At 13, Afrah wants to become a surgeon, and the war tearing through her country, depriving millions of children of education, has not dampened the determination of this Sudanese middle school student.
During the months when she was out of school, displaced by the fighting that has been raging since April 2023 between the army and its paramilitary rivals, “I reviewed my lessons again and again,” said the teenager to AFP, at the Al-Hichan camp near Port Sudan.
She is among the more than 25 million minors in Sudan, half of the population, with over eight million currently out of school according to UNICEF.
On a vacant lot at the site, tents arranged in square formations serve as schools for over 1,000 students. Nearly a third of them first followed a UN agency program to catch up.
Despite the difficulties, their determination is indomitable, and the makeshift establishment saw its first class move from primary school to middle school, as Ms. Ghaly proudly points out.
“Their future is at stake, and education itself is a form of protection,” explains Mira Nasser. “Here they can at least find a semblance of normalcy.”
Some had even forgotten how to read and write when they arrived at the camp.
“This war has destroyed people psychologically,” murmurs 16-year-old Fatma, who is making up for two lost years of education and wants to become a psychiatrist.
The wounds are also physical. A girl greets the AFP team with her only hand – her right arm amputated above the elbow.
Despite missing their old life, the students of Al-Hichan are soaring with the resumption of classes.
“My friends and family are missed, my school in Khartoum is missed, it was full of trees,” Ibrahim, 14, describes. But he also has a goal: “to become a petroleum engineer.”
Another boy, Rizeq, in a red Manchester United jersey, gathers his courage and approaches the adults. “I want more English classes in the evening,” he says, his voice slightly trembling but his chest puffed up to defend his cause.
