In Maiduguri, a Ramadan hotter than most

In Maiduguri, like on other days, the weather had heated up the atmosphere to 43°c this past Wednesday afternoon. For about a month now, the heat fluctuates between 42°c about midmorning to 43°c any moment from 11am to early evening. At this level, the heat dehydrates the majority fasting population this Ramadan, to the point of leaving just a little saliva in their mouths.

This Ramadan, there have been tales, from many wards, of some of the fasting population fainting between noon and late afternoon due to dehydration. Any moment from 11am, most itinerant traders, shop operators and many other workers vacate their trades and workplaces and scamper to tree shades, drenching the ground with as much quantity of water as they can to cool the ground, then spreading a large mat to rest upon.

Iced sachet water sells at between N40 and N50, while ‘common’ iced water goes for between N20 and N30 about breaking fast time.

“We are observing this year’s Ramadan fast with intense hardship due to the intense heat,” Bukar Abba Aji, who was reclining among about 20 others under a tree near the popular Post Office at the heart of the metropolis, said.

Aji is always in a hurry to reach Iftar, which is about 6:25pm, when he will guzzle as much cold water as he can. He also goes to the mosque with sachets of water for the evening prayers, the Ramadan Tarawih prayer. “After breaking my fast, I sometimes experience severe headache because of heat. I feel relieved only after taking a bath,” he said.

Adam drinks about eight sachets of ice-cold water between 6:30pm and 8pm. “It is so hot that hijab-wearing women and girls often pull their hijabs, soak them in water and put them back on in the full glare of people,” he said.

“The best way to fast under intense heat is to avoid movement that could dehydrate,” Dr. Yahaya Mohammed, a medical practitioner, warned, stressing: “Don’t work under the sun. If you must do so, do it minimally, as the heat dehydrates you. In a situation where you cannot drink water, break your fast with fruits such as cucumber, watermelon, pineapple and the like.”

Dr Mohammed added: “If you must eat oily foods, eat them during breaking of fast but not during the dawn feeding (Sahur), because oily foods dehydrate you, so also if you eat them at Sahur. People suffer observing fast under heat because of prolonged work under the sun, which leads to heat stroke. You know that Muslim clerics say that anyone under heat stroke can break his fast, so avoid working under the sun.”

“Ramadan fast is obligatory for all Muslims, except for the severely ill, the wayfarer and the suckling mother,” a renowned Muslim Cleric, Dr. Muhammad Abubakar of Indimi Mosque, Maiduguri, said. “About fasting during intense heat, there are two explanations: there is the heat you can bear, under which it is obligatory for you to fast. Then there is the heat which becomes too intense that it instils or provokes some ailments in you. If you are fasting to the point that you contract some ailment, clerics postulate that you can drop your fast. It is a matter of the fasting individual, not an entire fasting group of people, or an entire population. You cannot, for example, tell the entire people of Maiduguri to drop fasting because of intense heat. If you are struck down by heatstroke or any ailment you can drop your fast and repay it later.”