THE sad, sad case of Mohamad Thaqif Amin Mohd Gadaffi has, quite rightly, captured the attention of everyone over the past week or so.
After suffering for more than a week, the 11-year-old died in a hospital in Johor, despite what must have been an entire nation praying for his recovery. A bright young life lost, one which so yearned to learn the Quran that he persuaded his parents to give him two years at the tahfiz school in Kota Tinggi.
We have been told that Thaqif suffered injuries after being whipped with a rubber hose pipe. That he began experiencing extreme pain, then had ice put on his legs by his parents.
We have been told that his legs turned black and blue, and he was later taken to the hospital. We were told he had bacterial infection, which began to affect his kidneys, making it necessary for him to undergo dialysis.
We know that both his legs had to be amputated and that a blood clot in his left shoulder cleared up just in time, so his left hand did not have to be amputated as well.
We also know that a thinning of his blood in the right arm had necessitated amputation of his right hand, but this had to be cancelled due to complications which arose, and that he died the same day the amputation had been scheduled.
Quite naturally, a nation is up in arms, calling for the school to be held responsible, for the proverbial book and more to be thrown at the assistant warden who allegedly abused the boy and 14 others. There are also those who are calling for all tahfiz schools to be registered.
But are things quite as cut and dried as they seem?
Quite frankly, this case — or at least, what we seem to know about it — has left more questions than answers. Investigators likely know more than what we have been told. What we are left with are a lot of allegations from various sides.
Take, for instance, the issue of timeline. Why did Thaqif only start experiencing pain more than 20 days after he was whipped? Did he actually feel a gradual increase in pain from March 24, when he and the others were said to have been punished for being noisy in the school surau, until such a point that he complained to his parents on April 17? Or did he put up with severe pain until he could bear it no longer?
There is also the medical condition or conditions involved. Why did his legs turn black and blue when ice was applied? Was this, perhaps, a sign of kidney problems? If so, were the kidney problems caused by beatings little Thaqif suffered? Did he, perhaps, actually have a pre-existing kidney problem, one which may have been undiagnosed prior to his hospitalisation? Could it, perhaps, have been due to some other medical condition?
Doctors say the damage to the skin on the boy’s legs prior to them being amputated could possibly indicate that he had undergone an aggressive massage before being admitted to hospital. This has been refuted by the family, but the rumours that they had sent him for traditional massage still persist.
The Gabungan Persatuan Institusi Tahfiz Al-Quran Kebangsaan (Pinta) has claimed to have seen a closed-circuit television (CCTV) recording of the punishment meted out to Thaqif and his 14 schoolmates. Pinta claims Thaqif was whipped just once, on the sole of his foot and called for the public not to jump to conclusions.
Yet it had been reported that the boy had endured much abuse in the short time he had been staying at the school, and had written such things down in a diary. Could his injuries, then, have been the result of several incidences of abuse? If he had kidney problems, could it be due to abuse as well?
Pinta may have seen the CCTV recording and it may have been the case that Thaqif had, indeed, been whipped only once. But the organisation would not have been privy to whatever else had been going on in that school in Kota Tinggi. But Pinta did do one thing right. It called for everyone to be calm and let the authorities complete their investigation.
Until everything comes out in court, we will not know the full story. And while emotions justifiably run high in cases such as this, we would be wise to keep them in check and let investigators do their work.
While pathologists determine the cause of death, and for that matter, cause of the injuries Thaqif sustained, and the authorities figure out whether abuse did occur in that tahfiz school, if we are to concentrate our energies somewhere, let us debate what should be done to ensure such a thing does not recur. Let us debate, too, whether corporal punishment should be allowed in schools, whether public, private, religious or secular.
Let us hope that justice is done, wherever the blame for that little boy’s death lies. Let us pray that no other child needs go through such pain and torment.
Above all, let us keep Thaqif’s family in our prayers in this, their time of need.
The writer, Leslie Andres has more than two decades of experience, much of which has been spent writing about crime and the military. A die-hard Red Devil, he can usually be found wearing a Manchester United jersey when outside of work. He can be reached via [email protected]
