(ERGO) – Sahra Mohamed Hussein, 25, a single mother of two living in southern Somalia’s Jowhar town, suspended her university studies with a heavy heart when her uncle stopped sending her the fees.
Sahra’s uncle, who lives in England, had to close the small restaurant he owns there at the end of March due to Coronavirus restrictions.
He used to send Sahra the monthly 50 dollar tuition fees for her course in public administration at Jobkey university. Her uncle encouraged her to start university just after the birth of her first baby and to pursue her ambition of getting a good job to better the lives of her children.
“I have not submitted the final paper yet, nor have I completed the courses,” Sahra told Radio Ergo despondently.
“I am just waiting for money to cover all the fees…perhaps it will happen after this Covid19 is over.”
Sahra earns around earns $2 a day from tailoring at Hantiwadag market in Jowhar town. She does her sewing outside without shelter from the sun or rain, as she cannot afford to rent her own stall.
These small earnings supplement the $25 monthly support from her ex-husband, the father of her four-year-old daughter and two-year-old son, but its barely enough to cover all their needs.
She will also have to find about $400 to cover the graduation and certification costs that have to be paid before a student may sit the final exams.
Coronavirus has halted the dreams of many young Somalis, especially when it comes to education.
Mohamed Abdullahi Hussein, 17, missed last term’s exams because his family failed to pay school fee arrears of $69. He is a secondary school student in form two and was also relying on an overseas relative to support him.
Mohamed’s sister was working as a maid for two families in Saudi Arabia and managed to pay fees for him, a younger sister, as well as monthly housekeeping of for the family of five, amounting to $300.
But the sister’s employers in Saudi Arabia told her not to come back to work until the pandemic is over and they stopped paying her salary.
“My monthly school fees are $13 and my sister’s are $10. We haven’t paid for three months,” Mohamed said. “My classmates have paid their fees and are moving ahead, but I’m stuck now.”
Mohamed and his family returned to Somalia three years ago, after being repatriated from war-torn Yemen where they had been living as refugees.
Many committed Somali parents are doing whatever they can, including taking loans to pay for their children’s school fees, despite the huge challenges.
Mohammed Ali Afrah, a farmer in Jowhar, has two daughters in class six and seven of primary school and a son in form four of secondary school. He told Radio Ergo that his farm was submerged by the flooding of the river Shabelle in May and he lost his entire sesame crop.
He borrowed the $99 he needed from a relative who owns a shop, to cover the past three months of school fees for his children.
“I had to pay, otherwise my children would not be allowed to continue with the exams,” he said.
However, he is worried about the outcome of the exams because the schools have been closed due to Coronavirus lockdown and they did not receive any tutoring or revision classes.
