Al-Shabaab is an Islamic insurgent group based in Somalia which now operates in Kenya as well. Their core group consists of Middle-East educated Somali extremists that were partly funded and armed by al-Qaeda’s chief, Osama bin Laden. The unifying idea of Al-Shabab is the establishment of an Islamic state in Somalia and Kenya, and the opposition of anything Western-backed. This insurgent group has been known to enforce its own harsh interpretation of the Sharia Law, including an opposition to western education and a ban on cooperation with humanitarian agencies delivering aid; leading to hundreds of casualties in the 2007 famine.
Within Somalia, Al-Shabaab has launched multiple attacks on schools, carrying out a mass forceful recruitment drive whereby children are abducted from schools and indoctrinated to serve the militant armed group. In April of 2021, Al-Shabaab effectively introduced a new curriculum for all areas under its control; a curriculum 'free of foreign ideas'. Al-Shabaab continues to argue that Western education serves the interests of 'infidels' and aims to pull children away from the teachings of Islam, therefore warning all involved parties of serious consequences if they continue to send their children to schools. Due to this, education is Somalia has suffered for decades. The country is now known to have some of the lowest enrolment rates in the world.
Not only this, Al-Shabaab has also expanded to Kenya as it began attacking schools and killing teachers in the region, mainly launching a campaign against the recruitment of non-local educators. The armed group also staged an attack that targeted the only university in the entire region, Garissa University College, killing 148 students. The kind of fear this created played right into the extremist group's hands, as the government decided to withdraw all non-local school teachers and evacuated teaching staff from the North-East.
Due to this sectarian strife of sorts, millions of Somalian's and Kenyan's now face a bleak future. Even if this crisis is addressed and dealt with soon, it will take a lot of persuasion to improve security and persuade the teachers to return to the region. However, a good starting point would be an evaluation of the corruption in Somalia and Kenya's security sector, as military force on its own has not proven to be enough. In the meanwhile, local teachers should be trained so as to avoid an interruption in education. There should also be good focus on capacity building for civil society groups, community structures, local leaders and the media which could counter the violent extremism. Finally, and most importantly, deliberate policy action needs to be enacted to put an end to these terror attacks, for once and for all.
Furthermore, going in detail of your comment, you mentioned how religion should always be a personal endeavor, I could not agree more.
In fact, some researchers have gone so far as to claim that high levels of religious observance is actually capable of producing higher educational attainment. In fact, it is education itself which assists in the interpretation of religion. Therefore, to shun it in the name of religion is quite disappointing. Therefore, these radical groups should essentially be promoting education to aid in the accurate interpretation of religion if they truly stand to operate in the name of religion. But sadly, we all know better!!
That's exactly the point Mariam, Islam doesn't deny females or any individual education. The Quran itself Quran commands all Muslims, regardless of gender, to read, think, contemplate, and pursue knowledge. These practices are actually stemming from the lack of education of the leaders of insurgent groups as such. Instead of religion, these things actually stem from ultra-patriarchal power structures and therefore gender-discriminatory policies as a result.
This is the sad reality of most Islamic insurgent groups and what’s worse is how they target schools and innocent lives. Just on the basis that that they view these schools as being anti-Islamic and spreading western values. To them ideas such as women rights and human rights are seen as ‘liberal’ values which deviate from Islamic commandments.
You have highlighted how fundamentally upsetting the situation is in Kenya and the entire notion of children being abducted to serve military armed groups is nerve wracking.
It is truly unfortunate that a lot of these militant Islamic groups have been targeting education. The consequence is the price the children who experience such attacks have to pay. The Taliban and Boko Haram have very similar ideologies that are against Western education as it is deemed sinful. There have been attacks on schools and colleges by all of these armed groups. Not only do children lose their lives as a result, but even those who survive experience severe PTSD and other mental and physical health issues. Parents are scared to send their children to schools which also leads to an increase in child marriages and child labour. It is, therefore, extremely crucial that policies are made to counter…
Its unfortunate to read this but rather than empathy I feel rather more desensitized by it for I can relate this to my own surroundings so well. The millitant ideology of the Lal Masjid group was a similar take with the similar approach, fortunately it was dealt with at the time however these sharia enforcing moments/organizations and their need to expand their political ideology through violence has become so prevalent, in Afghanistan there is the Talibans. In Pakistan, every now and then there comes a conservative political organization for example TLP in the recent past, having the exact same ideology and approach; it appears rather uncertain whether or not it can ever be ended or even controlled and how. And…