Lekan Sote
Those who know the aphorism, “A people get the government they deserve,” won’t take the ballyhoo that former President Olusegun Obasanjo made Presidents Umaru Yar’Adua, Goodluck Jonathan, and Muhammadu Buhari. They, including former President Obasanjo himself, were thrown up by the flawed Nigerian system.
The flawed Nigerian system allows opinion leaders, with flawed characters, to select flawed leaders, who in turn, come up with flawed policies for the political, social, and economic aspects of Nigeria’s national life. It’s the same way you throw in garbage, only to get out garbage; you can only give what you have.
The faces at the recent rally of Obasanjo’s Coalition for Nigeria Movement are no more than the recycling of old hands. Nothing new is going to come out of the Third Force that the CNM is hinting at.
A scholar has said that the identity of a country is shown in its leadership; they carry in them what international relations scholars describe as national character. In other words, the pre-eminent Nigerians are the windows through which others look into Nigeria.
Hamisu, a friend, and Hausa from Daura, who is footloose these days, once told the following narrative: It is common practice in Northern Nigeria for an unemployed person who hardly completed a primary two education to be employed by his Local Government Education Authority to teach primary six pupils.
A clearly frustrated Hamisu concluded that when the blind lead the blind, everyone would fall into a gutter. He then wondered how Northern Nigerian pupils could compete with those of Southern Nigerian schools that had well-trained teachers, well-stocked school libraries, and well-equipped science laboratories.
Wonder no more why Northern Nigerian candidates sitting for the West African School Certificate Examinations, National Examination Council Certificate, and the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination record dismal performances relative to their Southern counterparts.
Hamisu is of the opinion that those who may want to disagree with the Kaduna State Governor, Nasir el-Rufai, and accuse him of “giving” jobs, and money, due to Kaduna indigenes, if he employs qualified teachers from the South, are ignoramuses who may not know the danger that a lack of education poses to the North.
Hamisu worries that the North may not get out of the socio-economic bind if something drastic is not done about its very apparent lag in education. A study reveals that out of the 20.5 million out of school children in the world, Northern Nigeria accounts for about half.
But this same shoe that is worn by the Northern Nigerian foot also fits the Southern Nigerian foot. You may recall that in the 1970s, former Mid-Western State military Governor, Brig-Gen Samuel Ogbemudia, was miffed that a teacher spelt “Gowalk,” as the surname of the late Benue-Plateau Governor, Joseph Gomwalk.
If you can also recall that a few years ago, a former Edo State Governor, Adams Oshiomhole, had a tough time trying to get an Edo State teacher to do some simple spelling tasks, you will understand the frustrations of Governor el-Rufai when 21,780, or nearly two-thirds of 33,000, primary school teachers in Kaduna State flunked primary four examinations.
Japanese management consultant, Kenichi Ohmae, in discussing a totally different subject, argued that citizens are victims of their upbringing, generally held perceptions, and what governments (or leaders) say (or do). You could add the fare of the media too.
Ohmae explains that “The key to a nation’s future is in its human resources. It used to be its natural resources, but not anymore. The quality, and number, of its educated people now determine a country’s prosperity or decline.” That means, in the final analysis, the fortune of a polity depends on its personnel.
Nigeria’s faulty and inequitable educational system has led to the worst injustice of placing a worker above his level of competence, in a futile attempt to balance ethnic interests in the polity. The quota system, for instance, has been used, in many cases, to substitute mediocrity for merit, and this does not help anybody–including the intended beneficiaries.
When the admission of a candidate with a higher UTME score is stepped down for a candidate from a so-called educationally-disadvantaged state, with a lower score, the fortune, and future, of the nation is consigned, ab initio, to the custody of the less endowed.
If you then run into an officer in the civil service, the military, the police, the academics, or into an engineer, a doctor, or some other professional, who -always- works below par, you should recognise that he is one of the monsters created by the Dr. Frankenstein in Nigeria’s quota, or federal character, system.
The thinking of the average Nigerian citizen is to share the proceeds from sale of primary products, like petroleum, rather than process before selling. This is akin to a people who prefer to fish already in the rivers, and avoid the trouble of commercially farming fish in a fish pond.
The whining of the marginalisation choir led further balkanisation of Nigeria’s original three regions into 36 unviable states, and a capital territory. This didn’t help matters. Aside from Lagos State, the other states cannot provide adequate infrastructure, or social services needed for their citizens. They cannot even pay the salaries of their workers, who idle away, on the days they come to work.
One other negative of Nigeria is that the values of Nigerians have become compromised almost beyond redemption. The other day, a driver rebuked his law-abiding boss who told him that driving on a wrong lane was against the Highway Code.
The boss was shocked when the driver told him that Nigerians from Generation X, down to the Millennial, neither learned nor obeyed the Highway Code. Maybe “Oga” did not know that the codes are old hat. You can only imagine how much traffic hold-ups, or deaths, this careless attitude has caused.
With all these limitations, most of what is achieved in Nigeria is by chance, the hand of God, deus ex machina, or the unexpected, but contrived solution to an apparently insoluble situation. Somebody says that Nigerians resort to prayer because they know that their system does not guarantee results, even if they work hard, and apply the best work methods.
But because God Himself has said that man must not only pray, he must also work, Nigerians must fashion a system that throws up only the best hands to fill leadership positions, or perish. And these “new breed” leaders must think up policies and practices that work in the interest of the individual citizens.
That is why the irrepressible senator with the splendid name, Dino Melaye, must be commended for praying the Senate with a bill to replace “State of Origin,” with “State of Residence,” for citizens that have lived and paid at least five years’ tax in any state.
With his hand on the plough, Melaye must join in dismantling the quota system which “awards” high strategic positions to individuals with lower credentials, and compels higher institutions to by-pass candidates with higher UTME scores, and admit weaker candidates from educationally-disadvantaged states.
If Melaye can finagle how to trade “state of origin” with “state of residence” when the National Youth Service Corps members are being deployed, there may be some hope for Nigeria.
–Twitter @lekansote1
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