Commentary by Mustafa Anuar

IF mistakes made in the past are to guide us so as to avoid making such blunders in the future, this wisdom seems to have lost on a number of tahfiz school operators in the country.

It is disconcerting to learn that, according to Malaysian Consultative Council for Islamic Organisations (Mapim) president Mohd Azmi Abdul Hamid, there are tahfiz schools that have yet to take the necessary preventive measures to avoid blazing occurrences that could prove fatal to both pupils and teachers.

This despite the fact that three years ago, 23 pupils and a teacher died in a fire that gutted a tahfiz school in Kuala Lumpur.

And recently, two tahfiz schools in Seri Iskandar, Perak and Banting, Selangor caught fire.

In the Perak incident, 115 male pupils escaped from a fire that began in a storeroom after midnight. The fire consumed 80% of the school’s dormitory, as well as part of a lecture hall in a nearby block.

Six days after the incident, fire damaged the fourth floor of a girls’ hostel at Maahad Integrasi Tahfiz Selangor (MITS) in Banting.

The gravity of this issue is exemplified by Fire and Rescue Department records that showed that between 2015 and 2017, 211 fires had occurred at tahfiz schools nationwide.

Studies showed that many fires that occurred at religious schools were triggered by a lack of fire safety awareness and construction of buildings without approval from the relevant authorities, including the Fire and Rescue Department.

As of last year, 1,030 tahfiz and 200 private religious schools were registered nationwide, a staggering number that should be a cause for concern about human safety among the stakeholders.

These schools have become increasingly popular over the years among rural and urban parents as they are said to be convinced that these institutions would help their children to form good character, apart from gaining religious knowledge.

The mushrooming of these schools should be under strict scrutiny of local governments, Education Ministry and other related government agencies to ensure their safety and that their buildings qualify for certificates of fitness.

Most parents who send their children to these schools put faith in the operators to take good care of their loved ones. While gaining religious-based knowledge is important, it is also equally vital that these young knowledge seekers are not placed in harm’s way.

Safety precautions should not be a secondary factor to the extent that it is given a serious thought only after a religious school is built and run – and worse, after a fire occurs. 

These schools, including those that run on a shoestring budget, must look into this matter seriously so that they do not eventually turn out to be fire traps to unsuspecting pupils and a subsequent cause for deep sorrow for parents. 

Overlooking these vital safety measures is not only downright irresponsible, but it might even be deemed by some as “sinful”.

Operators who depend largely on public donations should only begin operating their schools after necessary safety measures have been put in place. And these measures must be maintained at all times, for a slack could well trigger unnecessary misfortune.

This must be the standard operating procedure (SOP) for these schools and in the new normal era, physical distancing and other health measures have to be incorporated into the SOP in order to ensure the safety and security of the pupils and teachers. 

If formation of good character is placed highly by the tahfiz schools, then it is incumbent upon the operators to show good management attributes as well. – August 7, 2020.