Printed Edition ‖ No.: 223

Enab Baladi – Al-Hasaka

Hazwan Al-Waz, Minister of Education in the Syrian regime, gave a direct order, along with a decision of the Directorate of Education in Al-Hasaka, to move the exam centers of General Certificate of Secondary Education, including all branches; literary, scientific and Shariaa, to the areas under the regime’s control in the province, which caused a state of confusion among students and their parents.

Although the regime reversed its decision to move exam centers of regular students from the city of Qamishly to Al-Hasaka, yet the regime obliged the students who are taking the exams “irregularly” to move to areas under his control. The regime also canceled more than 20 exam centers of the areas under the control of “Self-Management” in each of Hamo, Qaseer and Tartab eastern to the city of Qamishly.

The employee at the Directorate of Education in Al-Hasaka, Juhaina Hajeej, told Enab Baladi that the school principal Elham Sarokhan, filed a formal letter to the Minister demanding the transfer of exam centers from Qamishly to Al-Hasaka, adding “a week later, the minister approved the principal’s request and canceled all the centers that were intended to hold General Secondary Education exams.”

Students and Parents’ Fears

The decision caused a state of panic and fear among the students’ parents, considering that Al-Hasaka is witnessing bad security conditions and conflicts every now and then, in addition to the presence of sleeper cells that follow the regulation of the “Islamic State”, which claimed responsibility of the bombings the city has recently suffered from.

Adnan Shaker, father of a General Secondary student, said to Enab Baladi “my son is an outstanding student and I expected him to achieve high marks”, but moving the exams to Al-Hasaka will prevent him to do so “because the distance between our residency place and Al-Hasaka is more than 450 Kilometers, not to mention that it is targeted by the regime and its security branches.”

Shaker asserts that he won’t let his son sit for the exams “because it is very possible for the regime to suddenly attack the schools of Al-Hasaka and arrest the students in order to take them into his own camps.”

Qamariah Hussein, mother of the student Nisreen, says that her daughter never traveled outside the village of Al-Ya’rubiya, considering that the decision to move the centers “heavily shocked us since Al-Ya’rubiya is close to the Iraqi borders and is far away from Al-Hasaka, therefore, she decided, along with a number of her friends, not to take the exams.”

Even though a number of students in the countryside of Al-Hasaka have decided to skip the exams, yet the student Badran Al-Hameed insists on taking the exams. His father explains that he does not want to prevent his son from going, pointing that “it is not that easy as there are many things to take into consideration, such as the distance between our town al malkieh and Al-Hasaka, besides the dangers of the road in light of the different laws that the controlling forces abide by.”

Students’ sit-in

Crowds of students went into a sit-in in front of the Educational complex in the city of Qamishly on Tuesday, May 24th, denouncing the decision and demanding a rescission of the decision.

Student Khanaf Mahmoud, from the area of Rimelan, participated in the sit-in and explained to Enab Baladi that “we, as students of Rimelan and Al-Muabbada, have rented a bus to Qamishly in order to participate in the sit-in. we will continue to demand the rescission of the decision”, pointing that students have been communicating with their friends in other countries, “to go out in similar sit-ins in front of specialized international organizations in Europe, so that they place this tyrant regime under pressure in order to reverse its unjust decision against the students.”

Why the decision?

Activists in the Kurdish areas believe that the fighting that recently took place in the city of Qamishly was the reason behind the regime making a decision of moving exam centers.

Political activist, Roni Kader, considered that the regime “sent a message through this decision to all parties in Qamishly, that meant; he still exists and no voice rises up over his”, pointing in his interview with Enab Baladi that the regime “ignored the Self-Management and all the other powers, giving them no significance whatsoever.”

The students wait for a change to the regime’s decision in order for things to get back to what they were and each student joins the exam centers close by his city or town, while the majority considered the decision to prove that the regime still stands in Al-Hasaka and controls many aspects of life within the province.