers/madrasas_medieval _and_modern.pdf. 32 Abd-el-Khalick et al., supra note 2. 33 Neil Skinner, Alhaji Muhammadu Koki: Kano Mallam (1977). 34 J. A. McIntyre, “A cultural given and a hidden influence: Qur’anic teachers in Kano”, in D.J. Parkin, L. Caplan & H.J. Fisher (eds.), The Politics of Cultural Performance (1996), 257, 257–274. 106 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 malam would defer to the scholarly lineage that produced him35 and maintain allegiance and linkages with it, there may not be any supervisory restraints in the exercise of his functions as a school proprietor and a dispenser of knowledge. Therefore, the ownership of a school by a malam provides him with some social and intellectual capital. It is within the context of his ownership of a school that a malam appropriates the power to determine the meanings, norms, and values that Adams and Chen identified as constituting the “boundaries” that education systems preserve and disseminate.36 The full implication of this power is manifest both at the social and intellectual levels. Being a malam often confers on a person leadership responsibilities in the religious and social life of host communities that include leading in prayers (as Imam), ceremonies, and funerals,37 as well as providing interpretations on matters of Islamic doctrine that regulate religious, personal, and social conduct. His presumption of Islamic knowledge also places the malam as a model of exemplary behaviour for younger generations of Muslims to emulate. At the intellectual level, the power of the malam is manifest in the selection of content and prescribed texts for school curricula that constitute the intellectual capital intended for inter-generational transfer. Because the educational programs and practices pursued in each Qur’anic school revolve around the personality and pedigree of its malam, the absence of common criteria for judging the professional standing of a malam and the lack of oversight of these schools have created room for divergence in their ideologies, pedagogies, and intellectual contents. Therefore, for a long time, various participants in this educational enterprise, consisting of prominent members of the ulama, middle-level malammai of Qur’anic schools, and gardawa have engaged in pedagogical practices that reflect differences in their perceptions of the essence and scope of learning permissible in Qur’anic schools. In the view of the leader of the 19th century reformist Jihad, Sheikh Usman Danfodiyo, and another prominent scholar before him, Al-Maghili, these differences persisted because not all those who performed the functions of a malam were qualified to do 35 U. M. Bugaje, “Some reflections on the development of Islamic learning in Katsina state”, in I.A. Tsiga & A.U. Adamu (eds.), Islam and the history of learning in Katsina (1997), 77, 77–87. 36 Raymond S. Adams & David Chen, The Process of educational innovation: an international perspective (1981). 37 McIntyre, supra note 35. N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 107 so. These scholars believed that the wide ranging functions of a malam, mentioned above, could only be performed by those specifically trained for the purpose through an in-depth study of the writings of respected orthodox Muslim scholars,38 which one can pursue only at the ilm phase of Islamic learning. Therefore the depth of learning of a malam provided a basis for classifying men who bear this title and perform functions associated with it into those malammai who have undergone the rigours of intellectual study recommended by Sheikh Danfodio, and those not so well versed. Graduates of ilm schools (or malamman ilm) have a wide understanding of the Qur’an and of other branches of Islamic learning (such as prophetic traditions, or Hadith, Islamic jurisprudence, or Fiqh, among others) and enrich the curricula of their schools with this breadth of learning. By contrast, gardawa have a minimalist curricular orientation. Qur’anic schools established or managed by gardawa are characterised by their exclusive focus on the Qur’an as the content of study, to the exclusion of other sources considered vital to transforming children into functioning Muslim adults. Reformist scholars of the Jihad era also thought that the minimalist curricula of gardawa schools were responsible for the poor understanding of Islam by the faithful and for rampant cases of syncretism in their practice of Islamic rituals and other acts of religious worship. As far as the reformists were concerned, the roles of Qur’anic schools as torch bearers of valid Islamic teachings and practices were compromised by the poor quality of their handlers (the malammai). This means that in their roles as Qur’anic school malammai and as preachers, gardawa had been under intense criticism from reformist ulama of the Jihad era for performing functions for which they were ill-prepared.39 Indeed, gardawa and members of the ulama who have been discredited as ulama’ul su (Arabic for “venal scholars”) for compromising the true teachings of Islam by their limited learning or for political or material gains, have been long excluded from the mainstream Islamic discourse, which by the late-18th century was increasingly dominated by the reformist ulama in Hausa land. In order to remove themselves from this negative spotlight, gardawa had a tendency to operate in rural areas or on the fringes of urban locations, where in addition to establishing Qur’anic schools and performing vital 38 Clarke, supra note 8. 39 Id. 108 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 religious social services, they also deploy their knowledge of the Qur’an for medical-spiritual purposes ranging from the practice of herbal medicine to the invocation of spirits.40 Rural areas provided a fertile ground for the proliferation of Qur’anic schools and the adoption by some of them of a mixture of traditional belief systems and Islamic teachings, because even after the Fulani reformist Jihad, some of these areas either remained non-Muslim or continued in their syncretism.41 In adapting to their local contexts, gardawa fit into an image of a malam that has gained acceptance among Hausa communities trying to reconcile their cultures with Islamic thoughts and practices to which they had been newly introduced. Bunza42 considered that the most distinctive qualities that define a malam in traditional Hausa societies were the possession of literacy skills and knowledge of the Qur’an, but he was also expected to perform the more traditional functions of healing and spiritual protection through divination and sorcery. It appears therefore that although practices such as syncretism, exclusive focus on the Qur’an, and non-recognition of other sources of Islamic knowledge exclude gardawa from the Ulama and mainstream Islam, the gardawa reinforced their cultural relevance in the traditional communities in which they operated even after the rise of a Jihad that was aimed at fighting these tendencies. Two concluding remarks are in order with regard to this early generation of scholars. First, despite differences in their approaches to Islamic learning, both the gardawa and the malamman ilm were products of what Umar43 referred to as the traditional Islamic education system that originated in the pre-colonial period of Nigeria’s history. Indeed, they can be said to represent the two scholarly traditions that this system of learning has been known for: first, the exclusivity of the Qur’an as the content of study versus in-depth study of other branches of Islamic learning alongside the study of the Qur’an. Although the former facilitates quicker mastery of the Qur’an (including its memorization), the latter is valued for the breadth of understanding of Islam that it provides.44 Second, although they were operating at different levels of intellectual depth, the two groups of malammai operated mainly within the confines of Sufism, which had been the main current of Islamic thought in Northern Nigeria until the second half 40 41 42 43 44 McIntyre, supra note 35. Clarke, supra note 8. Bunza, supra note 31. Umar, supra note 2. Skinner, supra note 34. N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 109 the 20th century.45 This generation of scholars can therefore be considered as the traditional ulama. Muslims’ encounter with new forms of knowledge brought about by the activities of Christian missionaries and colonialists in Nigeria reconfigured the definition of the learned man. The introduction and subsequent adoption of western education as the official system of education in Nigeria challenged pre-existing forms of knowledge and literacy, and more important, it undermined the traditional ulama’s monopoly over valued intellectual capital, which granted them access to prestige, positions, and resources in the pre-colonial order.46 To be relevant in the new colonial order, Muslims, including the religiously learned among them, needed to acquire new forms of knowledge and literacy. By offering curricula that integrated religious and secular contents, the Northern Provinces Law School established by the colonial state in the Northern Nigerian city of Kano in 1934 (later renamed the School for Arabic Studies, SAS) provided the basis for the emergence of a new generation of ulama schooled in both classical Arabic/Islamic studies and in formal school subjects such as English, arithmetic, general knowledge, and history.47 In addition, SAS provided a model of curriculum integration that Muslim elites built upon to establish modern schools for the teaching of Arabic and Islamic studies, using Arabic as the instructional medium (madrassas), and schools (known as Islamiyya schools) that were Islamic in orientation but adopted wholesale the curricula, organizational patterns, and instructional medium of Nigeria’s public school system, which is English. These schools assured the continuous production of new ulama and Muslim elites that are not averse to engagement with western secular education and institutions. Apart from expanding the content of study to include secular western education, the new Islamic schools also differ from their traditional prototypes in their organizational modes and pedagogies. Adoption of graded classes, modern methods of teaching, the use of textbooks written in standard Arabic, and the abolishment of practices such as mechanical memorization of the Qur’an and begging as a means of sustenance for the pupils, were some of the key features of these new schools.48 The new schools also 45 Hoechner Hanna, Searching for knowledge and recognition: Quranic 'boarding' students in Kano, Nigeria, (Dissertation, M. Phil. Thesis, Development Studies, University of Oxford, 2010). 46 John N. Paden, Religion and political culture in Kano (1973). 47 Umar, supra note 2. 48 R. Loimeier, “The campaign against the Quranic schools in Senegal”, in Holger Weiss (ed.), Social Welfare in Muslim Societies in Africa (2002), 118, 118–137. 110 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 expanded opportunities for females to enrol in school and remain there to the end of the school cycle. Although well represented in the early stages of traditional Islamic education, females are generally underserved.49 Girls are pulled out of schools as soon as they learn the portions of the Qur’an needed for devotional duties, or when they reach the age of marriage, which is commonly defined by some Muslims in Northern Nigeria to be the onset of puberty. Although females can continue learning and performing teaching functions in traditional Hausa societies, they operate within the private domains of their homes.50 By confronting deeply ingrained patriarchal tendencies that had long suppressed women’s education in Northern Nigeria, the new Islamic schools widened the scope and duration of female participation in Islamic education.51 Upon successful completion of their studies, the new female elites could serve as teachers in the new Islamic schools, become preachers, or enrol in universities for further studies. The most significant challenge that the new Islamic schools posed to traditional Islamic education was to question the epistemological foundation of school knowledge. Brenner52 used term “esoteric” to refer to the prevailing epistemology that had shaped Islamic religious culture in West Africa for centuries. It is a thought pattern that assumes that “not all knowledge is available to all persons, and possession of and access to secret knowledge is closely associated with one’s religious persona and status.”53 But several new Muslim elites and ulama, particularly those of salafi/wahabi persuasion, became convinced that this thought pattern, and the curricular practices associated with it, were no longer adequate or relevant to the changing situations brought about by westernization and modernization. The new schools approached knowledge as something that is open to all, and its acquisition is no longer limited to personal transmission but can be achieved through texts and pamphlets that are widely accessible to all. Because esoteric epistemology also pervaded Sufism, which was the main current of religious thought in Northern Nigeria, criticism of existing school practices of traditional Islamic education by the new ulama and by the Muslim elites created sharp divisions between the two on doctrinal matters. 49 Easton & Peach, supra note 9. 50 McIntyre, supra note 35. 51 Umar, supra note 2. 52 L. Brenner, “The transformation of Muslim schooling in Mali: the Madrasa as institution of social and religious mediation”, in R.W. Hefner & M.Q. Zaman (eds.), Schooling Islam: the Culture and Politics of Modern Muslim Education (2007), 199, 199–223. 53 Id, at 218. N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 111 Below I maintain, with Brenner, that the growth and proliferation of new forms of Islamic schooling did not completely obliterate the presence and influence of traditional Qur’anic schools and their malammai. I show how an interacting combination of poor delivery of public education, poverty, and rural location provided the impetus for the growth of Qur’anic schools as distinct school types tailored to the special needs of those who had limited engagement with the state. Neither public schools nor the modern Islamiyya schools could adequately satisfy these needs. Qur’anic Schools and the Education of Muslim Children in Northern Nigeria By remaining faithful to the demand for religious education and establishing linkages with the educational bureaucracy of the Nigerian state, the new Islamic schools have created a balance that neither the old Qur’anic schools nor public schools have been able to provide. But the reach of these new schools in northern Nigeria has been limited to the urban and semiurban elite that have the resources to pay for their costs. As Brenner observed in relation to Malian madrassas,54 the shift to new forms of schooling has created significant changes in the economic base that supports religious education. Unlike Qur’anic schools that require no special resources or investments to establish, the new Islamic schools rely on income obtained from fees in order to sustain their operation. In Nigeria, these schools are treated by the state as private educational enterprises that are self-sustaining, possibly profit-making as well, and which, therefore, do not enjoy subventions from the state. Reported cases of inadequacies of personnel, teaching materials, laboratories, and textbooks experienced by all new Islamic schools studied by earlier researchers55 suggest an absence of reliable sources of funding. Cost considerations are vital for understanding whether the traditional constituencies of the old Qur’anic schools are also served by the new Islamic schools. This is because scholars are unanimous in identifying poverty and rural residence as the most important demographic characteristics of populations served by Qur’anic schools.56 These factors, together 54 Id. 55 Muhammad S. Umar, “Profiles of new Islamic schools in Northern Nigeria”, 28 The Maghreb Review (2003), 146; Abd-el-Khalick et al., supra note 2. 56 S. Khalid, A socio-economic study of the transformation of migrant Qur’anic Schools system (Almajiranci) in Sokoto Metropolis, 1970 – 1995, (Dissertation, Ph.D. Thesis, Sociology, 112 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 with gender, constitute what Oxenham57 referred to as correlates of educational disadvantage, because they confer on learners from these backgrounds unique capacities, needs, and interests that formal schools fail to recognize and adapt to. Instead, by their emphasis on urban, western, or elite values, language, and behavior, formal schools become foreign islands to rural, poor, migrant, or nomadic children, increasing their sense of alienation and rejection.58 Although the new Islamic schools are culturally relevant, it is possible that similarly to the formal schools, they also exclude a portion of the population by the fees they charge and by other incidental costs that parents incur in sending their children to these schools. This situation places a heavy burden on poor families. When deciding to send children to school, parents must make what Bernard called “cruel choices” between schooling and survival needs. Even when parents are willing to make sacrifices, poor learning outcomes and uncertainty about the future benefits of schooling mean that they are less likely to come to the side of education. Qur’anic schools provide a soft landing for children rejected by formal schools or unable to benefit from them. First, they are cheap and accessible. Second, they are flexible to the socio-economic rhythm of the rural poor. Unlike formal schools, parents can send their children to Qur’anic schools without losing the child’s economic labour on the farm or market. The roles that Qur’anic schools and other alternative education networks play in the education enterprise became strengthened after the flawed implementation of expansionist education programs on which the state embarked from the 1970s onward. Problems such as poor planning of the programs, dwindling revenues owing to fall in petroleum prices and in the global market, and the consequent imposition of debt-relief and the Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) have led to reduced state presence in the provision of vital social services, including education.59 Therefore, even as concerns over the deterioration of school infrastructure, inadequate teacher quality and supply, and poor learning outcomes became widespread, parents had to bear substantial burdens for the education of their Bayero University Kano, Nigeria 1997); Umar, supra note 56; Policy and Program Coordination: Strengthening education in the Muslim world, supra note 2. 57 J. Oxenham, “Is the problem of equity in quality?”, in A.M. Vespoor (ed.), The challenge of learning: improving the quality of basic education in sub-Saharan Africa (2006), 69, 69–87. 58 Anne K. Bernard, UNESCO, Education for All and Children Who are Excluded, (2000), available at http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0012/001233/123330e.pdf. 59 C. O. Taiwo, The Nigerian education system: Past, present, and future (1980); Khalid, supra note 57; Umar, supra note 56. N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 113 children, contrary to the previously established social contract with the state. Nigerian public schools gradually became the resort of those without alternatives. Muslim elites searched for alternatives in private secular and religious schools for a fee, whereas the marginalized urban poor and rural residents turned to the more familiar terrain of Qur’anic schools. By 1999, when the National Primary Education Commission (NPEC)60 conducted a population survey of schools in Nigeria, it was found that enrolment in Qur’anic and Islamiyya schools was triple that of formal primary schools in the key Muslim states of Sokoto and Zamfara .61 A similar trend was revealed in a baseline survey of Qur’anic schools in four states in the North West (Katsina, Kebbi, Sokoto, and Zamfara) conducted by UNICEF,62 which showed that there were 16,648 Qur’anic schools in these four states, with a total enrolment of 1,145,111 pupils, of whom 63.2% were boys. The survey further showed that out of the total number of students enrolled, only 177,592 or 15.5% were attending primary schools; the remaining 967,519 or 84.5% were not. A recent survey of only 10% of the total number of Qur’anic schools in six northern states (Bauchi, Borno, Kano, Katsina, Sokoto, and Zamfara), conducted by FME and UNICEF,63 found a total pupil enrolment of 514, 264, of which 194,368 or 38% were females. When these figures are compared with the total number of 54,434 public primary schools across 36 states in Nigeria and the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, it becomes clear that Qur’anic schools have a commanding presence in Nigeria’s education sector. Although public primary schools in Nigeria enrol 24,422,918 children, about 10.5 million or 30% of the total number of children of primary school age (6-12 years) are out of school.64 With over 55% of children out of school, some parts of northern Nigeria (specifically the North East and North West) account for a significant portion of the national average of out-of-school children.65 NPC and IFC Macro also 60 In 2004 NPEC was replaced by the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) as the body responsible for managing Nigeria’s UBE program. 61 Al Bartlett et al., USAID, Strategic assessment of social sector activities in northern Nigeria, working paper available at http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNACT131.pdf. 62 UNICEF, Baseline survey of Qur’anic schools in Katsina, Kebbi, Sokoto and Zamfara states (1999) (on file with the author). 63 Federal Ministry of Education & UNICEF, A survey of Qur’anic schools and Early Childhood Education, (2008) (on file with the author). 64 Sam O. Egwu, FME, Roadmap for the Nigerian Education Sector (2009), available at http://planipolis.iiep.unesco.org/upload/Nigeria/Nigeria_Roadmap.pdf. 65 National Population Commission (Nigeria): Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey 2008 (2009), http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNADQ923.pdf. 114 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 revealed wide margins between national percentages of out-of-school children in rural areas (43%) and urban areas (26%), with the percentage of out-of-school children increasing with poverty levels. It is fair to say that in the Muslim North of Nigeria a large percentage of children, enrolled in Qur’anic schools, are excluded from the minimum state-sanctioned education provided in public schools and from many of its accruing privileges. In a global context in which local institutions gain relevance only by the risk they pose to global security, Qur’anic schools are likely to continue to exist on the fringes of state policy because they are believed to be contributing less to global terrorist networks.66 But because they dispense exclusively religious curricula that have no linkages with the state, Qur’anic schools offer their products little prospects for educational, social, or economic mobility within the modern economy and polity. Although some argue against judging Qur’anic schools purely by their utilitarian value given that they are religious schools,67 it is their potential to exclude future generations of Muslims from the mainstream national life that should raise some concerns at least at the domestic level. Since the 1980s, Qur’anic schools, their malammai, and their products have been associated with religious uprisings in Nigeria. Although the country is not new to inter- and intra-religious crises, a new dimension is becoming prevalent among Islamic groups, in which the targets are the state and its institutions.68 The uprisings by the Maitatsine,69 Boko Haram,70 and Kala Kato71 religious groups share a common minimalist ideology 66 Alao, supra note 7. 67 Easton & Peach, supra note 9. 68 Alao, supra note 7. 69 “Maitatsine,” or “he who curses others,” was the name given to the leader of an Islamic group that preached an alternative Islamic ideology. He was fond of ending his preaching sessions by cursing those who did not agree with him. His real name was Muhammadu Marwa, and his followers were known as Yan’tatsine. Marwa and his followers unleashed violence against the state and other Islamic sects in Kano (1980). Although Marwa was killed in 1980, his disciples extended the fight at different times to three other Nigerian cities: Yola (1984), Gombe (1985; 1987), and Lagos (1998). (See Calabrese, p.21). 70 “Boko-Haram,” a Hausa expression meaning “western education is sinful,” was the name given to a religious group led by an Islamic cleric, Mohammed Yusuf, that sought a forceful imposition of Shariah Islamic Law and the dismantling of state structures across some northern Nigerian states, unleashing violence in the cities of Bauchi, Borno, and Kano in July 2009. Yusuf was himself a gardi, and did not attend formal school. (See Ammani in the references). 71 “Kala Kato” is a Hausa expression denoting incorrect or illegitimate Islamic doctrines. Several Islamic groups characterized by exclusive reliance on the Qur’an in matters of N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 115 facilitated by exclusive reliance on the Qur’an and other practices similar to those of the gardawa.72 In all three groups, Qur’anic schools established and managed by the leaders provided the platform for the spread of their version of Islam, which rejects western education and ideas, modernity, the supremacy of the state or any of its institutions, which helps the movements recruit a loyal following to their cause. Scholars like Umar73 and Calabrese74 have explained the uprisings as manifestations of discontent by the malammai, their disciples, and followers with their socio-economic and political marginalization by the state and its elite. Sadly, Qur’anic schools, in their present state and carrying capacities, only add to the growing number of the marginalized in Nigeria. Conclusion The Nigerian state has consistently undermined Islamic education and institutions designed to dispense it by failing to recognize and utilize their potential in expanding access to education. Some Islamic elite and the ulama, who are predisposed toward engagement with the state and with western education, have created the linkages needed to overcome their isolation. But long years of unstable state policy toward Islamic education have further excluded those who have been marginalized by the alien nature of western education in colonial times and by its questionable quality and relevance in the post-colonial era. In their isolation, some malammai have consequently hijacked the once vibrant institutions of learning and turned them into havens of school avoidance and child neglect. Although mainstream Islam, the modernist ulama, and the state would wish that the malam, the gardi, and their old Qur’anic schools were pushed out of relevance in the context of modern Nigeria, their roots have penetrated too deeply into the underserved local communities of rural Nigeria to be ignored. conduct, rituals, and other practices considered un-Islamic, have been labeled “Kala Kato.” One of such groups was involved in intra-group violence in Bauchi, in December, 2009. 72 Alao, supra note 7; Umar, supra note 2; Maurizio D. Calabrese, Emerging threats and the war on terrorism: the formation of radical Islamist movements in sub-Saharan Africa (Thesis, Naval Post Graduate School, Monterey, California, 2005), http://www.dtic.mil/ cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA435589. 73 Umar, supra note 2. 74 Calabrese, supra note 73. 116 N.M. Baba / Journal of Law, Religion & State 1 (2012) 97–116 The answer to the question “What is the future of Qur’anic schools in Nigeria?” may well depend on the answer to another question: “What is the future of public education in Nigeria?” The answer to the last question could then be communicated to the “real” malam of the “real” Qur’anic schools, not to their urban proxies, for further dialogue.