‘I SHOULD not be near your children. I’m a big, bad Muslim. I’m going to huff and puff and blow up your school.” So says actor Maanuv Thiara in this documentary play exploring the UK Government’s 2014 inquiry into Trojan Horse, an alleged plot to Islamicise state schools in Birmingham.
Thiara voices the words of Tahir Alam, then chairman of the trust which oversaw three schools in the city, including Park View, where the controversy began with a disclosure from a teacher about the supposed plot. Days later, the BBC reported on a letter alleged to be from Islamists detailing how to take control of a school, and how the scheme could be extended to other cities. The letter was dismissed by several newspapers as fake, though Mike Tomlinson, the city’s education minister at the time, said what was alleged to be happening was happening in reality “without a shadow of doubt”. So far, so murky.
Written by Matt Woodhead and Helen Monks, Trojan Horse is adapted from over 200 hours of interviews with more than 55 people involved: teachers, governors, parents and students.
Under Woodhead’s direction, that Thiara and fellow performers Annice Boparai, Komal Amin, Ashna Rabheru and Shobat Kadara have managed to wrestle an entertaining and illuminating production from that overwhelming, complex source material is impressive, and the questions it raises about the marketisation of public services and the effects of branding a community as “extremist” are undoubtedly vital. It is ironic too, that an archetypal Tory policy of “liberating” state schools from local authority control (and accountability) allowed the alleged plot to take root.
Whether there was a concerted effort by the likes of Alam to radicalise pupils or just drive up academic standards, still remains unclear.
Until Aug 26, Summerhall, 3.15pm (70 mins), £12, £11. Tel: 0131 560 1581. Tickets: bit.ly/TrojanHorse18 @LungTheatre
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