“The courses will formally start in January, but registration is open. I will study communication sciences, I want to be a journalist”, said Mohammed Bashir Sheikh, a Somali refugee from the Dadaab refugee camp, speaking to MISNA about the forthcoming opening of a branch of Kenyatta University.
“This is the first project for the opening of a university in a refugee camp,” says Bashir Sheikh, blogger and head of an internet center in Dadaab, which, with its 470,000 residents, is the third largest city in Kenya and the largest refugee camp in the world.
“I arrived in Dadaab when I was four and a half years old. I have lived more time here than in my hometown of Kismayo, in Somalia,” says the 25-year old blogger to MISNA, noting that “the establishment of a university in a refugee camp restores hope for many young people who live such that they might be able to build a different future.”
The University of Dadaab accepts two thirds of the students from the refugee camp and one third from the people of the local villages, not to exacerbate already existing tensions between the two communities, fueled by the continued expansion of the Camp in the territory. In 2011 alone, the population of Dadaab after the Somali conflict and the severe drought that hit the Horn of Africa rose by 160,000 units, or one-third of the total.
Foreign donors will be allowed through special programs to pay for classes to young people who show particular propensity to study.
“Education is like food and water. It must be recognized as a right for these kids who know only war and misery. Instead, more of them are dropping out and for those who remain classrooms are overcrowded, with more than a hundred children per classroom,” said the blogger. The university will offer degrees and master in economics, sociology and literature. “We hope it acts as an incentive for young people to continue studying – sighs Bashir Sheikh – and not to abandon the dream of a better future.”
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