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There Is Ability
In Disability By
Fatima
Muhammad Audu
Today, street begging has become so rampant which is found especially in the third world and developing countries. Over the years, it has become an occupation that is growing as more people have decided to go into begging as a means of survival. In those days, the disabled roam the streets begging for food, money, clothes, etc. But today reverse is just the case both able men and women have ventured into this activities of begging.
It is surprising when you see a young, healthy and strong person on the street begging for money. Such beggars have given up in life even though they have what it takes to be self-employed. Honestly, it is a thing of concern and its very annoying when you see such people moving around the street and begging for money.
Street begging is not only common in Nigeria, but also exist in some developed countries like Brazil, Mexico, Bolivia, etc.
It is difficult to generalize how and where pan handling begins in the lives of beggars. Some are born into a begging family while some are “almajirai” who do it to be alive. Beggars are been categorized into different categories, but they all carry out their activities virtually in the same way.
There
are beggars that beg for specific things. These type of beggars usually
reject any other thing For example, a boy was begging for money and
someone offered him food. He .rejected it and said, "I only want money to
buy slippers”.
There
are also beggars who just found themselves in a family which as into the
tradition of begging. You will see physically fit women begging on the
streets with healthy and strong looking children. When you ask them the
reason you begging, they tell you that it is a tradition they themselves
were born into.
There
is also some category of children who are not really from a poor
background, but because of improper home training and their socialization
with other street beggars, they tend to involve themselves in begging.
The
common beggars are mostly "almajirai" (Sangaya students) who consider
begging as the only means of earning a living. They are found on the
street moving from house to house looking for left over food instead of
being in school. While on the one hand, they are supposed to be taken care
of by the teacher (Mallam). wealthy individuals and the government are
expected to cater for the students but they are neglected. The number of
beggars on the street is on increase, this can be connected with the
willingness of people to render financial assistance to street beggars. If
people don't patronize these beggars by giving them money, the business
will not be lucrative and that will make them go into other meaningful
business. Beggars have even adopted some ways of attracting the attention
of the passer by so that they get financial assistance. Some go to the
extent of pretending to be disabled or taking injuries just because they
want to get assistance.
Disabled beggars should learn that there is ability in disability. Because
they are disabled does not guaranteed them that they cannot achieve their
goals in life. We have seen disabled people who go into sports and
becoming successful athletes. There are disabled people that are using
their talent to make a living. Going into profession like music, painting,
drawing, acting, etc are all occupations, which one can go in to and
become successful.
Children are also greatly affected by the begging syndrome. Instead of
them to be in school so as to work hand and become successful persons in
the society, they spend the entire day on the street, come rain, comes
sunshine they never give up. All they do is serve as leads to those blind
and crippled beggars. A big question we should pose to ourselves is: what
becomes of the potentials and future of these children?
Generally, the elderly, the disabled and the unemployed take to begging.
Street children may not necessarily be homeless or without families, but
who live in situations where there is no protection, supervision, or
direction from responsible adults.
In
countries like Bolivia, statistics has shown that there are nearly ten
thousand children living on the street neglected and with no one to look
after them. For those children, daily life is a continuous fight for
survival. They have to battle against starvation, diseases and misery.
Also in Brazil, it has been estimated that the number of beggars range
from 7-8million and also children aged 5-8 are commonly found begging on
the streets. Numerous scientific research and media stories have reported
the widespread of the use of marijuana and cocaine among street children.
In
Nigeria today, the number of beggars is increasing geometrically because
of the number of disabled we have. Most of them have lost hope because of
their disabilities, therefore, they join the business of begging. Most of
these disabilities start at birth because the children grew up
malnourished from infancy and they survive on a grossly deficient diet
thus, because disabled in one-way or the other.
Adult
begging has a great impact on the present day society. This is because,
these beggars moving from one street to the other are supposed to be
placed somewhere they can acquire skills like tailoring, carpentry, etc so
as to improve the living standard of every citizen in the country.
A
beggar had an accident on the 26th of August,2006 at the Post Office in
Maiduguri by the roadside, while taking him to the hospital, a wallet fell
from his pocket. The wallet was opened, anticipating to see his contact
address, but to people's surprise, huge sum of money that was up to Twenty
Thousand Naira was found. The people were so surprised. A beggar with
Twenty Thousand Naira of his own and still begging for
The
need for beggars to be wiped off our streets should be emphasized. Some of
these disabled beggars beg in the daytime and at nights. They serve as
informants to armed robbers. Sometime last year, the police in Maiduguri
arrested a disabled beggar. The man is a beggar but also specialized in
the supply of human beings to ritual killers! While there are some beggars
who spend the money they got from the streets on prostitutes and other
form of extravagancies. Therefore, since these street beggars don't really
contribute positively towards the development of the society, it is of
great importance to wipe them off our streets with the help of government
by training them on skills and provide soft loans for them to start up
some small business.
Although, there have been many proposals and programmes for addressing the
problem of street begging, but it appears that only minimal success has
been achieved.
The
government and other wealthy individuals should set-up skills acquisition
centres that can provide beggars with the chance of acquiring skills so as
to become self-employed. The provision of loans, motorcycles, sewing
machines, grinding machines, etc should be given due consideration so as
to help the underprivileged and beggars in the society. I strongly believe
that this can at least wipe away begging in our society.
Again,
poverty alleviation workshops, seminars and paper presentations are also
programmes introduced so as to reduce the rate of begging and
unemployment.
I am
calling the attention of the government from the federal, state and local
government levels and other wealthy individuals to put these issues into
consideration for the betterment of the Nigerian citizen and the country
at large.
Fatima
Muhammad Audu
Department of Mass Communication
University of Maiduguri E-mail: ummyhayrat@yahoo.co.uk
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