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Schools and Education among Hazaras before and after the War
For over 250 years the Hazara
people in Afghanistan went through extreme sufferings under one of
the most suffocating form of ethnic repression in the world. In
addition to being driven to the verge of physical extinction and
total annihilation as a result of successive waves of large scale
massacres of the Hazara people by the Pushtoon governments of
Afghanistan, they were also systematically denied access to all
means of social mobility, including access to even basic level of
education.
However, in their sufferings of the past 250 years in Afghanistan,
Hazara people have come to a decisive realization that the key to
alleviate their plight in the ethnically repressive
socio-political environment of Afghanistan, is education. They
have consciously concluded that they need to make an all-out
effort to develop the needed infrastructure for building
educational institutions and to provide quality schooling
opportunities for their youth as the most effective way to attain
their civil rights in Afghanistan.
A comparison of the almost non-existing schooling opportunities in
the Hazara populated areas of Afghanistan during the ethnic
tyranny of pre-1978, to the educational infrastructure that
emerged after 1978 due to Hazaras' determination and based
entirely on scares indigenous resources, demonstrates a startling
difference. For example, in the entire densely-populated Jaghuri
district, with an estimated pre-1978 population of 150,000, there
was only one run-down middle school, only in nominal terms, before
the 1978 war. But now the same district is endowed with more than
10 high schools and over 200 elementary and middle schools, with
the whole educational network developed indigenously with the
support of local resources.
The same story of
success resonates throughout Hazarajaat, thanks entirely to the
Hazara people's strong dedication to the cause of education and
their vigorous efforts in mobilizing their minuscule resources
despite the harsh poverty in Hazarajaat. Hazara public
mobilization, in conjunction with the decisive leadership role of
Hezb-e Wahdat, produced an extensive educational infrastructure
all across Hazarajaat that features an impressive figure of close
to 2000 schools, covering all levels of education from elementary
schools to well-established high schools.
Moreover, Hezb-e Wahdat, with its outstanding leadership role and
its unwavering commitment to the establishment of ethnic justice
in Afghanistan, took a giant step and responded to Hazara people's
ultimate
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wish for an institution of higher education. In 1996,
despite severe lack of financial resources and the Taliban
onslaught from the South, Hezb-e Wahdat founded the University of
Bamian, in the provincial capital of Bamian province, to provide
the Hazara people the much needed opportunity for higher
education.
Unfortunately, the Taliban destroyed the University of Bamian and
burned it to ashes after they overrun Hazarajaat in 1998. The
dogmatic Taliban also tried to destroy the whole educational
infrastructure in occupied Hazarajaat by demolishing the schools
and banning education. The Taliban further tried to suppress the
Hazaras' quest for education by starving the entire Hazara
population to death through a systematic implementation of a
well-documented scorch-earth policy.
The occupation of Hazarajaat by the barbaric Taliban was
definitely a serious setback to the educational aspirations of
Hazara people, but then with the collapse of the Taliban and the
return of the popular Hezb-e Wahdat, hopes have been revived
again. Hazaras' determination in empowering themselves by
acquiring education and knowledge not only promises a bright
future for this historically oppressed people, but also entails a
harmonious and prosperous future for Afghanistan as a whole.
Now, we would like to invite our
site-visitors to study the following information about schools and
educational possibilities for Hazara people inside Hazarajaat,
Afghanistan.
by:
Obaid Nejati
To
see the list of Schools, click here... |
