The first time I heard about the kidnappings of schoolgirls in Nigeria was on Twitter, when the headline came up in my feed. I told my best friend about it and she was pretty surprised because she didnt know about it yet. We searched online so she could read the story and when she finished the one about the Boko Haram leader she was like: This man is insane. Its inhumane. We read on CNN that the Boko Haram leader said he would sell the girls because in his dream thats what Allah told him to do. I feel really bad for the girls, and insecure now because Im a student and a girl too. I feel like I have to be more guarded and careful. And, you know, it is also heartbreaking for me that Muslims can get really wrong ideas about our God. They are giving Islam a bad name. Its not just Boko Haram, but al-Qaida too. They use our religion to justify abducting schoolgirls and being terrorists. I think they have misconceptions about Islam. Sometimes it happens here in Indonesia too. Some Muslims here think it is OK to burn churches or temples because they believe that Christians and Buddhists are wrong. But actually they are the ones that are wrong. In the holy book, the Quran, it says that we should not discriminate against people. I know from the Quran, from my religion, that it also does not say that women can be sold or anything like that. In Indonesia not all Muslim women are educated and maybe they dont fully understand about the emancipation of women. I know in other countries they say ladies first, but in Indonesia if you want to be put first or put on the same stage as men then you have to act tough. In Indonesia maybe only half of the population believes that education is important. If a family doesnt have enough money to send all their children to school the boy gets first preference. That is a traditional thought here, because they think he will be the one that can earn money. Fortunately that is not the case for me, or any of my friends. The only pressure I have felt from my family is when some of my uncles tried to encourage me to study science more so I can be a doctor or technician. But Im majoring in social sciences instead because I want to study law. My mum is a lawyer too. A girl must get a schooling because she can build herself and be independent. An educated girl can do good to her parents and her children in future. I can say that an uneducated girl is worthless. Personally, schooling can provide me with an honourable job in future and will help me raise my children in a good manner who can be successful members of the society. As for the benefit of schooling to parents, an educated girl can be a source of pride to them. The girl can help parents by decently raising her siblings. As for the society, it will continue to be productive when it has educated girls. Society will develop when it contains female doctors and engineers. I do not feel threatened by any kind of patriarchal attitude as my educated parents push me to continue schooling until I finish my college education. Personally, mixing with men is not an obstacle and I do not mind working or studying with men. It is true that some parents prevent girls from education when they study or are taught by men. My comment on the kidnapping of the Nigerian girls: I can say that this is terrorism which has nothing to do with Islam. My religion does not prevent girls from schooling, rather encourages girls to study. Going to school is important to me because I want to be chief prosecutor of the international criminal court, like Fatou Bensouda. We need more justice in Africa. My school was closed for nearly two years when the jihadists occupied Timbuktu. They used the school as a firing range and chopped up the desks for firewood. The men who have taken the Nigerian schoolgirls are the same types as we had here. You cannot called them Muslims. They are just criminals. We had thought they were nice people but what we saw went far beyond the limits of Islam. They raped and beat girls. There were unwanted pregnancies. If they saw a girl who was not properly dressed they would take her away to the prison. I never went to their prison but I heard there was a mattress in the prison with a blanket and a mosquito net, and when they had finished with the girl they would send her home. People thought she had been imprisoned but actually she had been raped. My father, who is a Marabout [traditional Muslim preacher, considered heretical by fundamentalists], made me and my four sisters stay at home. We did household chores and read the Quran. If we went out it was for quick errands, never after dark. We had to wear those big veils that they imposed on us. Our father told us to pray day and night for the liberation of Timbuktu. Our prayers were answered when the French came. School is important but even in peacetime we do not have the equipment and means – like electricity or computers – to study to high standards. During the occupation, one of my teachers organised secret lessons at his house. He was very brave because he taught girls and boys together. But he had to stop after the jihadists came to his house one day. We went back to school in November last year but my school has only six teachers and more than 1,000 pupils. A few weeks before we went back to school there was a suicide car bombing on the army barracks just 100 metres from Bahadou. Flying debris punched a hole in the roof. It was them again. We are still frightened. Even now there are regular rumours that a jihadist pick-up has been seen or whatever. When that happens we are all sent home. It is easier to be a boy than a girl. Many girls get married really young. If they want to continue to go to school they have to defy their husbands. That is a sin so you would not do it. Marriage is a gift from God but if you are a girl you must resist it for as long as possible. I dream of being a doctor when I grow up so I must study. In the Pashtun community to which I belong, even today, many girls my age are not allowed to study. I feel lucky to have parents who work hard so I can. I think education can bring about change in the mindset of the people, hopefully in the next generations. When I grow up, I want to be free … to wear what I like, to move about without restrictions, be able to drive a scooter, go to work, be independent and not be stuck at home. I think that can only come if I and all the girls in Pakistan get education. We will be stronger and have a more powerful voice and the government will then have to pay heed. I think if I continue my education I can be whatever I want. I really wish Pakistan could be a more women-friendly place where perpetrators are punished for their crimes, especially those who do bad things to girls – like rape. I recently saw on television how a girl set herself on fire after the police set the accused free. It is lack of education that has led to the way our society views a girl – just someone who needs to be married off. Even girls, once they reach my age, begin to think of marriage. Little do they or their parents know the value of a girl. To think of an army of men kidnapping so many girls, its horrific. What would their parents be going through? I just shudder to think if I were in their place. Even if some people hate girls going to schools, I dont feel scared. I know the Taliban think seeking western education is against Islam, but they are so wrong. How can any form of education be harmful? In any case we are taught Islamiyat [Islamic teachings] in school. After what happened to Malala [Yousafzai], I know they can attack me or anyone they take a dislike to, but I dont quite feel scared or threatened. Many people say having sons is luckier and that daughters are a burden but that is not the case in my home. I love cricket and want to be a cricketer too. I play in school and I dont think its a sport only for boys. I would love to play cricket on the street like boys in my neighbourhood do. I envy them but that is just not a done thing here, at least not in my neighbourhood and that is when I feel being a girl is a disadvantage in Pakistan. I go to school because I want to make good use of my life. Knowledge is essential, especially now that the world revolves around those who have been educated. I have seen how some women who have not gone to school are suffering, because they cant read or write. I dont want to be like them, despite the odds. I want to be able to make my own way in the world without being a burden on anyone. I dream of being able to help myself and even those around me. Schooling is now the major guarantee of getting a good life. Going to school is also a process of personal progress. I want to be able to pass on things I learn to my children. It really upsets me [to think of the missing girls]. I keep thinking about how scary it must be and how the students are being treated now. These were girls like me who have parents, sisters and brothers who had hopes for them. The thing that brings it home is that, like me, they were also sitting their WAEC [West Africa Examinations Council] exams. Im already planning what to do after my exams. Those girls must have been thinking the same things. Now everything they were working towards has been destroyed. We go to school and come back peacefully. But the biggest difference is the uncertainty of our dreams. A lot of my classmates have been married off. Some parents marry off their daughters even while theyre in school as a way of reducing their burden, or because they dont want the girls getting big ideas about the future. Some husbands dont allow their wives to continue going to school. The problem is this: you dont know when this marriage is coming. You dont know when your education might be cut short. For most women, marriage cuts education short, whereas boys are allowed to go to university Education makes you know about the rest of the world. Without it its like you are in one country, in one house alone, sitting in one room, and you dont know even whats happening in the next room. The first word that God told the prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) was Iqraa, which means learn or study. God told him that you have to study. So Islam never said that education is forbidden for women or for men, in fact Islam obliges us to learn. Even if you dont think of religious reasons, you cant be just in one corner of the world and not know about the rest – its like you came to this world for nothing. My sisters, except one who is a dentist, all went abroad for their university. My uncles told my mother: You are a non-Muslim, you became a Christian, because your girls are studying abroad. But my mother doesnt care what people say. She is proud of us and my school [School of Leadership Afghanistan]. And I am really proud of my mother. My father died when I was one and she raised and educated us all on her own. You shouldnt have someone come and tell you not to go to school. Its actually none of their business. If we dont know anything, if we dont get an education, then how can we improve? In the world maybe just one person can change so many things. If you stop them getting an education what might you be preventing? Why are [Boko Haram] interrupting these girls lives, ruining their lives? I just cant believe that somebody could do a thing like that. I think that group, maybe they want to get money by kidnapping the girls, so with that money they can expand. If he [the leader] would think about his mother and his sisters he would not do this kind of thing. Hes like someone who does not have a brain, doing something that no human can do. I think of those girls who were kidnapped, how much pressure they must be under. If I was one of them, the only thing I would think about after I was released would be revenge. That would make me do so many things, even kill someone maybe. Those girls will say: This is what Islam is, because that is what [Boko Haram] told them. They are just going to hate Islam after they are found. But the Holy Quran said that education is an obligation.
Posted on: Fri, 09 May 2014 07:53:05 +0000
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