Life at the physically challenged colony in Karmajiji, a slum in Abuja, is tough. It is a tale of diseases, deaths and abject poverty. Many residents of the area survive on alms begging.
Government enforcement teams are on their heels daily in a bid to rid the city of nuisances. They are driven to the hinterland and left at the mercy of a few good spirited people.
Without a stable source of income and the physical requirement to engage in certain jobs, they rely on donations from well-meaning people to survive.
At the colony for disabled persons in Karmajiji, a slum located few kilometres from the Abuja’s City Gate behind the National Park, it is tale of diseases, deaths and poverty.
Their houses are made from zinc and wooden materials. Drainages are channeled within the shanties while most of the houses are constructed near septic tanks. The chief’s house, school, mosque are among the few houses in the community built from bricks.
During the weekends, about 100 children in tattered clothes, majority of whom are malnourished, play on the football pitch, oblivious of their situation.
In the community, diseases, especially communicable ones ravage due to lack of health centers. While diseases take its toll on the residents, hunger bites hard on the other hand. The situation has led to the death of many. Anyone who visits the community with relief materials is seen as a messiah, even though only a few ever get to benefit from such gestures due to the number of residents.
Among the physically challenged is Awalu Iliya, a primary one pupil of about nine years of age. He is in the government school in the community.
Though Iliya walks with crutches, he ensures that he attends school on a daily basis. Speaking with Daily Trust on Sunday, he expressed happiness over the opportunity. He said he hope to become a lawyer some day.
The chief of the Disabled Emirate Council, as the community is also called, Alhaji Mohammed Sulaiman Katsina, lamented the state of the area and urged the government to consider their plight and provide alternative accommodation as well as skills acquisition programmes for the members.
In a bid to desist from begging, some of them leave their abode in Karmajiji to the city where they do menial jobs or hawk stationeries, sell recharge cards, handkerchiefs and key-holders to make ends meet.
Without a stable source of income and the physical requirement to engage in certain jobs, they rely on donations from well-meaning people to survive.
At the colony for disabled persons in Karmajiji, a slum located few kilometres from the Abuja’s City Gate behind the National Park, it is tale of diseases, deaths and poverty.
Their houses are made from zinc and wooden materials. Drainages are channeled within the shanties while most of the houses are constructed near septic tanks. The chief’s house, school, mosque are among the few houses in the community built from bricks.
During the weekends, about 100 children in tattered clothes, majority of whom are malnourished, play on the football pitch, oblivious of their situation.
In the community, diseases, especially communicable ones ravage due to lack of health centers. While diseases take its toll on the residents, hunger bites hard on the other hand. The situation has led to the death of many. Anyone who visits the community with relief materials is seen as a messiah, even though only a few ever get to benefit from such gestures due to the number of residents.
Among the physically challenged is Awalu Iliya, a primary one pupil of about nine years of age. He is in the government school in the community.
Though Iliya walks with crutches, he ensures that he attends school on a daily basis. Speaking with Daily Trust on Sunday, he expressed happiness over the opportunity. He said he hope to become a lawyer some day.
The chief of the Disabled Emirate Council, as the community is also called, Alhaji Mohammed Sulaiman Katsina, lamented the state of the area and urged the government to consider their plight and provide alternative accommodation as well as skills acquisition programmes for the members.
In a bid to desist from begging, some of them leave their abode in Karmajiji to the city where they do menial jobs or hawk stationeries, sell recharge cards, handkerchiefs and key-holders to make ends meet.
In the community, there are sub groups of the blind, crippled and the deaf and dumb. Each group with its specialty fashions survival techniques, as they rely on one another. Alhaji Bala Jubril heads the camp of the visually impaired.
Alhaji Baba spoke through the group’s secretary, Suleiman S. Hammed, who is also visually impaired. He said there were 120 visually impaired men in the community, along with 40 women and 50 children.
He said they lived in a pitiful state and there was very little they could do to help themselves due to their condition.
Despite their poor living condition, some houses in the disabled colony were seen carrying the “red mark” of the Department of Development Control, an indication that they are billed for demolition.
Alhaji Baba said: “The place is not permanent, there was a time they gave us information that they would build a place for us. They took pictures of houses and the people and our families, but up till now, nothing has been done.”
He said the physically challenged persons had been victims of government politics and policies, lamenting that change of government is among factors that affected their relocation.
“The government does not want us to beg, but it is not doing anything to assist us. It is from the money we get from begging that we pay the school fees of our children. There is no potable water in the community and residents rely on vendors who sell a jerry can for N30 and two for N50. But even when we buy water from the vendors, we cannot guarantee its safety, so we are exposed to all sorts of diseases”, he said.
Zakariya Aliu had gone to beg for alms when he got information that his five-year-old son was ill. He spoke to Daily Trust on Sunday, “I was told that he was vomiting and passing stool, and before I could do anything, I lost him”.
He lamented that while he was still mourning the death of that child, his two-year-old son began to exhibit the same symptoms. He said following what happened to the first child, he worked hard to raise money to ensure that the two-year-old got treatment. “Unfortunately, that one also died”, he said. With two wives and 10 children, he said he goes hungry some days just to ensure that his children go to school. He said all his children attended the school in the community and that with the assistance of the assistant headmaster, he only pays half of the school fees.
“There was a time my children spent three years in Zamfara State with relatives, but the moment I heard that they were not in school, I went and brought them back,” he said.
“How many of the disabled people have to die before the government takes action”, queried Hauwa Ahmed-Fari, who was seen at the colony. The philanthropist said it was time people took the plights of the disabled and less-privileged in the society seriously.
While the men are mostly on the streets looking for help, the women are at home. Fatimah Suleiman said the greatest challenge for women in the community was the lack of health care.
Having spent three years in the area, the visually impaired Fatimah said they relied on God to see them through pregnancy because they don’t have the money to attend pre-natal, ante-natal or post-natal clinics.
She said more than 50 children were delivered in the colony in a year and that they only go to the hospital if there are complications.
Sehidu Yahu, apart from being physically challenged, has been living with diabetes for more than five years. He said the little he got from begging is used to manage the illness and as such he is unable to provide for his family.
Yahu recalled that someone took him to the Federal Staff Clinic, but was abandoned before his treatment could be completed. Since then he has been finding it difficult to feed as most cheap food items are now “poisonous” to him due to his ailment.
The chief of the community said that any government intervention without alternative accommodation and skills acquisition will not yield the required results.
Katsina, who spoke through his secretary, Mohammed Dantile, at his palace, urged the government to do something urgent to address the situation.
When contacted, the public relations officer of the Abuja Environmental Protection Board, Samuel Musa, confirmed that the government is aware of the colony, adding that an enlightenment team of the board was in Karmajiji, recently to sensitise the physically challenged persons on government’s plans to rid the city of beggars and street hawkers.
The public relations officer of the Social Development Secretariat of the Federal Capital Territory Administration, Mr. Abuo Ojie, also said the government was aware of the community, but was silent on their plans for the people.
Source: DailyTrust
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