By Owei Lakemfa
This is one of the most engaging seasons in the life or history of this country; when federal and state governments and our political leaders at all levels are engaged in succession politics which can also slide into secession politics. This is the season of party primaries and nothing else matters.
This is the time big political guns are rolled out and war chests opened to allow hoarded dollars and naira flow. This is the only explanation I can give for the dead silence on armed bandits operating for days long on the Kaduna–Birin Gwari highway unchallenged and without information to the general public. The bandits most infamous score was on May 31, when they ambushed a convoy of buses conveying students to their examination for admission into the School of Health at Makarfi.
Also, at this time, critical segments in the country’s security architecture are quite busy. The police are busy perfecting security measures for the primaries against the backdrop of threats by students to disrupt the party primaries over the continued closure of public universities due to government-lecturers disputes. So, the police could not keep the public updated on the wholesale kidnappings, at least for citizens to avoid travelling the deadly road. As for the army, its attention must have been diverted by the press briefing of the Methodist Church Nigeria Prelate, Samuel Kanu-Uche, on his abduction and his perceived ineffectiveness of the military check points.
Given the absence of these critical segments, it was left to the Chairman of the Birnin Gwari Vanguard for Security and Good Governance, Ibrahim Nagwari, to brief the nation and reveal the horrors being perpetuated by terrorists.
The organisation said in last Monday’s attack, the terrorists who have three camps along the road, set ablaze eight vehicles. It lamented thus: “The political will by the authorities to honour their oath of office to protect lives and property of our citizens remains a mirage. While politicians are engaged on their mission to clinch power, come 2023, none of the gladiators seeking for elections has any agenda of emancipating our people from the bondage of terrorists and miscreants.”
In the absence of government, the organisation tried to fill the vacuum by telling the people of Birnin-Gwari and communities along the highway to halt with immediate effect, travelling on the highway. It also advised other Nigerians to do the same.
The neglect of Nigerians by government is frightening; in some cases, unfathomable and quite absurd. For 70 years now, that is a decade before our independence, the West African School Certificate, WASC, has been the primary examination for Nigerian and West African students in the English-speaking areas. It is recognised abroad, including Europe. Even when a subsidiary examination, the National Examinations Council, NECO, was introduced, it remained subsidiary and not recognised even by Ghanaian tertiary institutions.
You can imagine my shock to learn that students of Zamfara State, the most educationally disadvantaged or backward state in the country, are not writing the current WASC/ WASSCE because the state government is owing the examination body fees accumulated over the years! This is an examination in which a total of 1,607,985 candidates from 20,221 schools are taking part across the country. It is an examination that will help build the future of the students and also put them in good stead as they seek admission into tertiary institutions. This is the examination the children are not taking; yet, the state governor, Bello Matawalle, a former member of the House of Representatives, is a teacher!
Also annoying in this abridgement of the students’ fundamental right to education is the excuse by the state’s Commissioner for Education, Zainab Gummi, who tried to link this neglect of the students to insecurity. The Commissioner said: “Our major challenge is insecurity because most students are not even in the right frame of mind to sit for examinations.” She might have assumed that Nigerians are daft. There are many secondary schools in the capital, Gusau; why can’t those ones and the schools in other safe areas not take the examinations? What scientific tests did the state government carry out that revealed most of the students are not in the right frame of mind to sit for examinations? If there is such a result, the state government should make it public. In any case, even if it were so, why can’t the government counsel the students and prepare them for the examinations?
Perhaps, more amazing to me is that Sokoto State, governed by Aminu Tambuwal, a trained teacher and former Speaker of the Federal House of Representatives, has for the second year running not presented students in the state’s high schools for the WASSCE examinations!
I was quite impressed by Tambuwal during the 2012 meetings of the House of Representatives and the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, over the fuel price increase uprising. He invited the then NLC President, Abdulwheed Omar, and I as the Acting NLC General Secretary, to a private meeting in his Maitama home to discuss how the strike could be averted, and when it was on, how it could be brought to a quick end in the interest of the country. He was then 46 and seemed imbued with so much knowledge and wisdom that I wished such a politician would lead the country.
You can imagine my great disappointment that such a man, who in fact was an aspirant for the 2023 presidential election, would deprive students in his state the right to take a basic examination that can build their future!
Rather than be remorseful or keep quiet, Tambuwal’s administration claimed it prefers the NECO examinations. Like the Zamfara State government, the Tambuwal administration thinks Nigerians are such retards that they will buy any bogus excuse. Tambuwal reminds me once again that a book should not be judged by its cover no matter how attractive.
With the general neglect of the citizenry, including their welfare, security and general wellbeing, and a concentration on party primaries, the country lies drained in the valley of hunger, hyperinflation, and abandonment.
After the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, primaries on May 28, it is the turn of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, to perform on the public stage. The outcome of the APC primaries is likely to indicate the direction the country is going to take as it carries a lot of baggage. In all, Ashiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is the APC’s dilemma; he is like a bone stuck in the throat; how does it swallow or spit it out, or will surgery be necessary?
Whatever the case, patriots should not be silent observers in the processes unfolding in the country. Our country can still be salvaged.
Owei Lakemfa, a former secretary general of Organisation of African Trade Union Unity (OATUU), is a human rights activist, journalist, and author.
