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TITLE: Taliban Forbid Girls From Attending Schools, and Women From Teaching |
AUTHOR: Cristiana L'homme |
PUB: Iran News |
DATE: January 28, 2001 |
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The little girls sit on the ground in rows of seven, studious and concentrated. Dressed in bright colors, they wear a white scarf over their heads according to a centuries-old tradition for girls in Afghanistan. One wall has been painted to serves as a blackboard. In their laps, they have a single black notebook which has to last for the whole term, and in their hands they hold lead pencils. Yet the sparkle in the eyes of these 6 to 12 years old unquestionably reflects their thirst for learning. The decree prohibiting small girls from attending school was announced by the ruling Taliban in 1996. But it hasn't discouraged the girls from their lessons. On the contrary, the girls' parents found another solution: since the schools had rejected their daughters, they set up schools inside their own houses, in the shadow of the high sun-baked earth walls, sheltered from oppression. These are now known as "home schools." The girls weren't the only ones to suffer when their schools shut: the female teachers were out of a job too. Banned from working by the Ministry of Education, the women lost their monthly wage of $8. Misery and drought ravage Afghanistan, and the rules of life imposed upon women are so strict that the teachers cannot find work elsewhere. Some joined an association of teachers which buys Persian-language books in neighboring Pakistan, in order to teach the girls basic reading, writing and arithmetic. The chosen textbooks, written and illustrated by Afghan refugees in Pakistan, are basically copies of books dating from before the war. However, unlike the old book, these new publications have no images of weapons. During the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan many books taught basic math by adding and subtracting images of Kalashnikovs. taught basic math by adding and subtracting images of Kalashnikovs. The books get to Afghanistan with the help of one of the teacher's associations which works with AFRANE, a Franco-Afghan association which has contributed to schooling and agriculture in Afghanistan for more than 20 years. UNESCO has provided financial and logistical assistance to AFRANE including a meeting held at headquarters in Paris on "Afghan Women Across the History of Afghanistan." Each year, a volunteer from AFRANE goes to Afghanistan to monitor progress and evaluate the needs of some 60 home schools in Kabul. This year it was Farida Kama, an Afghan who has not returned to her country for 20 years, who made the trip via Peshawar (northwest Pakistan). She crossed the Afghan-Pakistani frontier "with no trouble at all," she said. "When a woman is wearing a veil, no one would think of asking her to remove it. It is common to see women coming and going across the frontier where controls are in existent." Once in Kabul, she organized a meeting of those responsible for AFRANE home schools in two popular districts where 60 classes are conducted daily by 54 teachers. "The teachers have a tremendous urge to pass on what they know to these girls," says Kamal. "They do the job very well, in two languages - Pashto and Afghan Persian (Dari). But they are not all professionals. Some of them have only a school-leaver's degree or slightly better." In any case, the desire to learn on the part of the girls and their parents is so great that the teachers are totally committed. Nonetheless, the need for further pedagogical training is urgent. When the home schools project began, it was envisaged that parents would be asked to pay 20 cents (U.S.) a month for the classes. "However, there are only one or two girls in each class whose parents can afford this kind of tuition fee. Were we going to send the others home because they would have been absurd," says Kamal. "The girls arrived well before classes began, and each time we were unable to respond to all the demands," she says. "My mission was to set up 24 classes and I ended up opening 31." In this country where "all joy seems to have disappeared, because the population is victim to constant negotiation and help which never arrives, as well as eternal wars, these small structures carry incredible hope," says Kamal. As for the Taliban, they turn a blind eye. "They don't authorize the schools but they let them continue," explains Vera Marigo, president of the French-based Center for Research and Studies on Afghanistan, CEREDAF. Thus there is real and accessible hope for the 1200 students involved, because the schools don't cost very much to run - and they already have their $7500 budget for the year 2001.
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