Sierra Leone Telegraph: 19 October 2020:
A BBC News Arabic investigation has uncovered systemic child abuse inside Islamic schools in Sudan. There are nearly 30,000 Islamic schools, known as “khalwas” across Sudan.
The investigation, “The Schools that Chain Boys”, has found that boys as young as five-years-old are routinely chained, shackled and beaten by the “sheikhs”, or religious men in charge of the schools. The investigation also found evidence of sexual abuse.
For 18 months undercover reporter Fateh al-Rahman al-Hamdani – who used to study at a khalwa himself – secretly filmed inside 23 khalwas across Sudan. He found boys shackled and chained and witnessed brutal routine beatings. Many of the children were malnourished and living in squalid conditions, forced to sleep on the floor in extreme heat. Sick children were left without medical help.
From 2018-2020, investigative journalist, Fateh Al-Rahman Al-Hamdani went undercover in 23 different Sudanese Islamic educational institutions, known as khalwas. He witnessed and filmed physical and emotional abuse carried out by the religious men, or sheikhs, in charge of the schools. In 2020, Hamdani released a documentary for BBC News Arabic with video evidence of children from the age of five being shackled, beaten and starved of food and water. He also spoke to some children who accused the sheikhs of sexual abuse, however, they did not appear in the documentary. Hamdani began his research to find evidence for the widespread abuse in Sudanese khalwas in order to expose the sheikhs and their abuse of power. His aim was to create a platform for the vulnerable children who had to endure this abuse.