Aisha Siddiqqa (RA) Girls Academy (ASIGA)
Ghana, famous for great minerals that lie beneath this West African country, a population which once consisted of 45% Muslims is now more like a 30% minority. So where did the Muslims go?
The simple answer is nowhere, the people remained but sadly they fell out of the fold Islam.
In 2009, Caravan of Mercy carried out a Ramadhan food distribution in Ghana. Whilst visiting the regions, the delegates were made aware of the situation of the Muslims but without a foundation established in Ghana, it was very difficult to address the very worrying situation of the Muslims of Ghana.
In 2010, a Ghanaian brother, Mahama Ibrahim, more famously known as Ibrahim Ghana, then a trustee of Caravan of Mercy, made the brave decision of moving back to the country of his birth with his wife and three young children, Ridwan, Muhammed Iqbal and Manala, after some twenty years of living in the UK. Naturally, when the news of brother Ibrahim`s decision to return to Ghana permanently came, an opportunity arose, a way of hope, the very foundation Caravan of Mercy had been waiting for.
Planning began on how to start working in Ghana. Firstly, with food distribution to the poor and needy and then the distribution of Qurans and Islamic literature. This identified the lack of Islamic knowledge amongst the Muslims, especially the sisters.
The current situation in Ghana is as such that the students attend government schools, where other religious ideologies, beliefs and practice are enforced upon the pupils, or they attend private schools, again set up by missionaries or other religious denominations.
An intention and a worry from brother Ibrahim and the Trustees of Caravan of Mercy UK, led to the decision of establishing an all girls school, an academy dedicated to the teaching of excellent Islamic education and high level secular education for the sisters of the Ummah.
In 2011, land was purchased in the Tema area of Accra, Ghana, plans were drawn and foundations laid jointly by Molana Ebrahim: Chairman of Caravan of Mercy, Br Ibrahim Ghana and Br Zahid, the generous donor of the Academy. In early 2012, work began on the construction of the Academy, and even prior to its completion, the Muslims of Ghana were waiting, eagerly anticipating the opening of the all girl’s School.
Today in late 2013, Alhamdulillah, phase one of the project is complete, and now we have the school open and running, the first of its kind and the only Islamic Girls School in the whole of Ghana and Western Africa.
Plans for expansion in early 2014, with the start of phase two, include the construction of boarding facilities and maybe more classes inshAllah.
Here lies an opportunity to become part of this unique and noble cause by donating your Lillah, Sadaqah, Zakat and Interest Money towards the Aisha Siddiqqa (RA) Girls Academy, a rare chance to help safe guard the future generations of the Ummah in Ghana.