Afghanistan: Secret schools a way for Afghan women to get their right to education
After the Taliban decided to close the doors of secondary schools to female students, a large number of female activists attempted to establish online classes. However, Homeyra Qaderi, a former advisor to the Afghan Ministry of Education, believes that this kind of secret education means keeping women away from society.
She says that there is no secret education that can replace public schools. She says that girls are still deprived of the road to higher education and cannot pass university entrance exams. “Secret education can help girls from a psychological point of view, but from a logical point of view, these schools are not the answer to today’s conditions,” she said. More than a year ago, Afghanistan’s high schools for girls were closed under the Taliban, a decision allegedly stemming from Islamic law but originally a culture of the extremist movement, but the girls didn’t stop trying to learn, and women set up secret schools to educate a generation.
Taliban lies
The Taliban gave various reasons for closing girls’ schools. At first, it was religiously stated, but after local and international pressure, they said that female students’ clothes should be compatible with Islam, which is not a logical reason. Later, they said that the reason was cultural and implied that the Pashtuns – the people who control the south and east and who are mostly descended from the Taliban – do not want adult girls to go to school, Canada’s The Star newspaper said. It went on to say that the closures affect international relations.
Western officials explicitly said that progress in women’s rights and opening schools is a major factor in bringing the Taliban closer to the billions of dollars prohibited in the United States. A senior diplomat from the Taliban in a neighboring country who does not publish his name said: He does not want to close schools, and he admits that girls, including Taliban leaders, His daughter goes to school every day, adheres to all Islamic values, and travels on a school bus for girls.
Taliban spies
The paper published several interviews with some Afghan girls. In the morning, Shagova covers herself from head to toe with a burka and heads to school. As she makes her way, she tries to make sure no one sees her. After all, she goes to a secret school, the 16-year-old goes to a public school with dreams of becoming a journalist. But the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan has seen the return of girls being prevented from going to high school or studying journalism. Shagova – not her real name – travels through the streets of Kabul every day in fear of Taliban spies, a group with a record of torture and imprisonment of women activists, “there is such fear that I think everyone is looking for me and I have to be careful,” she says. She talks passionately as if she suffered intense pain when asked, “What do you want from the Taliban?”, “We don’t have any demands from them,” Shagova replied. “They are lying and they didn’t come to power through the vote of the people. They are occupying our country by force. The Taliban are neither Islamic nor cultural, but primitive,” she said, “We ask the international community to put pressure on the Taliban, not to legitimize a terrorist regime by carpet-making red under their feet and sending weekly bags of money to them,” she said. “Bahar,” a math teacher at the Shagova School in the capital who was a third-grade student in administration and business at Kabul University, initially says that after the Taliban decided to close the girls’ schools, she felt helpless and hopeless, but she hung on some hope. Bahar and some other friends decided to provide a secret place to teach the girls, barely looking like a school – a room with a carpet, a few chairs, a white board and some pens, to study for three days a week. She and her 15 students wait, starting at 10 a.m. every morning and continuing until noon, checking each girl’s window, then opening the door to let them in.
