Unheard World - Travel Blog: Koran

Talibé children in Senegal and the flood of issues connected to them – from health to human rights and child protection – have become my world for the past year and a half. I almost can’t even remember what it was like to first arrive in country and see these scruffy kids everywhere with their begging bowls. It’s hard to remember how much research I had to do and how many visits I had to make to daaras* in Kolda before the complexities of the talibé system really sunk in. And there’s always more to learn.

From the beginning, I felt that many talibés were being exploited, forced to beg for change on the streets to “support” their marabout (Quranic teacher) and his daara. I didn’t understand why a society could allow this, though. And I didn’t know if this was a facet of the culture I was supposed to respectfully ignore – or if many Senegalese actually felt the way I felt.

I can now answer that question: yes, many do feel the same way. But “Africans don’t have the culture of denunciation,” a radio journalist in Kolda explained to me once. Layers of tradition, respect for religious leaders, and poverty have prevented most people from speaking out for many years. That is changing now, little by little.

The hardest part for me now is to remember how I used to feel about talibés, these sometimes sweet and sometimes abrasive, world-weary boys roaming the streets. But when I read back through my old journals, I remember: I was intimidated, overwhelmed and a little frustrated. I didn’t know what to think about these kids because I didn’t understand the whole system – but they wouldn’t leave me alone, and they were making my transition into this new culture even harder.

It wasn’t until I sat through a presentation by former PCV (and talibé guru) Hadiel Mohamed a few months into my service in early 2013, and then followed up by pestering her with a million questions, that I understood how to look at the issue and how to keep my compassion front and center when dealing with them. Now by working with SeneGAD**, I’m hoping to pass that perspective on to as many people as possible, because honestly: it doesn’t come naturally. I still have to work at it every day.

Abrasive or confrontational kids getting up in your space will inspire negative feelings or reactions if you don’t train yourself. And that’s okay – you just have to recognize why you’re feeling these things and know what to do.

So how do you train yourself to look at talibé kid with a different mentality? How should we react?

Here are 7 tips on how to act around talibés:

1. Remind yourself, when you see them, that these kids have had an extremely hard childhood. They’ve been treated differently from other kids and exploited – sometimes abused – since age 4 or 5. They are children forced into the role of adults, finding food and caring for themselves. They are often uneducated and their future might look pretty bleak. Whatever attitude they project at you is a defense mechanism they’ve learned to survive a very harsh life.

2. If you feel angry or annoyed at what these boys say or do to you, try to redirect your anger towards the system and the adults who have put them into this life and made them act this way. Use that anger as fuel towards building projects that can help. It’s not the fault of the children.

3. The best response to a talibé’s demand for money is to greet him. Remind him that you’re a person, he’s a person. Shake his hand, ask his name and where he’s from.

4. If a talibé keeps asking for money and you don’t want to give, here are some things you can say: “Sorry, I don’t have change.” Or “Next time, inshallah!” If you want to make a joke out of it, you can add something like, “Sorry man, I’m really not ‘noosing’ these days… Times are rough!” (Noos is a Wolof and Pulaar expression meaning having fun and having money.) Phrasing things this way won’t harm anyone and will make talibé feel acknowledged. Simply saying “no” without explanation is not how the culture works here. These kids won’t understand your deeper motivations behind this – they’ll just assume you are stingy, rude, or don’t care about them.

5. See a big pack of talibés coming your way? This used to intimidate me and I’d try to avoid it, but now I try to look at is as another chance to remind them that we don’t think they’re invisible or distasteful. Give them a smile and a greeting, or at least a wave and eye contact, as you walk through. You don’t have to stop and be surrounded – that acknowledgement is enough.

6. If a talibé insults you or makes a joke at your expense, either ignore it or make a joke back. Getting angry will not result in behavior change.

7. Give something (not money) once in a while! There are countless debates over whether it’s an act of compassion or simply “fuels a bad system” to give to talibés. After all this time working with them, I’ve decided that giving money should be avoided, since it often goes back to the marabout and does perpetuate the system. However, it’s good to give the kids other small things every now and then – fruit or other nutritious food, soap, sandals, etc. It can help them meet an immediate need, can make them happy for a little while, and can incline them to trust and like you.

Most importantly, remember these are at-risk kids, generally far away from their families and often lacking a mentor to guide them through life. Some marabouts fill that role, but others do not, teaching them to memorize the Quran and little else. Who knows what kind of impact you can have if you try?

*Daaras = schools where talibés live and study the Quran under tutelage of a marabout

**SeneGAD = Senegal’s Gender and Development group for Peace Corps Volunteers, focused on gender equality and youth empowerment

I really didn’t know how it would go down. I honestly didn’t know if everyone we invited would show up. But there they were, 38 talibé boys flowing into the room, shaking my hand shyly. The next day, 39 Kolda villagers showed up – both men and women. On the third day, 37 Koranic teachers (marabouts) swept into the room in their long robes (grand boubous). Every population we’d hoped to reach had made an appearance.

This is the first project I’ve tackled here in Senegal that actually had me nervous, wondering if I was overreaching by trying to make it happen. It was the first time I went off the grid, trying something that hadn’t been done in my region or by a PCV in Senegal before, as far as I know. A little scary, but somehow it all came together in the end!

On October 10, 11 and 12, Kolda successfully pulled off its first regional conference on “Daara Modernization and Talibé Child Protection,” an event I organized in partnership with several different organizations working for child protection in Senegal (Tostan, World Vision, USAID, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime / UNODC, the Ministry of Justice’s anti-trafficking bureau, La Lumière, Enda, and more).

For each day of the conference, we invited a different target audience: 40 talibés from the city of Kolda, 40 men and women from nearby villages (community leaders or potential parents of talibés), and 40 marabouts (20 from the city of Kolda, and 20 from villages). Local NGOs, community actors, and officials were also invited. We showed a film and had a panel of 5-8 speakers for each day, all Senegalese experts on daara modernization, Islam, child protection, and community mobilization.

Background on the Issue

Exploitation of talibés, young students of the Koran often forced to beg on the streets, remains an extensive problem in Senegal. Most of these children live at Koranic schools (daaras) under the tutelage of marabouts, spending their days memorizing the Koran and begging for coins or food. Many suffer from extreme poverty, hunger, and abuse. Many are denied a full education, never attending French school and studying only the Koran. This lifestyle makes these children Senegal’s most at-risk population.

Over the past several years, media attention has thrown this human rights issue into the spotlight. The Senegalese government started a national movement to modernize the daara system and improve conditions for talibé. Unfortunately, public attention to this movement remains largely concentrated in the northern half of Senegal, even though the issue is just as pervasive in the south. In fact, my region of Kolda in the south is really an epicenter for human trafficking of talibés. Daaras here receive a flow of children from Guinea, Guinea Bissau, and Mali, and Kolda talibés are often sent north to live in big city daaras (Dakar, Mbour, Thiès, and St. Louis).

Hundreds of daaras exist throughout the Kolda Region. Throughout my first year and a half of service, I visited dozens of these daaras and started developing relationships with the local marabouts and talibés. While we do have handfuls of “modern daaras” in Kolda, the majority are traditional ones that teach nothing but the Koran and still send the boys out begging. Many of the marabouts I’ve met are unaware that the system could be any different. Same goes for parents who send their boys away – and for talibés who see little hope for their future.

This lack of knowledge about the daara modernization movement is why I wanted to bring the discussion down to Kolda. We’ve had small meetings and causeries before, but nothing bringing together all three target populations involved in the issue. It was a first!

Goals of the Event

With all of this in mind, the objectives of the conference I organized were:

1. To motivate Kolda talibés and give them a chance to discuss their difficulties, hopes and fears for the future. The points they raised were then communicated to the two other groups (marabouts and village parents).

2. To raise awareness of the Senegalese Government’s national efforts to modernize the system (enforcement of regulations, construction of new “modern daaras,” financial support.)

3. To suggest to community members steps they can take in the meantime to modernize local daaras and improve conditions for talibés. We can’t wait passively for the State to fix everything. It’s really up to local communities to take charge of their children and daaras, as some have done already by implementing Daara Management Committees and/or Child Protection Committees.

4. To gather recommendations for next steps from each target population (talibés, community members, and marabouts) and plan follow-up activities.

To be considered a “modern daara” recognized by the State, a Koranic school must meet certain specific qualifications, including:

Students receive both a French and Koranic education
Hygienic and sanitary conditions
Safe and secure housing for talibés
No begging

It’s true that this whole subject is a very sensitive issue with many religious and cultural complications. I didn’t want to offend anyone, but I was convinced that the conversation needed to be started. I definitely couldn’t have done it alone, though.

The Project Team

Honestly, the entire success of the project was due to my amazing project partners and panel speakers. Speakers from local NGOs, the Kolda Academic Inspector, and government representatives all made important contributions. UNODC sent a speaker to discuss human trafficking and screen a film about talibés. But it was a marabout, in fact, who was the life and breath of this project.

Thierno Mouhamadou Diamanka, one of my community work partners and President of Kolda’s Association of Koranic Masters, helped me plan out the project and led many of the activities and discussions during the conference. As a respected marabout who has chosen to modernize his daara, he was able to reach out to his peers and really hold their attention. Behavior change – especially when ingrained traditions and beliefs are involved – won’t happen quickly, but marabouts listen to Diamanka and respect his views.

I can’t even remember now how I originally met Diamanka, but we’ve been working together for over a year and he continues to amaze me with his dedication to children and to Kolda’s community development. Before the conference, he accompanied me all over town to help me invite marabouts and talibés in person and explain the program.

Another extremely valuable participant was Mouhamed Chérif Diop, Tostan’s director of child protection projects based in Dakar. He has spent years working with communities and marabouts around Senegal and is a well known among Koranic masters for his radio talks. He was able to explain the steps other communities have taken to modernize their daara system and outlined what communities need to do to get there. In his words, positive change for the talibé situation in Senegal must come through an overall change in social norms, led by communities and guided by a clear concept of child dignity, rights, and protection.

Results

Despite my worries about who would show up for the conference and whether or not we would offend anyone, we had no major problems during the 3 days! Nearly everyone showed up, and our panel speakers were able to answer all questions and keep the audience calm. With all the experts present, there was no question that couldn’t be answered – whether it related to Islam, the law, academic standards, government actions, child protection, or the practical steps of daara modernization.

Everyone seemed really interested to learn what daara modernization entailed and many community members participated in the discussion or proposed ideas. None of the talibés or marabouts came away resenting me. In fact, they seemed happy to have been included! (Some even showed up that we didn’t invite. The more the merrier.)

In total, 164 people were involved in this conference. On the talibé day, Peace Corps VSA Sakhir Dia, himself a former talibé, shared his personal story with the boys. Thierno Diamanka also played an Islam Q&A game with the boys called “Genie en Herbe” (don’t ask me why it’s called that), and I worked on my throwing arm by hurling candy to the winners. All of this seemed to loosen the boys up, and they really participated with a candor I didn’t expect in the group discussions.

DAY 1: Here are some of the difficulties with the current daara system as listed by the talibés:

Begging and the requirement of a daily quota that must be given to the marabout
Some marabouts do not teach; some exploit their talibés
Poor living conditions
Lack of professional training or apprenticeships
Children run away from their daaras because of abuse
Vulnerability of talibé children
Being treated like a criminal by the public
Street life (temptation to drugs and crime)
Beatings / violence
Lack of rest or leisure time for talibé children
Inadequate housing (insecure, unsanitary)
Unorganized daaras / education methods not conducive to learning (ex : multiple class levels all combined in one single daara)
Difficulties in finding a job after studies at the daara are complete
Lack of teaching materials

DAY 2: Here were the community members’ recommendations for next steps:

Send committees to raise awareness and train all Kolda villages and communities in daara modernization
Set standards for marabouts
Identify all marabouts with talibés in specific zones (daara mapping)
Raise awareness among Koranic masters; encourage them to accept the merging of daaras
Conduct trainings with Koranic masters of the same zone
Discuss child rights with marabouts and communities
Equitable geographical distribution of modern daaras constructed by the State
Call to action for communities and Senegalese Government (need support for projects)
Harmonization of interventions (need collaboration of all entities working towards child protection / daara modernization / education)
Establish a daara in each village / town / community to prevent talibés being sent elsewhere (child trafficking)
Bring together small community daaras to form a large modern daara