Madrassa seeks to unite Afghans

LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan | Situated along the dusty outskirts of Helmand’s capital, the newly built madrassa sits like an island between opposing armadas.

On one side: Reformists who want to remake Afghanistan into a modern state while maintaining its identity as a deeply pious Islamic republic.

On the other: Militants who are resistant to modernity and unwilling to compromise their interpretations of Islam.

The government-run Central Darul Hifaz madrassa, or religious school, is hardly alone in that it is caught between two very different Afghanistans.

All across Helmand, a powder-keg southern province that borders the far southwestern Pakistani province of Baluchistan, groups are struggling to reconcile, unite and rebuild institutions and infrastructure after more than 30 years of war.

At the same time, the region faces the buildup of U.S. and international troops and predictions of an intensified conflict as the Taliban refortifies itself here and across great swaths of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“The only way to solve our problems is to unite Afghans,” says the madrassa’s 28-year-old headmaster, Hafiz Abdul Hadi. “This means everyone: the Taliban, the government and the tribes.”

Education in Afghanistan and Pakistan is complicated and leaves most children behind.

While some schools here in Lashkar Gah must deal with a surge in students from rural areas, where buildings have been destroyed or forcibly closed by the Taliban, a relatively small percentage of children provincewide ever make it into a classroom. According to the provincial education office, the number of students attending schools last year dropped by more than half, to 54,000. There are an estimated 245,000 youths in Helmand.

Central Darul Hifaz is one of the few madrassas here to provide classes in math, science and literature, in addition to the traditional religious instruction, which is seen as one way to get more students into school because, as Mr. Hadi says, “the Taliban and the government both approve of this type of education.”

The school day runs from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., Saturday through Thursday. During a recent visit, about 25 young men and boys with prayer caps atop their heads sat against a cement wall along a red carpeted floor. They perched over Korans that sat on low wooden desks. Many of the students swayed in rhythm to the verses they were reciting in classical Arabic as sunlight streamed into the room.

The madrassa originally was founded in Baluchistan in southwestern Pakistan by displaced Afghans in the 1990s. It was relocated and opened in Lashkar Gah last June. Helmand’s governor, Gulab Mangal, says the government invested the equivalent of about $48,000 to rebuild it to introduce a more moderate interpretation of Islam in an attempt to help stem extremism in the region.

The madrassa is free to students, and even provides room and board for 700 of its 1,000 students in the first through seventh grades. The boarding option is attractive to many because it also removes some of the financial strains families face just feeding everyone.

Most pupils come from impoverished towns and villages across Helmand, and the school’s staff of about 40 teachers is aware militants may try to enlist some of the students to take up arms against the government when they return home.

“Of course, we worry that they may be recruited to fight once they return to their villages,” Mr. Hadi said. “We try to teach them that the gun is not the solution.” Teachers also worry their students won’t find work after leaving school or graduating the 12th grade, given an estimated unemployment rate in the country of at least 40 percent.

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