In Sokoto, beggars are faring under change mantra

“We were many in this place begging for alms but the current change syndrome in Sokoto state has forced many of our colleagues to retire. They have abandoned begging and joined small businesses in their respective villages,” a 25-year old beggar, Abdullahi Abubakar told Kano Chronicle reporter. Abubakar and his friend Mubarak Sani, both crippled, […]

“We were many in this place begging for alms but the current change syndrome in Sokoto state has forced many of our colleagues to retire. They have abandoned begging and joined small businesses in their respective villages,” a 25-year old beggar, Abdullahi Abubakar told Kano Chronicle reporter.
Abubakar and his friend Mubarak Sani, both crippled, who beg at the entrance of Oasis bakery along Abdullahi Fodiyo road and are no longer getting alms as they used to. They claimed that their daily earnings had dropped by 80 percent.
Another beggar, Nana Bala, 56, said she had been into begging for over seven years and already bought a land with alms money which she was looking for someone to develop for her.
Lamenting over the drop in their daily incomes, she said if she could get someone to build even a room apartment for her she would retire from the business.
“People are not giving out alms like before; some will not even look at you if you approach them. So if I can get someone who can build a room for me, I will go home and rest and start a small business,” she said
She added that she was into the business because she had neither husband nor a child that could look after her and her relatives were poor.
Another female beggar, Hauwa Ibrahim, a native of Nasarawan Burkulu in Zamfara state, said she had three daughters who were happily married in her hometown. When asked if they were aware of what she does for a living, she said “they are not aware of her involvement in begging.
“I am sure they will not be happy with me any time they find out. I always come here under the pretext of seeing my relatives but actually this (begging) is what always brings me the city,” she said.
Hauwa said she got a lot of money from the business and owned some assets in her village including animals.
Their method of begging differed depending on their sexes and or ages. The females claim losing husbands with the burden of looking after children.
For the child beggars, whenever they approach people they would simply say “help me with money to buy a peer of slippers” which they will never buy even if they have collected the money. Some of the beggars go round mosques and hospitals with medical bill some of which dated years back seeking for alms from people.
Sokoto state is known as a safe heaven for beggars. The trend has defied many solutions including the monthly stipend of N6,500 for each beggar and the Almajiri Integrated School introduced by the immediate past administration and sustained by the present administration in the state.
These were in addition to the provision of skills acquisition centers for destitute where they receive training in various trades and supported with equipments after passing out in order to be self reliant.
The programmes which were aimed at taking beggars off the streets however did little in this regards, as there was upsurge of beggars at public places such as hospitals, government offices, roundabouts, hotels, eateries, and mosques.
The Chairman, Sokoto state Zakkat and endowment Committee, Malam Lawal Maidoki, said the committee had disbursed over N400m to physically-challenged persons and orphans from June to November this year.
He said over N200m of the money was used to pay beggars their monthly allowances. Although some of the beggars interviewed by our reporter said they had not been benefiting from the state government N6,500 monthly allowances, the trend of begging has declined in the state in the last few months.
A public commentator, Malam Abubakar Umar said many people were motivated into begging simply because it was attached to Islam which promotes compassion.
 He said: “Of course some of the beggars had pronounced disabilities and helping them attracts huge reward from God, but others were just into it to make money.”
On why the beggars are not getting more alms nowadays, Umar said: “they must have  experienced decline in their incomes because givers themselves have to contend with current dwindling of economy in the country.”
He therefore recommended that effort should be made to capture the disable in the FG’s N5,000 monthly stipends so that it would augment the existing 6,500 monthly allowance given to them by the Sokoto State government.
“Government should create an enabling environment that would motivate people to be able to help themselves so that the able bodied who engage in begging will quit. If this is done then it should be complemented by preaching from religious leaders on how religion frowns at unnecessary begging,” he said.
Umar advised the state government to upgrade the kind of training which government of the past offered the disable such as rope making so that their product would enjoy the fancy and proper patronage in this era of modernity because plastic had taken over the traditional agric input product most of these disabled were acquainted with like mats, rope, hat and other household items.
However, Governor Aminu Waziri Tambuwal explained that the state of emergency which was declared on education was in line with his government’s resolutions to end street begging in the state.
He said that the emergency regime encapsulates the necessity of enlisting the support of the parents so that their wards would cravet go school, ‘’instead of loitering about begging and under utilizing their God-given capacities.
“It is most likely any member of our citizens taken to school is
at the same taken out of the Almajiranci syndrome,” he said.