The almajiri child, barefoot and bowl in hand, has become the defining visual of northern Nigeria’s failure, and its most lucrative commodity. For years, we have been sold a narrative of helplessness that demands our pity and our pennies. But the truth, as anyone who has spent time navigating the fragile intersections of education, poverty, and governance in this region knows, is far more sinister.
The modern “activism” and “charity” surrounding these children has devolved into a predatory industry. It feeds on the visual spectacle of destitution while systematically bypassing the structural fixes these children desperately need. We are witnessing the mass commodification of suffering, and the true beneficiaries are not the barefoot boys on the streets, but a sophisticated network of political elites, religious middlemen, performative NGOs, and even insurgent recruiters.
Nigeria holds the unenviable title of having the highest number of out-of-school children in the world. Recent data from UNICEF estimates this figure at approximately 18.3 million children, while some sources suggest it may have climbed to nearly 20 million. Of this staggering number, the almajiri system accounts for the vast majority. A report by UNICEF indicates there are about 9.5 million almajiri children in Nigeria, representing a staggering 72% of the nation’s out-of-school demographic.
Other independent researchers place this number closer to 12 or even 15 million when including unregistered street children in states like Kano, Kaduna, Sokoto, and Borno. The situation is particularly acute in Sokoto State, where estimates of almajiri children living in squalid conditions fluctuate between 100,000 and 400,000. These children are forced to beg for 10 to 12 hours a day to feed themselves and their teachers. These are not just numbers; they are lives traded for survival. Yet, instead of triggering urgent systemic reform, these figures have become bidding chips in a charity auction, where the highest bidder gets the most poignant photograph.
The charity sector in Northern Nigeria has largely fallen into what I call the “Snack-and-Snap” model. Organisations flood the streets during Ramadan or Sallah, distributing single meals and branded T-shirts, capture high-definition videos of crying children, and post them across global platforms to raise unrestricted funds. This is the poverty porn trap: these campaigns prioritise virality over viability. A one-off feeding provides 500 calories to a child today but does nothing to remove that child from the streets tomorrow.
The constant recycling of traumatic imagery desensitises the global public while enriching marketing agencies and content creators who charge exorbitant fees to produce these “awareness” reels. By focusing on handouts, these charities actively undermine local economies and parental responsibility. Communities learn to wait for the next NGO convoy rather than demanding functional public schools. The activist becomes a feudal lord of relief, and the child remains a permanent petitioner.
Let us talk about the most egregious betrayal: government appropriation. In the 2026 national budget, the National Commission for Almajiri and Out-of-School Children Education (NCAOOSCE) was allocated N22.82 billion. On paper, this should revolutionise Northern education. However, a forensic breakdown reveals a scandal of epic proportions. Out of this allocation, over N8.4 billion of this education budget was siphoned into constituency projects completely unrelated to schooling, specifically, the construction of rural roads in Ogun, Katsina, and Ekiti states, alongside the procurement of ambulances and the installation of solar streetlights. For every Naira spent on a road through an almajiri budget is a Naira stolen from a child’s alphabet. The Commission attempted to justify this by claiming these were “National Assembly insertions.” This is not governance; this is legalised larceny masked as constituency empowerment. The economic consequence is devastating; it is estimated that keeping millions of children begging instead of learning costs Nigeria billions of dollars annually in lost future productivity. We are burning our tomorrow to pave our today.
Based on my fieldwork and analysis of financial flows, we can definitively rank who profits from the almajiri exploitation system. At the very top are the political elite and legislators. They view almajiri children as mobile voter banks and political thugs, weaponising them during election cycles to disrupt opposition rallies and intimidate voters. More insidiously, lawmakers use the almajiri commission as a slush fund, inserting constituency projects to award lucrative contracts to their cronies. They campaign on “caring for the poor” while their pockets swell with diverted education funds. They profit financially and politically, all while ensuring the system remains broken so the crisis remains “fundable.”
Next are the Malam, or Islamic tutors, who have abandoned their spiritual duty. Originally, the almajiri system was meant to be a sacred exchange—knowledge in return for service. Today, many Malams treat these children as income-generating assets. They receive between 20 and 30 children per room, lacking basic sanitation or food. The children are mandated to bring back a daily cash quota, often between ₦200 and ₦500 per child, from street begging. If they fail, they face corporal punishment. These Malams have become power brokers in the informal sector, thriving on the perpetual destitution of their students.
The middle-tier winners are the performative NGOs and charity entrepreneurs. I have reviewed financial statements where 65% to 75% of donations go toward administrative costs, international travel, and logistics, with less than 25% actually reaching the children in tangible, long-term forms. Their profit is social capital and institutional sustainability; they need the almajiri crisis to exist to justify their own existence. They fight for contracts to feed children, not for policies that eliminate the need for feeding. However, the most dangerous profiteers are the insurgent and extremist recruiters.
The late Boko Haram founder, Mohammed Yusuf, was himself an almajiri. Extremist groups deliberately target these out-of-school, disenfranchised boys because they are identity-starved and economically desperate. For the price of a meal and a sense of belonging, these groups recruit child soldiers, spies, and suicide bombers. The “profit” here is strategic, using these children as expendable assets to destabilise the state, which in turn generates more chaos, which generates more donations for “counter-terrorism.” The child is caught between the beggar’s bowl and the suicide vest. Finally, international geopolitical actors also profit, tying their interventions to conditionalities that benefit their home economies and using “stabilising northern Nigeria” as a geopolitical bargaining chip.
We must stop treating almajiri children as objects of pity and start treating them as subjects of rights. To dismantle this exploitative infrastructure, I demand zero-based budgeting: the NCAOOSCE must be audited publicly, and every infrastructure project inserted by lawmakers must be struck out and reallocated to the construction of integrated Tsangaya schools that teach Qur’an alongside mathematics, science, and vocational skills.
We must see an end to “poverty porn”: donors must refuse to fund campaigns that do not present verifiable five-year impact metrics. Ask them: “How many of these children have transitioned into formal employment?” If they cannot answer, do not donate. We need criminal accountability: lawmakers who divert education funds must be charged with economic sabotage, and Malams who exploit children must face child welfare laws. And we must pursue local economic empowerment: instead of feeding a child for a day, we must feed the child’s family for a year through micro-grants, so that parents never feel the economic pressure to send their kids to the streets in the first place.
The almajiri crisis is not a failure of resources; it is a failure of moral allocation. We have enough money. We have enough policies. What we lack is the collective will to stop feeding off the carcass of these children’s futures. The streets of Kano, Maiduguri, and Sokoto are littered with the ghosts of potential doctors, engineers, and leaders, sacrificed at the altar of political ambition and performative charity. It is time to take the profit out of poverty.
Moshood Oshunfurewa, a public affairs analyst, writes from Lagos. He can be contacted via moshoodho2025@gmail.com
