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Originally posted by mansasulu

It is totally fine if you have no wish to learn, study or care about islam. Your absolute right and choice. At the same time, if you keep on trying to play the role of "innocent moderator" in topics you claim to have no interesting or care about it exposes your true intentions.

To reiterate, I am totally fine with what ever people choose to believe in and that includes you. For some reason, you seem to have a problem with stuff you claim to have no interest in. What I will not stand by and watch is people peddling lies and false statements against islam just because they dont believe in it. This is exactly what Tamsier has been engaging in and you are becoming his enabler. LIVE AND LET LIVE.

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Originally posted by tamsier

What lies are you talking about? These children are being treated like slaves by the adults who are suppose to be teaching them islam. Can't you see the problem?

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Originally posted by mansasulu

Kay, in your friend's case did they have to pay tuition for the kids to attend the quranic school? Just curious... I am not in any way disputing the problems you highlighted in the lack of "food, love, hygiene, and sanitation." This may well be the case. However to present the case as "...a side of islam in our region no one wants to discuss..." as Tamsier is claiming is disingenious. We should talk about these problems for what they really are.

These are societal problems not islamic problems. I think it is very important we distinguish between the two. Just to give you an example, I spent numerous rainy seasons in the Kiang around the areas straddling the Gambia, Senegal boarder. To this day I still have relatives there. In those days, proper food, hygiene and sanitation were lacking. We spent herding cows and sheep on an empty stomach all day. All they had were not even pit laterines but holes in the ground. Today, they are better off in so much so that they have flush commodes and don't engage in farming anymore. I was not even a teenager then but I enjoyed it. Today I credit that experience for beinga valuable character building tool for me.

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Originally posted by kayjatta

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Originally posted by mansasulu


I like many other people here studied how to read the Quran from other people besides our parents. My oustas's name (may Allah have mercy on him) is Sellu Jallow. He was a firewood seller from Guinea who never charged a single butut, nor sent anyone on the streets to beg. He sold his firewood and fed his family till the day he died. It is because of examples of such unmeasured selflessness that I have an enormous amount of respect for the Fulas. In my case, Sellu lived in my neighbourhood so all I had to do was show up three times a day and learn how to read the quran free of charge. May Allah reward him abundantly

The Almudu problem today however started in totally different circumstances. The original almudus worked together with their masters or members of the master's original family members fully in tow on their masters farms as a way of paying for their way towards getting their education. This is subsistence farming going on here not any form of commercial farming. The proceeds of these farms are used to feed and clothe the family in which the almudu now fully belonged in. Such an arrangement was feasible to all parties because of the level of poverty in those days. There was nothing like monetary tuition in those days.

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I didn't pay tuition for 'Dara' either. It was all free, well largely. It was like one day in a month or two when all of us the students would go help the Oustass in whatever work he was doing at the time. It was not only us; all his family-wives and kids would be around helping too. So it wasn't backbreaking or degrading work either. But he didn't have to lodge or feed us, we return to our parents everyday after classes.
But by the time I entered high school, my interest in religion was on a free fall. I did drop religious studies in high school, partly because I thought I already knew what was being taught and partly because I was losing interest.
So I cannot share belief in Tamsier's 'Serere Animism'. I think it is outdated, and has no substance in either science or reality. But that is just my opinion.
There are still some respected Gambian scholars, in the SIC, who accept children from across the country into a boarding establishment in very struggling circumstances where food, love, hygiene, and sanitation remain in short supply. I have a friend who could not resist snatching his younger brother away from one of these schools far away in the Kombos against the will of his parents. Another friend's mother cries all day whenever she visits her son in one of these faraway places, but could not bring the little boy home for fear of the wrath of her husband.
My concern is that we must not try to brush these problem under the carpet by arguing that it is "regional" or that it is "Tam and Touby"'s crusade (the 'Terrible Two'), or that the practice is separate from Islam and Muslims. As long as these parctice operates under the facade of islamic studies and by people who present themselves in society as Muslims and Muslim scholars (whether they are many or not, and whether they are from Guinea or elsewhere),the problem will continue to haunt muslims in the Gambia. Gambian Christians do not have this problem as such, but I am aware that child homelessness and "street children" are a problem in other countries too especially in Latin America. The fact that (the acclaimed sociologist and the Gambia's foremost intellectual), Halifa Sallah's experience has corroborated this story requires us to focus on solutions rather than bickering.
Any solutions?

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