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Category: Femi Abbas

  • Sir Ahmadu Bello’s Christmas Message

    Sir Ahmadu Bello’s Christmas Message

    His is the month of December, the month of paradoxical trade fair in which lies, fabrications and falsehood are, invariably, the wares displayed for exhibition. This is the month in which ostentation displaces faith and deception replaces conscience. How and why did these become cases of concern especially in Nigeria? Please, read the related story of facts and fictions below.

    Preamble

    An axiomatic Yoruba adage came to mind, recently, when a so-called National Christian Elders’ Forum (NCEF) published a fabricated statement in the media and falsely credited it to the late Premier of Northern Nigeria, Sir Ahmadu Bello some years ago. The statement which was quoted verbatim from a false publication by some Biafra agitators of Igbo extraction, as a justification for their thoughtless secession bid. The adage goes thus:

    “Any slave who is desperate to forcefully usurp an estate bequeathed to an innocent orphan must fabricate a rootless history to justify his/her inordinate desperation to illegally usurp other people’s properties”. For people who can read between the lines, this adage needs no interpretation. It is self-explanatory.

    Record of History

    Here is a season in which recalling certain aspects of Nigerian history, if only to put the records straight, is a sine qua non.

    History is a living phenomenon that is common to all people around the world, in time and in space. No matter what interpretation or misinterpretation is given to it, in certain quarters, the fact remains that history is not anybody’s personal property and can, therefore, not be anybody’s enclave of monopoly.

    Memory Lane

    Sir Ahmadu Bello, the first and only Premier of Northern Nigeria was not just one of the foremost political icons in Nigeria’s First Republic. He was also a patriarch of the ruling political party called Northern People’s Congress (NPC). This man of colossal status became the Premier of Northern Nigeria in 1954, the same year in which his political counterparts and arch-rivals, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe and Chief Obafemi Awolowo, became Premiers of Eastern and Western regions respectively. The trio assumed office as Premiers, in 1954, through party-based elections. They were later joined by Chief Denis Osadebe as the fourth regional Premier in Nigeria. The latter became the Premier of Midwest region, in 1963, when that region was created. However, barely five years after Nigeria’s independence, Sir Ahmadu Bello was callously killed, as Premier, on Saturday, January 15, 1966, by some Nigerian military coup plotters whose real intent was to obliterate all traces of Islam in Nigeria. Virtually all those coup plotters were of Igbo extraction and no single one of them was a Muslim, an indication that the coup was religiously and tribally motivated.

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    That devilish coup was led by one Major Patrick Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu, an Igbo man from the present day geographical area of Nigeria, called Delta State.

    Those coup plotters had killed the Muslim leaders in government, including Premier Ahmadu Bello, Prime Minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, Premier Samuel Ladoke Akintola and several other political leaders from other tribal extractions, in that year’s sacred month of Ramadan, before they started looking for reasons to give as a justification for their heinous termination of those leaders’ lives. The three reasons that they (the coup plotters) gave after killing those leaders were corruption, tribalism and religious bigotry. It was a matter of calling a dog a bad name in order to hang it.

    Analysis of Their Reasons

    Among the four Premiers in Nigeria during the first republic, only Ahmadu Bello, was a Muslim and he could not, in any way, be evidently linked to corruption. Unlike the three other Premiers who lived opulently in expensive affluence, Ahmadu Bello was an ascetic personality who served his people diligently and patriotically without an iota of blemish. At the time of his gruesome murder, that Northern Premier had only a small residential bungalow in his home town of Rabah in Sokoto Province, which he built with a loan and nothing more has been traced to him as property till today. He had not even completed the payment of the loan he obtained for the building of that bungalow before he was murdered.

    Who else among his peers can be said to have left such a flank behind?

    Sir Ahmadu Bello, the only Premier from the North, at that time, could also not be singularly accused of being tribally inclined because tribalism was the basis of all the existing political parties of the time. No Premier, in Nigeria, from 1954 to 1966 could be exonerated from tribalism directly or indirectly. They were all guilty of it.

    Genesis of Tribal Politics in Nigeria

    It can be recalled that certain tribal groups such as Ibiobio State Union (IBU), Ibo Federal Union (IFU) Egbe Omo Oduduwa (EOO) and ‘Jam’iyyar Al-Ummar Nigeriya ta Arewa’ translated as Northern Elements Progressive Association (NEPA) which later transformed into Northern Elements Progressive Union (NEPU) were all tribal socio-cultural organizations that metamorphosed into political parties. All those parties preceded ‘Jam’iyyar Mutane Arewa’ meaning Northern People’s Congress (NPC), to which Ahmadu Bello belonged. Many other ethnic-based political parties later emerged to broaden tribalism in Nigerian politics. If anything, therefore, Ahmadu Bello was the least tribally inclined Premier of his time. If he was actually a tribalist and religious bigot as he has always been maliciously painted in Nigeria’s political history, by the Southern Nigerian media, he would not have appointed Sunday Awoniyi, a Yoruba Christian, from the present day Kogi State, as his Private Secretary. Which other Premier appointed his private secretary from another tribe or from a religion other than Christianity? And, why did his killers link him alone to tribalism and bigotry?

    His 1959 Christmas Message

    Among the four Premiers in Nigeria’s first republic, only Ahmadu Bello was bold and sincere enough to allay the fear of the minority groups in his (Northern) region by making a public policy statement about his government’s stand concerning tribalism and religious bigotry. Here is an excerpt from what he said while sending a Christmas message to northern Christians at the time of Christmas in 1959:

    “…We are people of many different races, tribes and religions, who are knit together by common history, common interests and common ideals. Our diversity may be great but the things that unite us are stronger than the things that divide us. On an occasion like this, I always remind people about our firmly rooted policy on religious tolerance. Families of all creeds and colours can rely on these assurances. We have no intention of favouring one religion at the expense of another. Subject to overriding need to preserve law and order, it is our determination that everyone should have absolute liberty to practice his belief. It is befitting on this momentous day, on behalf of my ministers and myself, to send a special word of gratitude to all Christian missions”.

    “Let me conclude this with a personal message. I extend my greetings to all our people who are Christians on this great feast day. Let us forget the difference in our religion and remember the common brotherhood before God, by dedicating ourselves afresh to the great tasks which lie before us….”

    That was the Christmas message that Sir Ahmadu Bello delivered in a radio broadcast on Thursday, December 24, 1959. And, it remained intact in Nigerian historical archive until 2002, when a Yoruba agent of the Lucifer came up with a fabricated statement that is now being devilishly quoted and circulated spirally by mischievous elements in Nigeria, who have been crediting it to Sir Ahmadu Bello.

    The Fabricated Version

    Decades after Sir Ahmadu Bello’s unjustifiable assassination, some evil elements in the media, in active conspiracy with certain political demagogues, who were passionately pregnant with morbid hatred for Islam, went to fabricate another ‘Christmas Message’ and credited it to the late Northern Premier as a justification for his murder. The concocted statement was purportedly culled from a non-existing newspaper called ‘The Parrot’. Below is the fabricated Christmas Message:

    “…The new nation called Nigeria should be an estate of our great grandfather Othman Dan Fodio. We must ruthlessly prevent a change of power. We use the minorities in the north as willing tools and the south as a conquered territory and never allow them to rule over us and never allow them to have control over their future….”

    Now, should that senselessly fabricated statement said to have been made by Sir Ahmadu Bello on October 12, 1960, be quoted blindly by any sensible individual or group? How can a Christmas message by a Premier of Ahmadu Bello Status, be delivered in October, two months before Christmas? Haba! Is that not a confirmation that liars never think of the implications of their lies before they fabricate them?

    Truth and Falsehood

    “Truth has come and falsehood has vamoosed; surely, falsehood is meant to vamoose in the presence of the truth”.  Q. 17: 81 

    Comparison

    Now, looking at both (genuine and fabricated) statements quoted above very carefully, shouldn’t any sensible person be able to distinguish between truth and falsehood? The Premier’s original Christmas message, earlier quoted above, was made on the eve of Christmas on Thursday, December 24, 1959, through a radio broadcast and it was published by all newspapers in the country including the vociferous ‘West African Pilot’ owned by Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, the boisterous ‘Tribune’ owned by Chief Obafemi Awolowo and the clamorous ‘Daily Times’ jointly owned privately by certain prominent Nigerian individuals at that time. That original statement was equally published by many other smaller newspapers in Nigeria. All those newspapers are identifiable in Nigeria’s media history even though most of them are now defunct.

    On the other hand, the place and occasion of the fabricated statement credited to Sir Ahmadu Bello was not indicated and cannot be traced in any Nigeria’s newspaper history.

    Evidence of Fabrication

    The first time any genuinely existing newspaper ever made reference to that fabricated statement was on November 13, 2002 (42 years after it was purportedly made by Sir Ahmadu Bello. And, ‘The Tribune’ newspaper which published it on that date only claimed to have culled it from an online column published on October 24 2002 by a fraudulent Yoruba Journalist (name withheld) who entitled it ‘The Northern Agenda’. The referred online was actually named ‘Nairaland’, and it can still be found on the internet today, if googled.

    It can, therefore, be confirmed that the statement was actually fabricated, not in the 1960s but in October 2002, by the so-called online columnist who credited it to a newspaper that never existed. The objective was to give it an undeserved credibility. What a country! What a people! What a shame! This is a typical case of an obvious mischief by heartless mischief makers just to fetch ephemeral fame and illegal income.

    The belief of such fraudsters was that once such a fabricated article appears on the internet and is ignorantly quoted by some inconsequential mercenary writers, it would automatically become a document of fact. And, true to that assertion, a self-acclaimed Nigerian Christian Elders Forum’ (NCEF) has shamelessly quoted that fabricated falsehood, as usual, to justify its baseless allegation of ‘Islamization’ of Nigeria. That is Nigeria for you.

    The 1966 Coup Episode

    January 15, 1966 was a Saturday like no other one in the history of Nigeria. It was on that day that the bitter political seed which germinated and grew into the thorny political tree that is now feeding Nigerians with bitter political fruits, was planted. The evil planting of that seed marked the beginning of an agonizing voyage of destiny on which Nigerians embarked without a compass. Coming up in the sacred month of Ramadan, the day, (January 15, 1966) actually came to confirm the axiomatic thought of an Arab poet who once asserted in a couplet thus: “Nights are heavily pregnant; they give birth to wonders in the days….”

    The Major Casualties

    The real target of the heartless coup plotters in  military uniform, who struck on January 15, 1966 coup was Islam. Although they (the coupists) killed virtually all the major key players in the then Nigerian politics except those of Igbo extraction, most of the victims of that coup were Muslims and some non-Igbo Christians who were then in prisons. The Prime Minister, Alhaji Sir AbubakarTafawa Balewa and the Minister of Finance, Chief Festus Okotie-Eboh were killed in Lagos. The Premier of Northern Nigeria, Sir Ahmadu Bello, was killed with his wife and some other people in Kaduna, the then Headquarters of Northern Nigeria. The Premier of Western Region, Chief Samuel Ladoke Akintola, was killed in Ibadan, the then Headquarters of the South Western Region, while some military top brass of non-Igbo extraction were killed in different military barracks across the country.

    Except for Lt. Col. Arthur Unegbe who was killed for being too close to one Brigadier-General Zakariya’ Maimalari, a top Muslim military officer from the north, and could not be trusted, no other Igbo man of note, civilian or military, was killed in that coup. As a matter of fact, if there was any feeling of the coup in Nigeria’s Eastern Region at all, it was that of victory and heroism. The top military officers who were killed in the senseless coup included: Brig. S. A. Ademulegun (South West); Brig. Zakari Maimalari (North East); Col. Kur Mohammed (North West); Lt. Col. J. Y. Pam (North Central); Col. S. A. Shodeinde (South West); Lt. Col. Largema (North Central); Lt. Col. A. G. Unegbe (South East); S/Lt. James Odu (Mid West) and a host of others.

    The False Allegations

    After the dust had settled, it became evident that virtually all the planners of that coup as well as its executors were soldiers of Igbo extraction and Christians. Thus, other Nigerians whose relatives were severely affected saw the coup not only as tribal but also as religious, the killing of some Christians like Chiefs Akintola and Okotie-Eboh notwithstanding. This was because the then Governor of Eastern Nigeria, Sir Francis Akanu Ibiam was as deeply involved in religious matters as Sir Ahmadu Bello. The one was a Vice-President of the World Council of Churches. The other was the Vice-President of the Muslim World League. If religion was therefore the reason for the coup, the two of them not one ought to have been killed for bigotry. But history entails a variety of interpretations especially in a society where conscience hardly plays any meaningful role.

    Beneficiaries

    It is historically notable that the chief beneficiary of the coup (Major-General Johnson Aguiyi Ironsi) was also of Igbo extraction. Almost all the military appointments after the coup were for men of Igbo extraction. Among those appointees, only Hassan Katsina and Muhammadu Shuwa were Muslims. How else could a coup be tribal and religious? After all, as far back as 1953, a frontline Igbo politician (name withheld) had set such agenda for his tribe’s men when he reportedly said that “Ibos’ domination of Nigeria is a matter of time”.  That statement was allegedly made at a cocktail party in Lagos. If this remains the yardstick for driving democracy in Nigeria, for how long can such democracy last?

  • Who owns the Schools?

    Who owns the Schools?

    There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we (should) fail to protest (against injustice).”  By Elie Wiesel

    Preamble

    his is one of the very rare occasions when this column, ‘The Message’, is compelled to serialise an article. The last time that such occurred was about seven years ago.  That this article is being serialised now is a child of necessity. Ordinarily, professional Journalists who know their onions often strive to avoid serialisation of articles except if it becomes a necessity like on this occasion. Generally, serialisation of articles which often enables good readers to distinguish between professional journalists and mere writers has the tendency of leaving a sour taste in the mouth.

    However, the seriousness of this article and the referential importance of its contents are the factors that necessitate its inevitable serialisation. Surely, some serious-minded readers of this column who are intellectually inclined will appreciate the assertion here especially when the implications of the Appeal court in Lagos on the related case vis a vis the provisions of Nigerian constitution is taken into consideration. The delicate case of hijab wearing by Muslim female pupils in public schools, whether in Lagos State or elsewhere, cannot be separated from the big but unnecessary question of who owns Nigerian public schools in the 21st century.

     Problem of Diversity

     One good thing about life generally is the ability of the phenomenon called environment to conveniently accommodate the positive angle of life along with the negative angle despite their seeming incompatibility. This means that diversity may not be an oddity after all. It may serve a more purposeful end than humanly perceived. Perhaps that is why the Almighty Allah created all living things in twins of males and females as well as in couples of colours and hues. Yet, despite their natural differences they manage to cohabit without any visible rancour.

    Of all the creatures on earth, only human beings believe and emphasise the problem of incompatibility. At least we know that on a single farm land, all sorts of plants ranging from sugarcane to bitter leaf trees grow and cohabit without any visible rancour. And in the ecosystem, (forests or oceans) both the herbivours and carnivours coexist without threatening their habitats. It is only among human beings that the well fed rejoice in preventing the hungry ones from feeding even on remnants. With regard to this manifest situation, what is true of human beings in temporal life is equally true of them in spiritual life. Otherwise, how can some people who are claiming to be of faith insist on preventing others from covering their heads according to the tenets of their faith in a co-financed commonwealth affair when those of others do not prevent the half-naked ones from walking about in nudity despite the natural eyesore that the latter constitutes?

    Genesis of Schools Takeover

    According to Dr. Amiel M. Fagbulu (quoted copiously in the first leg of this article last Friday), “the take-over of schools has not been reported upon sufficiently for most people to understand the nefariousness and Machiavellian dimensions attached to it. To start with, it meant loss of income to some proprietors who were actually milking the people while pretending that they were magnanimously making sacrifices for them. Next is the falsehood that the governments did not pay compensation to proprietors. Another was that it was the federal government’s decree that made takeover final and legal. Last but not the least is that by retaining their names government had conceded that take-over was just in name alone. There are other false assumptions that will be dealt with as they are made”.

    Fagbulu continues thus: “the takeover of schools was a final act of dissociation of former proprietors from ownership of their schools. The schools no longer belong to them. To talk of Muslim or Christian schools that are run with public funds is absolute nonsense. Any school that is run with public money is a public school. All others are private institutions at whatever level and by whatever name.”

     The Question of Compensation

    Also as a continuation of his expert treatise on education in Nigeria, Fagbulu further elucidated on the question of compensation for proprietors of old missionary and privately owned schools in Nigeria as follows: “the question of compensation was raised by the proprietors of most of the Christian- and Muslim-based schools. In the West (of Nigeria), the only bodies I clearly remember as handing over schools voluntarily and with no conditions attached were the Seventh Day Adventist group and Adeola Odutola who owned a fairly good secondary school at Ijebu-Ode. The noisiest ones were sole proprietors who individually owned schools. The discussions were preliminary and informal exchanges to advise both sides before the final decision was taken. The government of the Western State was glad to oblige but what silenced the demand were the conditions put to the proprietors based on government’s sense of fairness to the taxpayers whose funds had been utilised”. They were as follows:

    1.            “Proprietors would calculate their investment on all structures in the school including the land (x) which by the education laws of the time must be registered in perpetuity in the name of the school (at least in the West)

    2.            Proprietors would compute the total amount they had incurred in running the school from inception to date of takeover (y)

    3.            Proprietors would compile a list of the value of all gifts and donations the school had received (p)

    4.            Government would compile the value of all grants (general and special) that it had paid to the school up to the time of takeover (q).

    5.            Compensation to proprietors would be C = [(x + y) – (p + q)]”

    Fagbulu’s Personal Comment

    When the discerning proprietors among them did the Arithmetic and found out that they would be seriously indebted to government at the end of the exercise, they blinked and went silent. A funny footnote to the exercise was the demand of one or two proprietors who wanted to be paid for their ‘brand’ name. Government had no use for their names anyway and when they eventually lost, they pleaded with government to kindly retain those names, a demand which was graciously granted.”

    His Further Comments

    “Heritage has at least two dimensions. Your child can only make claims to what belongs to you. That is one form of heritage. The other like UNESCO’s heritage, relates to values. The pleasure derived from listening to Sonny Ade’s music or reading Achebe’s books are golden gems they have bequeathed to the world. Achebe collects his royalty forever, which means that it is a heritage of his children. We who acclaim and cherish the books are not beneficiaries of the pecuniary offerings. Similarly UNESCO helps preserve those monuments in Egypt say, but it is the Egyptian government and people that own the monuments. The government, when it took over schools took over the land, the structures on them, and the responsibility to continue to run schools. Those who are capitalising on Heritage can be assured that it is their’s to cherish and share with the world. They are free to do so.”

    Analytical Deduction

    In his analytical deduction on the unwarranted controversy over the ownership of public schools in Nigeria, the Octogenarian education expert revealed an eye witness account as follows: “A few students imported the Dancing Club from the Higher College, Yaba to the University College, Ibadan. We started the Bug and later others started the original Cult that was not malevolent. They are part of the history of that institution. The good things keep going from generation to generation and those who cherish them regard them as part of things to be retained forever. Heritage in the sense people who are talking about it will survive on its own if the generations want them. There is no law that new influences cannot add their own quota before they pass away. There is nothing stopping those being locked out today from leaving their imprints that will be cherished behind”.

    He continued: “The form for the annual census of schools provides for three categories of ‘girls only’, ‘boys only’ and mixed schools. It is the responsibility of government to determine which of its public schools will be designated in any of the three categories. As a part of the process of development if it becomes necessary to alter the gender status of any school especially from a mixed to a single gender and vice-versa, it may be necessary to do some juggling of names. For instance a St. Agnes Girls’ School cannot become mixed and still retain its name. However it could become St. Agnes High School or something equally appropriate without much loss of identity. While the use of adjectives like Junior, Senior, Middle, High, and Primary are helpful indicators of level, those of gender like boy’s, girl’s, and mixed are pointless tautologies as names go. A St, Agnes should have no trouble ministering to both girls and boys, or doing whatever saints are supposed to do for both genders.”

    Elderly Advice

    “Government should not exert any serious effort to take on the trivial exercise of changing the names of schools for the mere fun of it. There must however be rhyme and rhythm in naming schools. Changing the name of an institution will always generate some heat. University of Ife alumni protested to the heavens but UNIFE is today OAU and the heavens have not fallen. It should be possible to reconcile all views with no ulterior motives through dialogue.”

    False Claim

    According to Pa Fagbulu, “the claim that the federal government enforced the takeover is false. Those who are old enough will remember that the exercise was not uniformly executed across the country. The Catholics put up a very tenacious resistance in the East and that slowed implementation. Some states only half-heartedly carried it out simply because Education has always been on the concurrent list and no central government could successfully enforce such a complex maneuver at a swoop even under the military. Decrees merely backed the intention of governments and the people who had spoken through Asabia.”

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    He went further thus: “One lingering and unfortunate consequence of the takeover of schools is the undeniable fact that standards of education have fallen over the years since the takeover. It is in no way a direct consequence of the proposal but one of implementation by government. In fact the takeover was to be a new beginning whereby the following would take place in the spirit of Adefarasin and Asabia (recommendations): “

    1.            All existing and new schools would be registered: that implied that the basic minimum requirements for providing good education would be provided in all schools irrespective of who was the proprietor. That would satisfy the demand of the NUT that all educational institutions should provide equal facilities for the children to learn and the teachers to teach

    2.            All schools would be bound by the same rules and treated equally when being assessed in respect of management, number and quality of staffing, and other areas that deal with the evaluation of the outcome of learning. I had the unpleasant duty of writing to the government of the Western State to give notice of closure in respect of the famous Government College, Ibadan of which I was by law the stand-in proprietor on behalf of the government, due to poor accommodation and general neglect. That decadence as it developed had shown that governments could default in providing fully for their schools and that any measure to avoid that unfortunate situation must be a corner-stone of any changes.

    3.            All schools would have properly constituted Boards of Governor to oversee the management of the schools as outlined in law. That body would be independent and good enough to get governments to act appropriately in funding schools.”

    Naked Truth

    “At the primary school level in particular, the Local Education Authorities have been greatly handicapped to the extent that it is difficult to believe that they exist at all. The (naked) truth is that governments have increasingly been unable to fund education adequately and though the rates might have been perhaps slower, the rot would have set in anyway if even schools had not been taken over.”

    Undeniable Fact

    Commenting on the recent hullaballoo over hijab and ownership of schools in Osun State, the sage observed as follows: “It is regrettable that a respected body like CAN can display so much ignorance in respect of education in Nigeria. To start with, the State of Osun like the rest of Nigeria cannot discriminate in the provision of educational facilities on the basis of gender or religion. Secondly CAN is operating from a false premise that some schools are Christian schools. All public schools belong to all the people irrespective of their religious beliefs.

    “If we Christians want to have schools over which we will have full control, the constitution provides for that. Finally the history of the take-over of schools credited to Gowon is also false. The take-over of schools was a direct consequence of the Asabia Commission and I was the originator of the idea with my colleagues who served after me as advisers to that body.”

    Reason for the Brouhaha

    “A main reason for that action was that the proprietors who received grants from government and fleeced parents through high fees made education very expensive. In spite of not investing their own money in education they failed to pay teachers on time if at all; they tyrannised teachers; they even went as far as not promoting teachers on merit especially if those teachers belonged to other denominations. CAN should please do its research and acknowledge that Adefarasin emancipated teachers and Asabia, its sub-committee recommended the procedures for achieving that end, If CAN needs being educated on this issue, I will oblige. In the meantime, it should stop spreading falsehood.  Aregbesola may or may not be guilty of wanting to Islamise Osun; that is not my concern here. Accusing him of using education is however not true.”

    Conclusion

    Concluding, Dr. Fagbulu said: “it should be reiterated that public schools belong to the people and that government as the representative of the people has the responsibility to determine the future of education and the direction and shape schools take. There is no problem of education that cannot be solved through dialogue if those involved are sincere and have no hidden agenda. And for the sake of our children, let us take interest in education and make constructive inputs. Government should take the lead and we should walk and work with it all the way.”

  • City key for ‘Nomadic’ Scholar

    City key for ‘Nomadic’ Scholar

    One good turn, according to an adage, deserves another. Perhaps nothing encourages good deed as much as appreciation. To show appreciation for good deed is to ask for more. This is what Ilorin indigenes did to the delight of all well-meaning people on Sunday 7  June 2013 when they came together from all walks of life to treat an intellectual ‘settler‘ to an appreciative reception.

    The occasion was a sort of gala night in royal regalia. It was a rare gathering of the crème de la crème of Ilorin indigenes who uniquely clustered the Kwara State Hotel Banquet Hall to clad one towering non-indigenous scholar in a historic wreath of honour. The cynosure of the august gathering was an international household personality whose contribution to the development of the city in the past two decades has remained non-such.

    Whether in Africa or even in the world academic circle, Professor Ishaq Olanrewaju Oloyede the past Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ilorin is like a golden fish which has no hiding place. But it takes only men of worth to recognise a vertical man of worth with special reverence.

    The Relevant Question

    The relevant question here is not who and who attended the occasion but who and who were not there? Where you have colossal names like those of Governor Abdul Fattah Ahmed; former Governor Bukola Saraki; the Emir of Ilorin, His Royal Highness, Alhaji Sulu Gambari; the former Chief Justice of the Federation, Justice Alfa Belgore; the former President of the Federal Court of Appeal, Justice Mustapha Akanbi who chaired the occasion; the former Special Adviser to the President on security matters, Major-General Muhammed Abdullah Adangba; an erstwhile Grand Khadi of Kwara State, Alhaji Abdul Kadiri Orire; the past Grand Khadi of the State, Justice Mutallib Ambali; the Grand Khadi, Alhaji Harun Idris who was eminently represented by Justice S.O. Muhammad; the Kwara State‘s Doyen of the Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SAN), Alhaji Salman Alarape; the 2011 Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) governorship candidate, Alhaji Dele Belgore (SAN); the thenVice-Chancellor of the University of Ilorin, Professor Abdul Ganiy Ambali; the former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ilorin, Professor Shuaib Oba Abdul Raheem; the former Vice-Chancellor of the Kwara State University, Professor Abdur-Rasheed Naala; the former Commissioner for Education, Alhaji Saka Onimago who stood in for the Governor; Alhaji Saka Sa’d a former Chairman of the University of Ilorin Council and coordinator of the reception; Prominent city indigenes like Alhaji Sa’d Belgore; Justice (Mrs.) Raliatu Elelu-Habeeb; Alhaji Usman Ajidagba; Arch. Faworaja and Professor Kuranga. Of course, there are several personal friends and associates of Professor Ishaq Oloyede such as Mallam Yusuf Olaolu Ali, Professor Yusuf Lanre Badmus, Professor Wahab Egbewole, Dr. Aliu Badmus, Alhaji Jamiu Ekungba and Alhaji Jamiu Afolayan were all there to grace the historic occasion. Besides, the rank and file of Ilorin Muslim Clergy including the Chief Imam of Ilorin, Alhaji Muhammad Bashir Al-Fulani, the Imam Gambari Alhaji Said Al-Gambari and Imam Imale, Alhaji Abdullah Abdul Hamid, as well as a retinue of other important personalities too many to mention here.

    Invitation

    Though, admission into the Banquet Hall was strictly by invitation, virtually all sectors of Ilorin society including the professional, the economic and political groups, the social and traditional communities, as well as the academic and religious bodies were proudly represented. In the citation of the honouree eloquently read by Professor Yusuf Lanre Badmus, Professor Oloyede was virtually described as a signpost of guidance beaming light to all directions of the environment to the benefit of all and sundry. The hallmark of his achievement is in the education sector where as a former Vice-Chancellor, he was generally acknowledged as an exemplar.

    Professor Oloyede is not the only non-indigenous scholar of international repute resident in Ilorin. But his selfless service to humanity in that city without thinking of the factor of indigene-ship stands him out of the crowded pack. In recognition of his unique service and in acknowledgement of his indelible legacy therefore, this Professor of Islamic Studies, whose ambition then was to become a fellow of African Academy of Letters which was recently fulfilled has added a further step to his footprint.

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    Socially, Ilorin is a highly civilised city with a fertile soil of profound knowledge on which towering intellectuals in various fields of learning grow uninhibitedly. A realm of oriental and occidental diffusion though, Ilorin still maintains her cultural and traditional trait. These are manifest in the people‘s marital life style, extended family affairs, economic and moral conduct, maintenance of cultural chastity and veneration for the Emir, the Galadimas, the Chief Imams and other elders.

    Intermarriage

    Intermarriage and tribal interaction through urbanisation has shown the old city as a typical example of an isogloss. And today, it may be very difficult to know by conduct or by appearance who is not a true son or daughter of the soil.

    All the people irrespective of their tribes, tongues and creed automatically acclimatize and acculturate in the perennially peaceful environment created by the ancestors of the city. Hospitality, chauvinism and radiation of ecstasy, are entrenched in the culture of Ilorin inhabitants. However, an average Ilorin son or daughter is allegedly trained to be crafty and this earns the inhabitants the appellation .‘Ilorin mesu jamba‘‘ meaning Ilorin the custodian of craftiness.

    Religious Life

    Religiously, people see Ilorin through the spectacle of Islam. This is hardly disputable since more than 85 per cent of the in-habitants are Muslims. One can attribute the overwhelming beam of Islam on the city to the early romance by courtesy between Alimi and Afonja in which the earlier converted the latter to a Muslim. And today, Professor Oloyecde is not just a JAMB boss but a Secretary General for the Supreme Council For Islamic Affairs. More may be said about Ilorin in the future.

    By virtue of the key to the city offered him by the assembly of indigenes, Professor Oloyede can genuinely claim to be an indigene of Ilorin. That is the fruit of education. Or what else can one say?

  • Muslims funeral

    Muslims funeral

    Preamble

    Mother earth can be described as man‘s inseparable companion. She accompanies man day and night, in life and in death. She surpasses biological mothers in playing her role in the life of man. She serves as a farm for man. From a chip of her natural being, man is said to have been created. The Qur‘an tells us that ‘From her (the earth) We created you and into her We shall return you…’ Qur’an 20:55.

    The Role of A Mother

    In playing the role of a mother, the earth carries man on her back while the latter remains alive and in death, she incubates him in her belly in readiness for the resurrection that will see him through the inevitable Day of Judgment. In that process, there is a similarity between the duties of a primary mother (the earth) and that of a secondary mother otherwise known as biological mother. While the biological mother cares for man only when she and man are alive, the mother earth cares for him both in life and in death. Unlike that of the biological mother, the life span of the mother earth is indefinite.

    Age of The Earth

    Some scientists have given us different ages of the earth using all sorts of technological instruments. But the only authentic knowledge of that can come from the Almighty Allah Who created the earth. If scientists have the means of telling us the age of the earth, do they also have the means of determining her life span? The earth is not just a carrier of unlimited weight; she is also a scale of unlimited measure. She weighs the load on her head as well as the one in her belly and balances them up for natural equanimity.

    Without the earth, mountains and oceans would have no habitat to call their own and the long term fossils which turn into what we call minerals would have had nowhere to hibernate. Before all these and millions of other unidentified matters came into existence, the earth had been. And when all of them might have vanished into permanent oblivion, according to their scheduled time, the earth will continue to be until Allah‘s scheduled time for her termination.

    Creation of Man

    We know that man was created from the earth. We know that the earth harbours all living and non-living things on and in her. What we do not know is the source of the earth in creation. From what was the earth created? In luring us to reasoning, Allah has severally called the attention of man to the nature of certain creatures like the mountains, the valleys, the oceans and the seas, the minerals and the human and animal fossils buried in the earth as well as the varieties of plants and insects which dot the earth like a galaxy of stars on the Milky Way. He has also challenged man to observe the very nature of the wonderful carpet called the earth.

    All these are to enable man know that all things except the grace of Allah will perish. And Allah confirms severally that a record is being kept for everything which will eventually be opened as a means of reassessing the existence and otherwise of all things on earth.

    Consciousness of Hajj

    Any Muslim who has performed Hajj with full consciousness of piety will understand the gravity of this mysterious scenario. We came into the world naked. We brought nothing into it except the placenta. And, as soon as we settle down as babies on the laps of our biological mothers, we forget about the sojourn that brought us into this ephemeral transit called the world. No one remembers again how he or she travels down to the world. No one can describe features of the womb through which he or she came into the world. Even the real purpose of our mission in the world becomes lost on us until we are taken through a new earthly tutorial that makes us what we grow up to be. At least, no book or document has shown the role of anybody‘s placenta in the journey of life. And could that natural luggage have been in vain?

    Placenta

    Placenta in the life of man is just a symbol of vanity which life represents. A sincere pilgrim prepares for Hajj as if he is preparing for death. His journey for that mission is unpredictable. No one knows for sure who will return from the journey and who will not. That is why an intending Muslim pilgrim makes all necessary provisions for his family and leaves vital instructions or advice behind. It is a way of saying ‘in case I do not return from this journey, these are the steps to follow in my absence as a way of keeping life going.

    At the end of every Salat in both Sanctuaries of Makkah and Madinah, especially during Hajj, there is a funeral prayer (Janazah) which confirms that people die in virtually every minute of life. Those who die between Dhuhr and Asr prayers might not necessarily be patients in the hospitals. Some die while observing Salat. Some die while eating. Some die in toilets. Some die while talking. Some die in the market with their purchases in their hands even as the wristwatches on their hands keep working. Death in such circumstances is a matter of destiny rather than ill health. It is only in our own part of the world that death is expected to be caused by ill health lamented endlessly. That is why an Arab poet crafted a stanza to remind man that death could strike at any time by any means. This is how he puts it: ‘Whoever does not die of sword may die of anything else; There are many ways of dying but death itself is only one..’

    Just as no man can remember to ask about his placenta after settling down in life so can no dead person remember to ask about his luggage or his money after death. As a matter of fact, no dead person knows that he or she has left the shores of this world. Death is like a dream. You move from one spot to another as if you are alive. You interact with people, at times dining and wining with them and at other times rejoicing or grieving with them without knowing that you are already dead.

    First Duty

    After death has struck down a Muslim, the first duty of other Muslims is to clean his body and wrap it up for burial. Then, the funeral service (Salatul Janazah) is performed congregationally and this is followed by burial. Men are to wash the body of a deceased male. Women are to wash the body of a deceased female. In Islam, the closest people are expected to wash the body of the deceased. But where such deceased had indicated who should carry out that function, no other person should do it.

    A husband may wash the body of his wife if there are no qualified women around to do it. Same can be done by a wife for her deceased husband for the same reason. Mature children can wash the body of their parents but the rule is that of male to male and female to female. It is only in the absence of close relatives that outsiders are allowed to carry out this duty or where his will indicates so. There are no professional undertakers in Islam.

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    The burial of a Muslim body within hours of death is in accordance with the Prophetic tradition (Sunnah). Muslim bodies are quickly buried for three important reasons: One is to prevent it from decomposing. Another is to minimize the grief which it may bring to its relatives and the third is to let people know that life continues despite the death of anybody. After all, death is as normal in the life of a Muslim as birth of a new baby.

    It is for the same reasons mentioned above that Muslims are advised to create their own cemeteries and not bury their deceased fellows inside houses or in cemeteries meant for adherents of other religions or around the compound.

    The dead is not expected to take over the abode of the living just as the living is prohibited from seeking an abode in a cemetery. Both the living and the dead have their pattern of space occupation which cannot be interchanged.

    Cemetery in Islam

    Cemetery in Islam is as important as community settlement. Physically, the deceased cannot act in congregation as the living. But within the colony of their cemetery, spiritual interaction is quite possible. This does not however, have any statutory basis in Islam. Once a soul has departed from the body reunion of souls and body is only possible on two occasions. One is the period of transit (Barzakh), when the deceased is interrogated by two designated Angels (Munkar and Nakir). The other is the Day of Judgement when all souls will rejoin their bodies for the purpose of rendering account.

    Another important role of the living Muslims is to take care of the cemeteries in which their departed fellows are buried. No cemetery should be allowed to grow bushy or be left un-kept.

    The environments of those buried in the cemeteries deserve as much care as when they were alive. And the living should always remember that sooner or later, they will join those in the belly of the earth.

    Equal Beings

    Muslim cemetery should be like a settlement of equal beings where no traces of segregation can be found. Such a cemetery should be kept tidy by the living and protected against any possible invasion or destruction. A non-Muslim should not be assigned or employed to watch over a Muslim cemetery. The cemetery should be weeded and even swept from time to time if possible.

    Every Muslim community or group should have a cemetery. And the maintenance of a Muslim cemetery should be the responsibility of every member of the community. No funeral ritual bath or funeral service (Janazah) should be performed at the cemetery. It is desirable to plant trees in the cemetery either for the purpose of protecting it against erosion and sand storm or for making it cool and serene.

    It is preferred that a Muslim be buried where he or she died, and not be transported to another location or country which may cause delay or require an embalmment for the body. The deceased is laid in the grave without a coffin (if permitted by local law) on his or her right side, facing the Ka’bah in Makkah. At the gravesite, erection of tombstones as well as elaborate markers or flowers or other decorative is discouraged. Rather, one should humbly remember Allah and His mercy, and pray for the deceased.

    Men of the Community

    While all members of the community attend the funeral prayers, only the men of the community accompany the body to the gravesite. The relatives of the deceased may observe a 3-day mourning period. Mourning is observed in Islam by increased devotion, receiving visitors and condolences, and avoiding decorative clothing and jewellery. Widows observe an extended mourning period (iddah) of 4 months and 10 days in accordance with Qur’an 2:234.

    During this period, she is neither to remarry nor move out of her home, nor wear decorative clothing and jewellery until the iddah period is over. Iddah is for women alone.

    Observing the eighth day or 40th day after burying the deceased is an act of extravagancy which Allah prohibits.

    When one dies, everything in this earthly life is left behind, and there are no more opportunities to perform any acts of righteousness and faith. Prophet Muhammad once said that there are three things, however, which may continue to benefit a person after death: charity given during life which continues to help others, knowledge from which people continue to benefit, and a righteous child who prays for his or her deceased parents regularly.

    Grave

    Grave is the final abode of man. All the mansions and castles built in cities and towns are a mere vanity which will eventually crumble into dust. Thus, whoever expects death should know that grave is inevitable. In there, there are neither kings nor Presidents. And there is no difference between masters and servants. Everybody lies helplessly in anticipation of resurrection and judgment.

    Transit

    Life is a transit. There is a time to be conceived in the mother‘s womb. There is a time to be born into the world. There is a time to grow up and become a man or a woman. There is a time to work and earn a living. There is a time to marry and bear children. There is a time to rejoice over the pleasantries of life. There is a time to grieve over certain calamities or tribulations. There is a time to be strong. There is a time to be weak. And finally, there is a time to die. No time can be substituted for another. In all these, the earth has a role to play. Her role cannot be denied. And when the time comes, we shall all be assembled in the presence of the Almighty Allah and give the account of our sojourn on earth. And, based on such account, each person shall take his final abode in paradise or hell. Thus, death is like visa which authorises the right of entrance into Paradise or of preventing it. You can choose the one you want. The criteria are there.

  • Rebellion of Nature

    Rebellion of Nature

    Arabs, in spite of what may be their misdemeanor today, are highly gifted in prose and poetry. Their literary prowess is unsurpassable as they combine the heritage of the Hellenes with that of Islamic treasures. In what has become an axiom, one poet among them once succinctly but philosophically put across the following couplet for the benefit of mankind: Human sense channelizes the course of destiny: whoever misapplies his sense and blocks that course should not blame destiny for his or her misfortune..

    Restiveness of The World

    The world is restive today not just for its bereavement of peace but also for the hopelessness which that bereavement entails. From Wellington in Australia to Helsinki in Finland; from Anchorage in America to Hiroshima in Japan; from Beijing in China to El Salado in Argentina and from Casablanca in Morocco to Antananarivo in Madagascar there is no peace and there is no hope for it. Nigeria’s share of this calamity is as enormous as that of the United States of America. Bomb blasts or massacre today, flood or hurricane tomorrow. Yet, both countries are comrades in arms.

    When and Where Did We Start Taking Wrong Steps?

    A Yoruba adage poses a relevant challenge when it states thus: when a kid falls down he looks forward for rescue but when an adult falls down he looks backwards to assess the cause of his fall.. That adage is worth studying by the right-thinking men who are capable of asking the right question at the right time: when and where did we start taking wrong steps?

    Venturing a little back into the recent past, one will discover that the world was not anything near the current prevailing barbarism even about 50 years ago. The occurrences which piloted the world to this stage can be best described as, REBELLION OF NATURE against man. And that rebellion could only have emanated from man’s own invention. People who are more than 60 years of age will testify to the fact that this same world of ours had once been in perfect serenity with harmony and concord even as peace was generally taken for granted.

    Problem of Man

    The main problem of man is to assume that the world is meant for him alone. He hardly believes that all other creatures like soil; animals, birds, insects, vegetations, waters, air and others known and unknown also have a right to claim a space in the tapestry of the wonderful web called the world. Yes, man is made the captain of this web but that does not give him the absolute right to re-write the constitution of the world by tampering with the nature of other creatures.

    Audacity of Man

    In an audacious attempt to affirm his supremacy over all other creatures man has gone deep into the firmament of transgression. He does not only change the courses of rivers and distort the nature of vegetations he also tampers with the flow of air just as he rebrands the nature of certain animals and trees in his so-called scientific experiments adopted to further the course of his capitalist project. Thus, for many years, other creatures have tolerated the dominance of man for as long as that dominance remained positively tolerable. But when it became too negative to bear, they collaborated to rebel against the oppression of man by fighting back in a way that beat the imagination of the oppressor. Today, whether through the tsunami in Japan or the wild fire in Australia, or earthquake in Haiti and Iran or hurricane in America and Canada, or flood in Africa the ecosystem is angrily revolting not only against the transgression of man over it but also against man’s inhumanity to fellow man.

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    Greed

    With his glorification of greed, man has relegated justice to the background by rendering truth irrelevant and by deifying an agent of trade called money. This has led to crowning money as the global ‘god’ which virtually everybody on earth is now worshipping directly or indirectly. Capitalism as a major weapon of Satan has become the finger of destiny with which the success or failure of everything is measured.

    The world is restive today not because some people have gone berserk by choosing the satanic course of barbarism, vandalism and terrorism but because such people were created by injustice through capitalism. If the truth must be told, manipulation of world serenity for the purpose of capitalism is the root cause of restiveness in the world today. And anybody who wants to change the status quo must be ready to return to the old order by restoring justice and shedding the toga of satanic supremacy. At the inception of the world, the Almighty Allah had called it a divine trust and he had called for volunteers among His creatures to keep its custody in trust. This is contained in Qur’an chapter 33, verse 172 thus: ‘we offered the trust to the heavens, to the earth and to the mountains but they all refused to bear it as they were afraid of it. However, man, out of arrogance and ignorance undertook to keep custody of it but he has since proved to be foolishly unjust’.

    Injustice

    The injustice in the world today is not only that of man to man but also of man to nature. The search for the wealth in the belly of the soil by all means and without any consideration for the pain which the soil itself can suffer in the process is a major cause of nature’s rebellion against man. Excavation of minerals, fossils and antiquities as well as seeking for more space through the expansion of the earth by reclamation of swampy areas around oceans and seas continues to bring untold hardship to man and the ecosystem even as man persists on these activities. Earthquakes, cyclone, hurricane, flood  and tsunami which are now called natural disasters are some of the results of those activities. If the ecosystem had done to man only one percent of what man has been doing to it the world would have for long forgotten any existence of man on earth.

    Yet, without minding the consequences, man continues to invent elements of destruction in form of human and material forces by ventilating the avenue for bringing the world to an abrupt end only to turn round and blame nature or human terrorism for it. This world was quite orderly and virtuous until the capitalists introduced into it the obstructions that turned it upside down and brought restiveness to the fore. For instance from time immemorial, mothers had been breastfeeding their infants and this natural upbringing had spoken in understandable language to those who can reason. It took the capitalists to introduce processed animal milk to the world which was rebranded baby formula. This was backed up with unprecedented adverts and commercial campaigns that tricked mothers into accepting it. For about two generations of almost 50 years human infants were forced to take animal milk. And by the time they all grew up to be men and women the die had been cast.

    The world We Are Living Today

    Kindness had disappeared from the surface of the earth, dignity had vamoosed and man’s humanity for man had become flakes of history.

    Children of yesterday began to behave like animals of today. Now, there are men but no husbands. There are women but no wives. There are children bearers but no parents. Couples began to live like co-tenants. There are certificates but no knowledge. Responsibility has taken flight even as children began to treat their aged parents like outcasts thereby reducing the once highly valued cultures into unnecessary luxury. Genuine workers are not adequately remunerated. Governance has become a trade that must yield profit for the rulers even as governments are trading officially in lottery and other forms of usury thereby giving the impression that in making money, only the end is capable of justifying the means.

    Nigeria for Instance

    Here in Nigeria about 97% of the oil wealth is shared among only three percent of the population while 97% of the entire populace wallow in abject poverty in their struggle for a share of the 3% wealth left for them by the governing cabal who propound obnoxious policies to create monster for themselves with which to hound perceived enemies. And as a result of such policies they have become prisoners in their own houses and environments even as they now run away from their own shadows.

    All these were compounded by the introduction of yet some other terribly devastating elements like cocaine, marijuana, heroin and others of the like used by the new human species to charge themselves into untameable wildness. Thus, today, the world is at war with itself as ubiquity of drug barons, drug addicts, hired killers, bandits, armed robbers, political thugs, economic vandals and suicide bombers come to the prowl. Even religion, the once exclusive niche is not spared. More than 90% of today’s clerics across faiths are shams merely hiding under the cloak of religion to extort money from their sheepish followers and exploit them to marrow. Where are we going from here?

    Vices to Avoid

    Prophet Muhammad (SAW) had admonished Muslims against all these vices some of which he described as signs of the last days. That prophesy is vividly reflected in the poem of another Arab poet who said: ‘This is the time against which we had been warned through the transmission of Ubayy Bn Ka’b and Abdullah Bn Mas’ud; a time in which the truth would be consigned to the refuse bin while falsehood and treachery would be held aloft; Were this time to linger for long, humanity would have zoomed into a situation whereby no one would cry over the death of a dear one and no joy would be expressed over the birth of a new baby”.

    Now, in Nigeria, we have boxed ourselves into one corner of a ring where the ruled can no longer believe the rulers because governance is based on falsehood and rulers are perceived as sheer liars.

    We are in a period where betrayal rather than trust is the order of the day and those in charge of the treasury are the real thieves stealing people’s money kept in that treasury and giving a part of the loot to religious sanctuaries. Those charged with the nation’s security are the greatest threat to the same security. Or how else can we classify our so called police?

    Colonialist Infrastructure

    Ours is a nation where the infrastructure provided by the colonialists over 70 years ago cannot be maintained despite the enormous wealth at our disposal. Billions of naira is budgeted every year for electricity, road network, railway, aviation, agriculture, and other vital projects. Yet there are no such projects in place and the budgeted money is never returned to the treasury. Over 70% of what is supposed to constitute the workforce for the nation is idle. Those who had spent their vital youthful years serving the nation are left to die of hunger and wretchedness in their old age as their pension is being pocketed by some fictitious official fingers. We are in an era where the lesson to be taught to the youth is public mutual abuse by certain shameless former rulers of this country who call each other a fool. The situation in the Southwest is the worst. Here is a region where language and culture have been lost in the name of civilization. Majority of those who went through schools can no longer speak their mother tongue. Yet they are embarrassingly backward in English language to which they lost their natural language. No moral lessons on radio and television stations, no cultural values in private homes and public places. All that matters is the money that can be made and not how such money is made.

    In this, what legacy can the present generation leave behind? And what heritage can the future generations expect from criminal prisoners who are met on their return from prisons by co party stalwarts with songs and dances? Whenever we hear of bomb blasts and suicide bombings nowadays we get alarmed and terribly agitated forgetting that these are the fruits of the seed which some leaders of yesteryears had planted in the soil of Nigeria. Or have we all forgotten that the very first bomb blast that killed a Nigerian (Dele Giwa) was linked to government quarters? What else is expected of the experts who carried out that dastardly act? Besides utilizing that skill for their own purpose having served their employers meritoriously, can’t they pass their expertise to some other Nigerians who might need such skill? The lamentations by some people today on the hearing of bomb blasts, is an indication that Nigerians are either forgetful or mischievous. By and large it should not be expected that prayers for which many people have called will solve any crime or negligent problem. Who are those to pray? What is their record before Allah? The panacea for criminal acts is to desist from criminal acts. Thousands of years of prayers against crimes by criminals can never bring succour to this world. Most of those perceived as men of God who will want to champion prayers to God are more covertly criminal than those actually perceived as criminals. They are rather men of Satan than men of God. Allah has strongly warned thus: Surely Allah will not change the situation of a nation or a community until they themselves have reneged from evil acts and if Allah intends punishment for a nation or a community no one can repel it except a change for the better by the nation or community in question…. Q. 13: 11.

  • Who owns the Schools? (2)

    Who owns the Schools? (2)

    Elderly Advice

    “Government should not exert any serious effort to take on the trivial exercise of changing the names of schools for the mere fun of it. There must however be rhyme and rhythm in naming schools. Changing the name of an institution will always generate some heat. University of Ife alumni protested to the heavens but UNIFE is today OAU and the heavens have not fallen. It should be possible to reconcile all views with no ulterior motives through dialogue.”

    False Claim

    According to Pa Fagbulu, “the claim that the federal government enforced the takeover is false. Those who are old enough will remember that the exercise was not uniformly executed across the country. The Catholics put up a very tenacious resistance in the East and that slowed implementation. Some states only half-heartedly carried it out simply because Education has always been on the concurrent list and no central government could successfully enforce such a complex maneuver at a swoop even under the military. Decrees merely backed the intention of governments and the people who had spoken through Asabia.”

    He went further thus: “One lingering and unfortunate consequence of the takeover of schools is the undeniable fact that standards of education have fallen over the years since the takeover. It is in no way a direct consequence of the proposal but one of implementation by government. In fact the takeover was to be a new beginning whereby the following would take place in the spirit of Adefarasin and Asabia (recommendations): “

    All existing and new schools would be registered: that implied that the basic minimum requirements for providing good education would be provided in all schools irrespective of who was the proprietor. That would satisfy the demand of the NUT that all educational institutions should provide equal facilities for the children to learn and the teachers to teach

    All schools would be bound by the same rules and treated equally when being assessed in respect of management, number and quality of staffing, and other areas that deal with the evaluation of the outcome of learning. I had the unpleasant duty of writing to the government of the Western State to give notice of closure in respect of the famous Government College, Ibadan of which I was by law the stand-in proprietor on behalf of the government, due to poor accommodation and general neglect. That decadence as it developed had shown that governments could default in providing fully for their schools and that any measure to avoid that unfortunate situation must be a corner-stone of any changes.

    All schools would have properly constituted Boards of Governor to oversee the management of the schools as outlined in law. That body would be independent and good enough to get governments to act appropriately in funding schools.”

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    Naked Truth

    “At the primary school level in particular, the Local Education Authorities have been greatly handicapped to the extent that it is difficult to believe that they exist at all. The (naked) truth is that governments have increasingly been unable to fund education adequately and though the rates might have been perhaps slower, the rot would have set in anyway if even schools had not been taken over.”

    Undeniable Fact

    Commenting on the recent hullaballoo over hijab and ownership of schools in Osun State, the sage observed as follows: “It is regrettable that a respected body like CAN can display so much ignorance in respect of education in Nigeria. To start with, the State of Osun like the rest of Nigeria cannot discriminate in the provision of educational facilities on the basis of gender or religion. Secondly CAN is operating from a false premise that some schools are Christian schools. All public schools belong to all the people irrespective of their religious beliefs.

    “If we Christians want to have schools over which we will have full control, the constitution provides for that. Finally the history of the take-over of schools credited to Gowon is also false. The take-over of schools was a direct consequence of the Asabia Commission and I was the originator of the idea with my colleagues who served after me as advisers to that body.”

    Reason for the Brouhaha

    “A main reason for that action was that the proprietors who received grants from government and fleeced parents through high fees made education very expensive. In spite of not investing their own money in education they failed to pay teachers on time if at all; they tyrannised teachers; they even went as far as not promoting teachers on merit especially if those teachers belonged to other denominations. CAN should please do its research and acknowledge that Adefarasin emancipated teachers and Asabia, its sub-committee recommended the procedures for achieving that end, If CAN needs being educated on this issue, I will oblige. In the meantime, it should stop spreading falsehood.  Aregbesola may or may not be guilty of wanting to Islamise Osun; that is not my concern here. Accusing him of using education is however not true.”

    Conclusion

    Concluding, Dr. Fagbulu said: “it should be reiterated that public schools belong to the people and that government as the representative of the people has the responsibility to determine the future of education and the direction and shape schools take. There is no problem of education that cannot be solved through dialogue if those involved are sincere and have no hidden agenda. And for the sake of our children, let us take interest in education and make constructive inputs. Government should take the lead and we should walk and work with it all the way.”

    Yet another Embryologist, Professor Keith Moore of the Department of Anatomy, University of Toronto, Canada, after carefully examining the translation of the Qur‘anic verses presented to him admitted thus: ‘most of the information concerning embryology mentioned in the Qur‘an is in perfect conformity with modern discoveries in the field of embryology and does not conflict with them in any way..

    Professor Moore had no prior knowledge of anything leechlike about embryo until he read chapter 96 of the Qur‘an where Allah says ‘Read! In the name of your Lord who created. He created man out of a leechlike clot…. He then went to verify this fact in an embryo under a powerful microscope and compared his observation with a diagram of a leech. He was astonished at the resemblance of the two. That prompted him to go fully into studying the Qur‘an and Hadith to acquire more knowledge until he was able to answer about 80 hitherto unanswered questions in that field.

    That prompted him to correct the contents of his book ‘The Developing Human‘ which he published earlier and he re-published it in 1982. It was with that revised edition that he became the recipient of an award for the best medical book written by a single author in the 20th century. That book has been translated into many major languages of the world and is mostly used as textbook of embryology today in the first year of medical studies in various Universities in the world.

    Sciences and Signs

    Yet, despite talking about all sciences, the Qur‘an is not a book of Sciences but that of ‘Signs‘. Those ‘Signs‘ invite man to realise the purpose of his existence on earth and live in harmony with nature.

    Judging the above verses of the Qur‘an revealed close to 1500 years ago with the wonderful reality of scientific civilisation of today what further proof does anybody need of the genuineness of the Qur‘an? And who else can give better guidance than the Supreme Creator Himself? And who else can be better called the ‘PATH FINDER‘ than Prophet Muhammad (SAW) who showed humanity the way to that all time guidance?

    Perhaps, this was why Michael Hart, a Jewish American Astrophysicist, named Prophet Muhammad the greatest man that ever lived in his famous book entitled ‘The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History‘.

    Further Testimonies

    If all the descriptions given above about Prophet Muhammad (SAW) sound exaggerated because they are given by Femi Abbas, a Muslim and an ardent follower of that Prophet, and if Michael Hart is seen as crazy in his judgment let us read the views and impressions of some other non-Muslims about this great Prophet. One of them (Alphonse de Lamartine of France) had the following to say in his book ‘Histoire de la Torque‘:

    ‘Never has a man set for himself, voluntarily or involuntarily, a more sublime aim since this aim was superhuman; to subvert superstitions which had been interposed between man and his Creator; to render God unto man and man unto God; to restore rational and sacred idea of divinity amidst the chaos of the material and disfigured gods of idolatry, then existing.

    Never has a man undertaken a work so far beyond human power with so feeble means, for he (Muhammad) had in the conception as well as in the execution of such a great design no other instrument than himself, and no other, except a handful of men living in a corner of a desert…. If greatness of purpose, smallness of means, and astounding results are the three criteria of human genius, who could dare to compare any great man in modern history with Muhammad? The most famous men created arms, laws and empires only. They founded, if anything at all, no more than material powers which often crumbled before their very eyes. This man moved not only armies, legislations, empires, peoples and dynasties, but millions of men in one-third of the then inhabited world; and more than that, he moved the altars, the gods, the religions, the ideas, the beliefs and the souls. On the basis of a book, every letter of which has become law, he created a spiritual nationality which blended together peoples of every tongue and of every race…..As regards all standards by which human greatness may be measured we may well ask, is there any man in human history greater than Muhammad?.

    On his own, Napoleon Bonaparte, the great 18th century French conqueror of Europe was so much amazed by the traits of Islam which he saw in Egypt during his military expeditions that he made the following historic statement about that divine religion and its great Prophet:

    ‘Muhammad, in reality, was a great leader of mankind. He preached UNITY among Arabs who were, till then, torn asunder due to internecine quarrels, sometimes resulting in bloody war fares. He brought them out of the obscure world in a short time and the discipline which they maintained under his leadership was simply marvellous, and so was their bravery, courage and devotion to the cause which they loved and cherished. This, coupled with the contempt for death, as taught by their leader, made them great soldiers and fighters like of whom history rarely produces. I simply marvel at the achievements of this great ‘Son of the Desert’ within a mere period of less than 15 years; a thing which Moses and Christ could not do in 15 centuries. I salute this great man; I salute his qualities of Head and Heart…..

    George Bernard Shaw

    And, in corroboration of the above statements, variously made by renowned men of letters and intellect, another foremost Orientalist, playwright and dramatist, George Bernard Shaw, had the following to say about Islam and Prophet Muhammad (SAW) in his book ‘The genuine Islam’ (vol. 1 No 8 of 1936):

    ‘The Christians and their missionaries have presented a horrible picture of Islam. Not only that, they also carried out an organised and planned propaganda against the personality of Prophet Mohammad and the religion he preached. I have carefully studied Islam and the life of its Prophet. I have done so both as a student of history and as a critic. And I have come to the conclusion that Mohammad was indeed a great man and a deliverer and benefactor of mankind which was till then writhing under a most agonizing pain. I have always held Islam in high estimation because of its wonderful vitality. It is the only religion which appears to me to possess that assimilating capacity to the changing face of existence which can make it appealing to every age. I have studied him-the wonderful man and in my opinion, far from being an anti-Christ, he must be called the saviour of humanity. I believe that if a man like him were to assume the dictatorship of the modern world, he would succeed in solving its problems in a way that would bring it the much needed peace and happiness.

    I have prophesied about the faith of Muhammad that it would be acceptable to the Europe of tomorrow as it is beginning to be acceptable to the Europe of today. For confirmation of Bernard Shaw‘s remark quoted above, see ‘The Genuine Islam, vol. 1, No. 8, 1936.

    Conclusion

    These are just some of the facts that make an orphan, unlettered Prophet, Muhammad (SAW), the greatest human being that ever lived on earth. None of the attestations above made any reference to his birth or birthday because they knew that his birth had nothing to do with his achievements. If non-Muslims could go as far as shown above to benefit from the greatness of Prophet Muhammad‘s mission on earth what is expected of Muslims for whom that mission is primarily meant?

  • Who owns the Schools? (1)

    Who owns the Schools? (1)

    This is one of the very rare occasions when this column, ‘The Message’, is compelled to serialise an article. The last time that such occurred was about seven years ago.  That this article is being serialised now is a child of necessity. Ordinarily, professional Journalists who know their onions often strive to avoid serialisation of articles except if it becomes a necessity like on this occasion. Generally, serialisation of articles which often enables good readers to distinguish between professional journalists and mere writers has the tendency of leaving a sour taste in the mouth.

    However, the seriousness of this article and the referential importance of its contents are the factors that necessitate its inevitable serialisation. Surely, some serious-minded readers of this column who are intellectually inclined will appreciate the assertion here especially when the implications of the Appeal court in Lagos on the related case vis a vis the provisions of Nigerian constitution is taken into consideration. The delicate case of hijab wearing by Muslim female pupils in public schools, whether in Lagos State or elsewhere, cannot be separated from the big but unnecessary question of who owns Nigerian public schools in the 21st century.

    Problem of Diversity

     One good thing about life generally is the ability of the phenomenon called environment to conveniently accommodate the positive angle of life along with the negative angle despite their seeming incompatibility. This means that diversity may not be an oddity after all. It may serve a more purposeful end than humanly perceived. Perhaps that is why the Almighty Allah created all living things in twins of males and females as well as in couples of colours and hues. Yet, despite their natural differences they manage to cohabit without any visible rancour.

    Of all the creatures on earth, only human beings believe and emphasise the problem of incompatibility. At least we know that on a single farm land, all sorts of plants ranging from sugarcane to bitter leaf trees grow and cohabit without any visible rancour. And in the ecosystem, (forests or oceans) both the herbivours and carnivours coexist without threatening their habitats. It is only among human beings that the well fed rejoice in preventing the hungry ones from feeding even on remnants. With regard to this manifest situation, what is true of human beings in temporal life is equally true of them in spiritual life. Otherwise, how can some people who are claiming to be of faith insist on preventing others from covering their heads according to the tenets of their faith in a co-financed commonwealth affair when those of others do not prevent the half-naked ones from walking about in nudity despite the natural eyesore that the latter constitutes?

    Read Also: Nouhaila Benzina becomes first player to wear hijab at World Cup

    Genesis of Schools Takeover

    According to Dr. Amiel M. Fagbulu (quoted copiously in the first leg of this article last Friday), “the take-over of schools has not been reported upon sufficiently for most people to understand the nefariousness and Machiavellian dimensions attached to it. To start with, it meant loss of income to some proprietors who were actually milking the people while pretending that they were magnanimously making sacrifices for them. Next is the falsehood that the governments did not pay compensation to proprietors. Another was that it was the federal government’s decree that made takeover final and legal. Last but not the least is that by retaining their names government had conceded that take-over was just in name alone. There are other false assumptions that will be dealt with as they are made”.

    Fagbulu continues thus: “the takeover of schools was a final act of dissociation of former proprietors from ownership of their schools. The schools no longer belong to them. To talk of Muslim or Christian schools that are run with public funds is absolute nonsense. Any school that is run with public money is a public school. All others are private institutions at whatever level and by whatever name.”

    The Question of Compensation

    Also as a continuation of his expert treatise on education in Nigeria, Fagbulu further elucidated on the question of compensation for proprietors of old missionary and privately owned schools in Nigeria as follows: “the question of compensation was raised by the proprietors of most of the Christian- and Muslim-based schools. In the West (of Nigeria), the only bodies I clearly remember as handing over schools voluntarily and with no conditions attached were the Seventh Day Adventist group and Adeola Odutola who owned a fairly good secondary school at Ijebu-Ode. The noisiest ones were sole proprietors who individually owned schools. The discussions were preliminary and informal exchanges to advise both sides before the final decision was taken. The government of the Western State was glad to oblige but what silenced the demand were the conditions put to the proprietors based on government’s sense of fairness to the taxpayers whose funds had been utilised”. They were as follows:

    “Proprietors would calculate their investment on all structures in the school including the land (x) which by the education laws of the time must be registered in perpetuity in the name of the school (at least in the West)

    Proprietors would compute the total amount they had incurred in running the school from inception to date of takeover (y)

    Proprietors would compile a list of the value of all gifts and donations the school had received (p)

    Government would compile the value of all grants (general and special) that it had paid to the school up to the time of takeover (q).

    Compensation to proprietors would be C = [(x + y) – (p + q)]”

    Fagbulu’s Personal Comment

    When the discerning proprietors among them did the Arithmetic and found out that they would be seriously indebted to government at the end of the exercise, they blinked and went silent. A funny footnote to the exercise was the demand of one or two proprietors who wanted to be paid for their ‘brand’ name. Government had no use for their names anyway and when they eventually lost, they pleaded with government to kindly retain those names, a demand which was graciously granted.”

    His Further Comments

    “Heritage has at least two dimensions. Your child can only make claims to what belongs to you. That is one form of heritage. The other like UNESCO’s heritage, relates to values. The pleasure derived from listening to Sonny Ade’s music or reading Achebe’s books are golden gems they have bequeathed to the world. Achebe collects his royalty forever, which means that it is a heritage of his children. We who acclaim and cherish the books are not beneficiaries of the pecuniary offerings. Similarly UNESCO helps preserve those monuments in Egypt say, but it is the Egyptian government and people that own the monuments. The government, when it took over schools took over the land, the structures on them, and the responsibility to continue to run schools. Those who are capitalising on Heritage can be assured that it is their’s to cherish and share with the world. They are free to do so.”

    Analytical Deduction

    In his analytical deduction on the unwarranted controversy over the ownership of public schools in Nigeria, the Octogenarian education expert revealed an eye witness account as follows: “A few students imported the Dancing Club from the Higher College, Yaba to the University College, Ibadan. We started the Bug and later others started the original Cult that was not malevolent. They are part of the history of that institution. The good things keep going from generation to generation and those who cherish them regard them as part of things to be retained forever. Heritage in the sense people who are talking about it will survive on its own if the generations want them. There is no law that new influences cannot add their own quota before they pass away. There is nothing stopping those being locked out today from leaving their imprints that will be cherished behind”.

    He continued: “The form for the annual census of schools provides for three categories of ‘girls only’, ‘boys only’ and mixed schools. It is the responsibility of government to determine which of its public schools will be designated in any of the three categories. As a part of the process of development if it becomes necessary to alter the gender status of any school especially from a mixed to a single gender and vice-versa, it may be necessary to do some juggling of names. For instance a St. Agnes Girls’ School cannot become mixed and still retain its name. However it could become St. Agnes High School or something equally appropriate without much loss of identity. While the use of adjectives like Junior, Senior, Middle, High, and Primary are helpful indicators of level, those of gender like boy’s, girl’s, and mixed are pointless tautologies as names go. A St, Agnes should have no trouble ministering to both girls and boys, or doing whatever saints are supposed to do for both genders.”

    Elderly Advice

    “Government should not exert any serious effort to take on the trivial exercise of changing the names of schools for the mere fun of it. There must however be rhyme and rhythm in naming schools. Changing the name of an institution will always generate some heat. University of Ife alumni protested to the heavens but UNIFE is today OAU and the heavens have not fallen. It should be possible to reconcile all views with no ulterior motives through dialogue.”

    False Claim

    According to Pa Fagbulu, “the claim that the federal government enforced the takeover is false. Those who are old enough will remember that the exercise was not uniformly executed across the country. The Catholics put up a very tenacious resistance in the East and that slowed implementation. Some states only half-heartedly carried it out simply because Education has always been on the concurrent list and no central government could successfully enforce such a complex maneuver at a swoop even under the military. Decrees merely backed the intention of governments and the people who had spoken through Asabia.”

    He went further thus: “One lingering and unfortunate consequence of the takeover of schools is the undeniable fact that standards of education have fallen over the years since the takeover. It is in no way a direct consequence of the proposal but one of implementation by government. In fact the takeover was to be a new beginning whereby the following would take place in the spirit of Adefarasin and Asabia (recommendations): “

    All existing and new schools would be registered: that implied that the basic minimum requirements for providing good education would be provided in all schools irrespective of who was the proprietor. That would satisfy the demand of the NUT that all educational institutions should provide equal facilities for the children to learn and the teachers to teach

    All schools would be bound by the same rules and treated equally when being assessed in respect of management, number and quality of staffing, and other areas that deal with the evaluation of the outcome of learning. I had the unpleasant duty of writing to the government of the Western State to give notice of closure in respect of the famous Government College, Ibadan of which I was by law the stand-in proprietor on behalf of the government, due to poor accommodation and general neglect. That decadence as it developed had shown that governments could default in providing fully for their schools and that any measure to avoid that unfortunate situation must be a corner-stone of any changes.

    All schools would have properly constituted Boards of Governor to oversee the management of the schools as outlined in law. That body would be independent and good enough to get governments to act appropriately in funding schools.”

    Naked Truth

    “At the primary school level in particular, the Local Education Authorities have been greatly handicapped to the extent that it is difficult to believe that they exist at all. The (naked) truth is that governments have increasingly been unable to fund education adequately and though the rates might have been perhaps slower, the rot would have set in anyway if even schools had not been taken over.”

    Undeniable Fact

    Commenting on the recent hullaballoo over hijab and ownership of schools in Osun State, the sage observed as follows: “It is regrettable that a respected body like CAN can display so much ignorance in respect of education in Nigeria. To start with, the State of Osun like the rest of Nigeria cannot discriminate in the provision of educational facilities on the basis of gender or religion. Secondly CAN is operating from a false premise that some schools are Christian schools. All public schools belong to all the people irrespective of their religious beliefs.

    “If we Christians want to have schools over which we will have full control, the constitution provides for that. Finally the history of the take-over of schools credited to Gowon is also false. The take-over of schools was a direct consequence of the Asabia Commission and I was the originator of the idea with my colleagues who served after me as advisers to that body.”

    Reason for the Brouhaha

    “A main reason for that action was that the proprietors who received grants from government and fleeced parents through high fees made education very expensive. In spite of not investing their own money in education they failed to pay teachers on time if at all; they tyrannised teachers; they even went as far as not promoting teachers on merit especially if those teachers belonged to other denominations. CAN should please do its research and acknowledge that Adefarasin emancipated teachers and Asabia, its sub-committee recommended the procedures for achieving that end, If CAN needs being educated on this issue, I will oblige. In the meantime, it should stop spreading falsehood.  Aregbesola may or may not be guilty of wanting to Islamise Osun; that is not my concern here. Accusing him of using education is however not true.”

    Conclusion

    Concluding, Dr. Fagbulu said: “it should be reiterated that public schools belong to the people and that government as the representative of the people has the responsibility to determine the future of education and the direction and shape schools take. There is no problem of education that cannot be solved through dialogue if those involved are sincere and have no hidden agenda. And for the sake of our children, let us take interest in education and make constructive inputs. Government should take the lead and we should walk and work with it all the way.”

    Yet another Embryologist, Professor Keith Moore of the Department of Anatomy, University of Toronto, Canada, after carefully examining the translation of the Qur‘anic verses presented to him admitted thus: ‘most of the information concerning embryology mentioned in the Qur‘an is in perfect conformity with modern discoveries in the field of embryology and does not conflict with them in any way..

    Professor Moore had no prior knowledge of anything leechlike about embryo until he read chapter 96 of the Qur‘an where Allah says ‘Read! In the name of your Lord who created. He created man out of a leechlike clot…. He then went to verify this fact in an embryo under a powerful microscope and compared his observation with a diagram of a leech. He was astonished at the resemblance of the two. That prompted him to go fully into studying the Qur‘an and Hadith to acquire more knowledge until he was able to answer about 80 hitherto unanswered questions in that field.

    That prompted him to correct the contents of his book ‘The Developing Human‘ which he published earlier and he re-published it in 1982. It was with that revised edition that he became the recipient of an award for the best medical book written by a single author in the 20th century. That book has been translated into many major languages of the world and is mostly used as textbook of embryology today in the first year of medical studies in various Universities in the world.

    Sciences and Signs

    Yet, despite talking about all sciences, the Qur‘an is not a book of Sciences but that of ‘Signs‘. Those ‘Signs‘ invite man to realise the purpose of his existence on earth and live in harmony with nature.

    Judging the above verses of the Qur‘an revealed close to 1500 years ago with the wonderful reality of scientific civilisation of today what further proof does anybody need of the genuineness of the Qur‘an? And who else can give better guidance than the Supreme Creator Himself? And who else can be better called the ‘PATH FINDER‘ than Prophet Muhammad (SAW) who showed humanity the way to that all time guidance?

    Perhaps, this was why Michael Hart, a Jewish American Astrophysicist, named Prophet Muhammad the greatest man that ever lived in his famous book entitled ‘The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History‘.

    Further Testimonies

    If all the descriptions given above about Prophet Muhammad (SAW) sound exaggerated because they are given by Femi Abbas, a Muslim and an ardent follower of that Prophet, and if Michael Hart is seen as crazy in his judgment let us read the views and impressions of some other non-Muslims about this great Prophet. One of them (Alphonse de Lamartine of France) had the following to say in his book ‘Histoire de la Torque‘:

    ‘Never has a man set for himself, voluntarily or involuntarily, a more sublime aim since this aim was superhuman; to subvert superstitions which had been interposed between man and his Creator; to render God unto man and man unto God; to restore rational and sacred idea of divinity amidst the chaos of the material and disfigured gods of idolatry, then existing.

    Never has a man undertaken a work so far beyond human power with so feeble means, for he (Muhammad) had in the conception as well as in the execution of such a great design no other instrument than himself, and no other, except a handful of men living in a corner of a desert…. If greatness of purpose, smallness of means, and astounding results are the three criteria of human genius, who could dare to compare any great man in modern history with Muhammad? The most famous men created arms, laws and empires only. They founded, if anything at all, no more than material powers which often crumbled before their very eyes. This man moved not only armies, legislations, empires, peoples and dynasties, but millions of men in one-third of the then inhabited world; and more than that, he moved the altars, the gods, the religions, the ideas, the beliefs and the souls. On the basis of a book, every letter of which has become law, he created a spiritual nationality which blended together peoples of every tongue and of every race…..As regards all standards by which human greatness may be measured we may well ask, is there any man in human history greater than Muhammad?.

    On his own, Napoleon Bonaparte, the great 18th century French conqueror of Europe was so much amazed by the traits of Islam which he saw in Egypt during his military expeditions that he made the following historic statement about that divine religion and its great Prophet:

    ‘Muhammad, in reality, was a great leader of mankind. He preached UNITY among Arabs who were, till then, torn asunder due to internecine quarrels, sometimes resulting in bloody war fares. He brought them out of the obscure world in a short time and the discipline which they maintained under his leadership was simply marvellous, and so was their bravery, courage and devotion to the cause which they loved and cherished. This, coupled with the contempt for death, as taught by their leader, made them great soldiers and fighters like of whom history rarely produces. I simply marvel at the achievements of this great ‘Son of the Desert’ within a mere period of less than 15 years; a thing which Moses and Christ could not do in 15 centuries. I salute this great man; I salute his qualities of Head and Heart…..

    George Bernard Shaw

    And, in corroboration of the above statements, variously made by renowned men of letters and intellect, another foremost Orientalist, playwright and dramatist, George Bernard Shaw, had the following to say about Islam and Prophet Muhammad (SAW) in his book ‘The genuine Islam’ (vol. 1 No 8 of 1936):

    ‘The Christians and their missionaries have presented a horrible picture of Islam. Not only that, they also carried out an organised and planned propaganda against the personality of Prophet Mohammad and the religion he preached. I have carefully studied Islam and the life of its Prophet. I have done so both as a student of history and as a critic. And I have come to the conclusion that Mohammad was indeed a great man and a deliverer and benefactor of mankind which was till then writhing under a most agonizing pain. I have always held Islam in high estimation because of its wonderful vitality. It is the only religion which appears to me to possess that assimilating capacity to the changing face of existence which can make it appealing to every age. I have studied him-the wonderful man and in my opinion, far from being an anti-Christ, he must be called the saviour of humanity. I believe that if a man like him were to assume the dictatorship of the modern world, he would succeed in solving its problems in a way that would bring it the much needed peace and happiness.

    I have prophesied about the faith of Muhammad that it would be acceptable to the Europe of tomorrow as it is beginning to be acceptable to the Europe of today. For confirmation of Bernard Shaw‘s remark quoted above, see ‘The Genuine Islam, vol. 1, No. 8, 1936.

    Conclusion

    These are just some of the facts that make an orphan, unlettered Prophet, Muhammad (SAW), the greatest human being that ever lived on earth. None of the attestations above made any reference to his birth or birthday because they knew that his birth had nothing to do with his achievements. If non-Muslims could go as far as shown above to benefit from the greatness of Prophet Muhammad‘s mission on earth what is expected of Muslims for whom that mission is primarily meant?

  • An Orphan‘s Legacy

    An Orphan‘s Legacy

    Who shares his life‘s pure pleasure and works the honest road; who trades with heaping measure and lifts his brother‘s load; who turns the wrong down bluntly and lends the right a hand; he dwells in God‘s own country and tills the holy land.. Louis F. Benson

    No man in history has ever been as fitting to the above poetic description as Prophet Muhammad (SAW) the undisputable greatest man that ever lived.

    His legacy is the solid foundation upon which the contemporary civilisation is built. But despite the vivid visibility of that legacy it remains invisible to many eyes that are alien to Islam. Thus, the Prophet‘s legacy is like the beaming sun which no blind can see and no seeing eyes can perceive in its natural nakedness. Yet, both the blind and the seeing feel the burning effect of the sun ‘Willy nilly’ even as it photosynthesises the plants around them.

    This article is not meant to celebrate the birth of Prophet Muhammad (SAW) for which a public holiday was declared in Nigeria.

    As far as ‘The Message’ is concerned, what is to be celebrated about this great Prophet is by far much more than his birthday. His achievements clearly transcend his birth. Thus, there is no need wasting time on his birthday here.

    Read Also; Kidnapped Benue commissioner freed

    The Prophet‘s Biography

    From the creation of Adam, the first human being created by Allah, till date, no man‘s biography has been so much written and read as that of Muhammad (SAW) the son of Abdullah and Aminah. This man‘s biography has been written from all perspectives, positive and negative, by various men and women of diverse races, tribes, ideologies and religions in the past 1500 years or there about. And the biography is still being written and re-written authoritatively and un-authoritatively, today, in uncountable languages.

    Through the writings of the Prophet‘s biography, some people have zoomed into un-dream-able fame. Others have sunk into the abyss of a permanent oblivion. But virtually all the writers have benefitted from their writings directly or indirectly in coins and in kind. No other Prophet‘s biography has attracted as many writers from believers and non-believers, from friends and foes alike as that of Prophet Muhammad (SAW).

    Every aspect of this Prophet‘s life including the dresses he wore, the food he ate, the way he spoke, the wives he married, the children he bore, and the wars he fought, has formed the basis of his biography. In short, next to the Qur‘an, no book is as much read daily in the world today as the biography of Prophet Muhammad (SAW) in one form or another.

    Question

    But there is a vital question: why is global focus so much on this unlettered Prophet from Arabia? The answer to this question is not far-fetched. The world has not produced any other personality like him. And it will not. He is the seal of all Prophets and the epitome of human exemplariness. In him alone are found all the traits of what a perfect gentleman should be in all ramifications.

    If Prophet Muhammad had not been an orphan, he would not have been able to guide humanity on how orphans should be treated especially with regards to inheritance. If he had not been a husband, his marital life would not have been an excellent example for others to emulate and women‘s rights would have been permanently ignored. If he had not been a widower the world would not have realised the plight of widows and learnt how to provide for them. If he had not been a father, the proper care for children by parents would have been relegated to the background in Islamic doctrine. If he had not been trustworthy, the value of trust would have been totally lost on mankind.

    His migration from Makkah to Madinah paved way for the culture of hospitality universally imbibed today and the wars he was forced to fight engendered the law of war, armistice and peace. Without the conquests he achieved, the word magnanimity would not have found a place in the dictionary of man and if he had not suffered defeat in war, the vanquished would not have learnt the act of gallantry. If the Prophet had not been a judge, the virtue of justice would have been globally thrown to the winds and survival in all societies would have been for the fittest.

    If he had not been a democratic ruler, the relationship between the ruled and their rulers, all over the world, today, would not have been dissimilar from that of slaves and their masters and dictatorship in governance would have known no bounds. If Prophet had not been poor despite being a Head of State, the policy of social welfare adopted in civilised societies today in favour of the poor, would not have been possible. If he had not been an illiterate, the world would not have known the difference between literacy and education. And, if, despite all these qualities in him, he had not been humble and affable, arrogance would have been the main character of all privileged people in the world today.

    His Qualities

    Who else can be compared to this man in history? And, in which any other single person have all the aforementioned qualities ever been found in history? There can be little wonder then why so much attention was and is still being focused on the personality of this extra-ordinary human being. That is Prophet Muhammad (SAW) for you, the like of whom the world has never seen and will never see again. If this man is celebrated anywhere in the world, anytime, therefore, it is definitely not because he was born. His achievements transcend his birth.

    But for him, the world would have remained in the dungeon of ignorance and primitivism and humanity would have remained at the level of crude beasts. It was he who brought back the manual of life to mankind after it had been lost in the search for sheer vanity. Manual of life is the divine instruction which came gradually from Allah to mankind according to the growth rate of human intellect. But such manual is not peculiar to man alone. All other organisms have their own instructions from Allah which in a way constitute their own manuals of life.

    The Path and the Path Finder

    However, due to the intellectual superiority of man, the various divine instructions to other organisms were incorporated into man‘s own manual of life. This is to enable man understand the complexity of his environment vis a vis the essence of his own existence and thereby act effectively as Allah‘s vicegerent on earth. Although because of the differences in times and methods, Allah’s message is perceived differently, the fact remains that the message is only one coming from only one and same God. This message is the ‘RIGHT PATH’ to salvation which came to mankind after several millennia of wondering in the wilderness of ignorance and vainglory. And the man, Muhammad (SAW), through whom that message reached us is the ‘PATH FINDER’. There are many attestations to this.

    Attestations

    For instance, after many years of scientific experimentations, a German-born American physicist and Nobel Laureate, Albert Einstein, the inventor of atomic bomb who is generally known as the 20th century creator of special and general theory of relativity, compared his works with the contents of the Qur‘an and concluded as follows: ‘Science without religion is lame and religion without science is blind.. He then called on fellow scientists to endeavour to read the Qur‘an without bias in order to know the true origin of science in human life.

    And as if responding to Einstein‘s call, Professor Tagatat Tajasen, Chairman of the Department of Anatomy at Chiang Mai University in Thailand accepted Islam on the strength of just one scientific sign accurately mentioned in the Qur‘an. He had spent a great amount of his time, as a Professor, in search of pain receptor. When his attention was drawn to the Qur‘an, he did not believe initially that such a highly sophisticated aspect of science could have been mentioned about 1,500 years ago. But when he confirmed it by himself in the translation of the Qur‘an, he became so much impressed that he purposely attended the 8th Saudi Medical Conference held in Riyadh where he publicly embraced Islam.

    Another leading scientist, Professor Marshall Johnson, the Head of the Department of Anatomy a Director of Daniel Institute at the Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, USA, was asked to comment on the verses of the Qur‘an dealing with embryology. In response, he said it was probable that for Prophet Muhammad (SAW) to have given such vivid description of foetus, he must have had a powerful microscope. But when he was reminded that the Qur‘an was revealed about 1500 years ago and that the invention of microscope took place only a couple of centuries ago Professor Johnson laughed and made the following remark: ‘I see nothing here in conflict with the concept that Divine intervention was involved when Muhammad recited the Qur‘an……

    Yet another Embryologist, Professor Keith Moore of the Department of Anatomy, University of Toronto, Canada, after carefully examining the translation of the Qur‘anic verses presented to him admitted thus: ‘most of the information concerning embryology mentioned in the Qur‘an is in perfect conformity with modern discoveries in the field of embryology and does not conflict with them in any way..

    Professor Moore had no prior knowledge of anything leechlike about embryo until he read chapter 96 of the Qur‘an where Allah says ‘Read! In the name of your Lord who created. He created man out of a leechlike clot…. He then went to verify this fact in an embryo under a powerful microscope and compared his observation with a diagram of a leech. He was astonished at the resemblance of the two. That prompted him to go fully into studying the Qur‘an and Hadith to acquire more knowledge until he was able to answer about 80 hitherto unanswered questions in that field.

    That prompted him to correct the contents of his book ‘The Developing Human‘ which he published earlier and he re-published it in 1982. It was with that revised edition that he became the recipient of an award for the best medical book written by a single author in the 20th century. That book has been translated into many major languages of the world and is mostly used as textbook of embryology today in the first year of medical studies in various Universities in the world.

    Sciences and Signs

    Yet, despite talking about all sciences, the Qur‘an is not a book of Sciences but that of ‘Signs‘. Those ‘Signs‘ invite man to realise the purpose of his existence on earth and live in harmony with nature.

    Judging the above verses of the Qur‘an revealed close to 1500 years ago with the wonderful reality of scientific civilisation of today what further proof does anybody need of the genuineness of the Qur‘an? And who else can give better guidance than the Supreme Creator Himself? And who else can be better called the ‘PATH FINDER‘ than Prophet Muhammad (SAW) who showed humanity the way to that all time guidance?

    Perhaps, this was why Michael Hart, a Jewish American Astrophysicist, named Prophet Muhammad the greatest man that ever lived in his famous book entitled ‘The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History‘.

    Further Testimonies

    If all the descriptions given above about Prophet Muhammad (SAW) sound exaggerated because they are given by Femi Abbas, a Muslim and an ardent follower of that Prophet, and if Michael Hart is seen as crazy in his judgment let us read the views and impressions of some other non-Muslims about this great Prophet. One of them (Alphonse de Lamartine of France) had the following to say in his book ‘Histoire de la Torque‘:

    ‘Never has a man set for himself, voluntarily or involuntarily, a more sublime aim since this aim was superhuman; to subvert superstitions which had been interposed between man and his Creator; to render God unto man and man unto God; to restore rational and sacred idea of divinity amidst the chaos of the material and disfigured gods of idolatry, then existing.

    Never has a man undertaken a work so far beyond human power with so feeble means, for he (Muhammad) had in the conception as well as in the execution of such a great design no other instrument than himself, and no other, except a handful of men living in a corner of a desert…. If greatness of purpose, smallness of means, and astounding results are the three criteria of human genius, who could dare to compare any great man in modern history with Muhammad? The most famous men created arms, laws and empires only. They founded, if anything at all, no more than material powers which often crumbled before their very eyes. This man moved not only armies, legislations, empires, peoples and dynasties, but millions of men in one-third of the then inhabited world; and more than that, he moved the altars, the gods, the religions, the ideas, the beliefs and the souls. On the basis of a book, every letter of which has become law, he created a spiritual nationality which blended together peoples of every tongue and of every race…..As regards all standards by which human greatness may be measured we may well ask, is there any man in human history greater than Muhammad?.

    On his own, Napoleon Bonaparte, the great 18th century French conqueror of Europe was so much amazed by the traits of Islam which he saw in Egypt during his military expeditions that he made the following historic statement about that divine religion and its great Prophet:

    ‘Muhammad, in reality, was a great leader of mankind. He preached UNITY among Arabs who were, till then, torn asunder due to internecine quarrels, sometimes resulting in bloody war fares. He brought them out of the obscure world in a short time and the discipline which they maintained under his leadership was simply marvellous, and so was their bravery, courage and devotion to the cause which they loved and cherished. This, coupled with the contempt for death, as taught by their leader, made them great soldiers and fighters like of whom history rarely produces. I simply marvel at the achievements of this great ‘Son of the Desert’ within a mere period of less than 15 years; a thing which Moses and Christ could not do in 15 centuries. I salute this great man; I salute his qualities of Head and Heart…..

    George Bernard Shaw

    And, in corroboration of the above statements, variously made by renowned men of letters and intellect, another foremost Orientalist, playwright and dramatist, George Bernard Shaw, had the following to say about Islam and Prophet Muhammad (SAW) in his book ‘The genuine Islam’ (vol. 1 No 8 of 1936):

    ‘The Christians and their missionaries have presented a horrible picture of Islam. Not only that, they also carried out an organised and planned propaganda against the personality of Prophet Mohammad and the religion he preached. I have carefully studied Islam and the life of its Prophet. I have done so both as a student of history and as a critic. And I have come to the conclusion that Mohammad was indeed a great man and a deliverer and benefactor of mankind which was till then writhing under a most agonizing pain. I have always held Islam in high estimation because of its wonderful vitality. It is the only religion which appears to me to possess that assimilating capacity to the changing face of existence which can make it appealing to every age. I have studied him-the wonderful man and in my opinion, far from being an anti-Christ, he must be called the saviour of humanity. I believe that if a man like him were to assume the dictatorship of the modern world, he would succeed in solving its problems in a way that would bring it the much needed peace and happiness.

    I have prophesied about the faith of Muhammad that it would be acceptable to the Europe of tomorrow as it is beginning to be acceptable to the Europe of today. For confirmation of Bernard Shaw‘s remark quoted above, see ‘The Genuine Islam, vol. 1, No. 8, 1936.

    Conclusion

    These are just some of the facts that make an orphan, unlettered Prophet, Muhammad (SAW), the greatest human being that ever lived on earth. None of the attestations above made any reference to his birth or birthday because they knew that his birth had nothing to do with his achievements. If non-Muslims could go as far as shown above to benefit from the greatness of Prophet Muhammad‘s mission on earth what is expected of Muslims for whom that mission is primarily meant?

  • What the Judge Said?

    What the Judge Said?

    Experiences of life keep informing us of what people and institutions really are against what they are presumed to be. It is quite unfortunate that Africans especially Nigerians whose livelihood still depends heavily on the imitation of the misconduct of European colonialists without considering the implications of such imitation are the ones proclaiming civilisation in Nigeria’s contemporary times. The Yoruba elite of the Southwest of Nigeria are particularly guilty of this cultural bastardisation.  They are the ones who believe that the ability to speak and write the colonial language called English is what constitutes civilisation. With the foreign languages permanently on their tongues, they have battered their African brains for European brains.

    Unlike the Igbo people of Eastern Nigeria and the Hausa people of the North, the Yoruba elite have become a serious embarrassment to their cultural pedigree through the relegation of their linguistic heritage. To them, the legacy of their ancestral lineage is a primordial shame not worth to be called a modern heritage. Thus, in their homes as well as in their public and private discussions, the language of communication is invariably English. And whoever is incapable of speaking Queen’s English or writing Shakespearean prose is considered primitive and unfit to live in cities and towns. Watch out for an important occasion at the International Conference Centre of the University of Ibadan today and note the formal language of communication on that occasion.

    It is, culturally, a laughable orientation attributable only to a tribe of black people who prefer to substitute their naturally endowed culture for that of the wild white people and thereby getting lost in the wilderness of cultural confusion. How can such people who are deeply engrossed in colonial mentality believe in the cultural emancipation of others? Today’s article is not meant for discussing the details of this fundamental aberration that chains a people to the apron of perpetual colonialism. Another day in the near future will do.

    Appeal Court Ruling in Lagos

    Reactions of various colours and hues have been trailing last week’s ruling of the Appeal Court in Lagos State in respect of a litigation over hijab wearing in public schools by Muslim female pupils in that state. But every reaction seems to be an exhibition of antecedent and level of civility on the part of those who have been reacting to it. Last week’s ruling was not the first to be pronounced by a Nigerian court of competent jurisdiction concerning hijab wearing in public schools. It was preceded by a High Court ruling in the same state three years ago and we can still vividly remember the reactions that trailed it.

    When a Lagos High Court ruling that prompted an appeal by the litigants in hijab case was pronounced in 2013, there were various reactions which have not lost on us. The affected Muslims, at that time, who got the wrong side of the judgment, did not bring fanaticism into it. They did not take the law into their hands by threatening fire and brimstone. Rather, they simply exhibited civility and adherence to the rule of law by appealing to a higher court. That is civilisation in all its ramifications.

    Precedent   

    The unnecessary controversy over the right of wearing hijab in public schools by Muslim female pupils in those schools is not peculiar to Lagos  State. A similar court pronouncement was made in an Osun State High Court recently and we know the reactions that trailed it. So we cannot be alarmed by any inflammatory reaction to last week’s ruling from any quarter since we are familiar with its trend as far as such quarters are concerned. The original aim of writing on this topic today is neither to celebrate any victory nor to vilify any recalcitrance. But to congratulate the Lagos State Muslims on their civilised behaviour throughout the period of the case and to further encourage them to stick to the upholding of the rule of law in all circumstances including one of unwarranted provocation.

    Meanwhile, the outcome of that case has thrown open a fundamental question which had for long remained tacit. Who owns the public schools in Nigeria generally and in Lagos State in particular? This question becomes germane not because of last week’s ruling that was more about freedom of religion and dressing but because of the future of our children who may have cause to ask questions and want to get the relevant and appropriate answers. The fundamental question of ‘who owns the schools’ deserves a fundamental answer that may become a reference point for our children in future. Luckily, yours sincerely needed not labouring much before answering that question. A foremost Nigerian educationist of Yoruba extraction, Dr. Amiel M. Fagbulu (from Ilesa in Osun State) who incidentally happens to be a Christian has provided the right answer in his (unpublished) professorial book entitled  ‘DEFINING THE FUTURE OF NIGERIAN EDUCATION’ which he wrote about November 2012. In chapter 2 of that book, Pa Fagbulu traced thoroughly the history of schools take-over in Nigeria. The chapter was titled ‘THE OWNERSHIP OF SCHOOLS IN NIGERIA’.

    From the Book:

    An excerpt from the book may be of useful reference to any intellectually endowed Nigerian who may be in need of such a reference now or in future. It goes thus:

    “Certain events in recent days make it imperative to clarify the issue of who owns schools in Nigeria. This search is complicated by the antecedents that define the history and development of Western education in the country. It is useful therefore to open the search with a brief digression into the history of that type of education with the view of gaining an understanding of the forces that shaped their development from their inception till today.

    It is pedestrian to repeat that Western-type education was an import of European missionaries and that the environment in which they propagated their type of education was entirely their personal or collective business, that is until government started meddling in the missionaries’ affairs. That movement started in England where some mainly rich do-gooders felt greatly concerned about the appalling conditions in which children of the poor worked and lived. Coupled with that was the horrendous imagery of the inhuman trade in slaves that filtered to these Christian countries to disturb the serenity of their conscience and awaken the humane elements in them that drove some to seek redemption in Christian deeds that included stopping the slave trade and making legal provisions to assist missionary schools at home and abroad. It must be acknowledged that saving the souls of those poor children was a professed and serious reason of those do-gooders who were so damn serious about that fixation that derived from the fervor of their religion.

    Historical Background

    Education in England was not planned. Ordinances and education codes that were enacted as when needed were the main sources for policy formulation over a period of about 130 years from about 1820 to the time of Nigerian self-government. Some years after they were established and applied in England these bills, codes and ordinances found their way to the colonies where the colonial governments were obliged to adopt and apply them.

    Concerned and interested missionary and other groups took the initiative to establish schools and government’s concern was that the purpose for which they were established should be fulfilled. This development implied that sufficient assistance needed to be given to the schools to ensure that they survive to fulfill their dual role of harboring those freed from slavery along the West Coast and providing skills that would serve more the needs of the missionaries than the provision of life skills for those who were lured to go to, and who stayed long enough at school. The children in these institutions provided the fodder for missionaries to use in order to benefit from the fiscal intervention of governments in the form of badly needed grants”.

    Source of Funds in Public Sachools

    “Whichever face one puts on it, the bottom line was that governments became the major sources of funds without which the missionaries would have to go begging at home or abroad. They never adopted the option of closing schools; they persevered and made do with whatever they had. Under those conditions ‘schools’ could sink to any depth of badness. It was to obviate that possibility that governments at home and in the colonies accepted responsibility for ensuring that what was offered to the children especially of the poor in England and the converted in Africa would at least be of some benefit to them. That was how government got dragged into the business of assisting schools.

    The promise of grants-in-aid ensured that schools had reliable sources of funding if they attained defined standards.  So the giving of grants was a crucial factor in the rate at which new schools were opened and old ones expanded or improved qualitatively. The fact that schools did desperate things to get listed for grants speaks the obvious that grants have always been the lifeline of almost all missionary schools.

    We are lucky that the whole grants-in-aid saga is properly documented in the Phillipson Report. However, since that document is not widely available to the generality of people, I have taken the liberty to use some segment of my writings (Chapter 2 of my unpublished book DEFINING THE FUTURE OF NIGERIAN EDUCATION, November, 2012) here.

    The Grants-in-aid Report

    “This brief highlight is about the financial assistance that government gave to schools across West Africa as an instrument for improving the quality of instruction being offered to the children in those areas.

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    The first purely Nigerian Education Ordinance was enacted in 1887. The Board of Education that assumed prominence at this time was empowered to use certain criteria to give grants to different levels from infant, through primary and secondary, to industrial schools. The Board even had the discretion to offer the sum of £10 to poor students to further their education at the secondary level. This and most of what follows come from the Phillipson Report.

    Phillipson Report

    As early as 1890, the familiar problems arising from the use of untrained ‘teachers’ in schools had become pronounced and problematic. Not only did demand outstrip supply, but many areas that also wanted schools could not be serviced. The consequence was that government had to step in to fill some gaps by establishing its own schools in areas where missionary influence was negligible. By so doing those schools became ‘models’ for the fund-strapped mission schools to copy.  (The Education Code of 1908)

    There were therefore generically three types of schools; the government, the mission, and the assisted schools.  Although the so-called government schools were government ‘owned’, the reality was that the local chiefs and Native Courts as appropriate were responsible for the buildings and their maintenance.  In fact, the recurrent cost for which government was supposedly responsible was covered in part by public funds.

    The 1916 Regulation abolished the ‘payment-by-result’ procedure of making grants to schools. That was replaced with a better one that took cognizance of the overall efficiency of schools. The immediate effect of this change was a rapid increase in the number of assisted schools. The carefully spelt-out conditions included visit(s) from inspectors. This in turn led to the increased and improved capability of the Department of Education to monitor the appalling and dubious quality of schools in the regions that the Governor-General had commented upon Important Information

    What is of importance in this narrative is that from as long ago as 1887, public fund had gone into the running costs of assisted schools. Second, government had actually transferred some of its own schools to the missions in the mid-fifties of the 19th century as contained at p.24 of that very authoritative report. This information has been ignored or denied by the missions when government had cause to reverse this trend more than 80 years later when the grant-in-aid system was being grossly exploited and abused mainly by private proprietors.

    After a thorough review of the grants-in-aid system which included one of the best documented and most authoritative writings on education for the period 1842 to 1946, Phillipson made his landmark and well received recommendations under the following heads (pp.93-98):

    Division of the grants-in-aid vote

    A national teaching profession

    Separation scheme for non-Government certificated teachers

    Staff and organisation of the Education Department in relation to the new grant-in-aid proposals

    Procedure in connection with the report: implementation.

    Documentation

    He (Phillipson) then went out specifically to make the following recommendations (p.99):

    That, in suitable areas and as an experiment, Native Administrations should be encouraged to introduce local education or school rates. (Paragraph 41 (b)).

    That the Native Authority Ordinance, 1934, be amended so as to allow of local education or school rates being applied to the support of approved Voluntary Agency schools (Paragraph 41 (b)).

    iii. That Grants-in-aid of the recurrent recognised expenses of schools and teacher training institutions under regulations 1 to 32 and 34 of the grant-in-aid regulation be classified as Nigerian expenditure and that grant-in-aid of capital and “special purposes” expenditure under regulation 33 should be classified as regional expenditure. (Paragraph 41(f)).

    That, subject to further consideration in connection with the first allocations of revenue to the Regions due to take place in July next, the special vote ( E150,000 in the 1948-49) Estimates) for Northern Educational Development should also be classified as Nigerian expenditure.

     That the provision in the Nigerian Estimates for grants-in-aid of recurrent recognised expenses of schools and teacher training institutions should constitute a division of the Nigeria Estimate under Head 32-Education, the arrangement being as proposed in Paragraph 48.

    That the question of establishing national scales for certificated teachers, whether employed by the government, Native Administrations, Local Authorities or approved Voluntary Agencies, should be considered by the Director of Education in consultation with the authorities concerned.(paragraph 49)

    vii. That the general procedure after the publication of this report should be as outlined in Paragraph 52

    viii.   That for the better administration of the scheme proposed, the Senior Service establishment of the Education Department should be strengthened, particularly at the Provincial level. (Paragraph 51)

    That the method of payment of grants in aid of primary schools should be as outlined in paragraph 45 (n) and that action should be concerted accordingly between the Education Department and the Accountant-General’s Department as part of the work preparatory to bringing the regulations into effect on 1st January,1949.

    That the Government should definitely accept liability for the retiring benefit of non-Government teachers under the proposed superannuation scheme. (Paragraph 50)

    “The most relevant part of the Phillipson Report for the 1960s was that the question of establishing national scales for certificated teachers, whether employed by the government, Native Administrations, Local Authorities or approved Voluntary Agencies, should be considered by the Director of Education in consultation with the authorities concerned. (Paragraph 49).

    Further details on the ownership of schools will be published in this column next Friday in sha’Allah.

  • Nigeria’s triangular axis of evil

    Nigeria’s triangular axis of evil

    History is not just a teacher of all times for all living human beings. It is also a permanent school that constantly reminds mankind of the lessons to learn from the various events and experiences of the past as a means of guidance towards the future.

    About 900 years ago, an Arab poet of the second Umayyad Dynasty, in Spain, came up with a bewildering stanza that is now more relevant to Nigeria than his own nation and his own time. An  excerpt from the poem went thus: “Here is the period in human life about which we had been seriously warned in the words of Ubayy Bn Ka’b and those of Abdullah Bn Mas’ud; Here is the period in which truth is meant to be totally rejected; And falsehood as well as evil machinations are to be warmly accepted and upheld as societal norms; Should this period continue to swing dangerously (like a pendulum over our nation) without any positive change, the world will surely forage into a stage in life when grief over deaths will become an aberration even as rejoice over the birth of new babies will become an anathema”.

    Observation

    Today, judging Nigeria’s situation, by what we can see and feel against what we are yet to witness or experience, can any prediction be more accurate and more appropriate for our country than the above quoted poem?

    With the seeming ongoing resistance to positive change and persistent entrenchment of evil machinations as we are witnessing today, how can there be any hope for a better future? Yet, the charlatans who use religion as an instrument of threat and intimidation through propaganda and blackmail refuse to see the possible danger ahead.

    Axis of Evil

    Today, Nigeria is dangerously entangled in a triangular axis of evil, the consequences of which cannot be foretold with precision. That axis is like a crushing pendulum swinging restlessly over Africa’s most populous country with a threat of ruins. That triangular axis consists of three dominant, vocal  blocks of evil. Each of them is an implacable enclave serving as an abode for its designers. One of those enclaves is the abode of politicians, another is for the palace of the clergy and the third is for the igloo of the media.

    While the Politicians stand out as the engine room of virtually all the evils afflicting our country, the clergy represents the dangerous chimney through which the polluting smoke of that evil oozes out to suffocate the populace spiritually in the name of God. On its own, the media serves as the megaphone for both the politicians and the so-called clergy through the instrumentality of satanic propaganda.

    Disappointing Leg

    Of the defined evil axis above, the most disappointing leg is the clergy. From time immemorial, religion had stood out as the societal salt used as a preservative for all other ingredients with which to prepare a delicious soup of life for the consumption of all and sundry at any stage. But with the sudden adoption of ‘ashes’ to replace salt as the main ingredient of preservation in the 20th century, courtesy of the capitalist West, how can the soup of life be tasteful anymore to its consumers?

    Ordinarily, Salt should be salt in its natural form. To pour ashes on it in the name of spiritual preservative is to deprive it of its natural value and render it totally useless to its consumers. Thus, with the importation of a hitherto unknown brand of a religion from the West, which is bitterly coated in capitalism, Nigeria has dangerously become a polluted country with a suffocating smoke. Those who are responsible for this situation are the fraudsters parading themselves as prophets and are issuing satanic statements with which they deceptively rationalize their claim of prophet-hood.

    The Role of Money

    Incidentally, the bottom line for all these evil machinations is nothing other than the vanity called money. Let money be removed from Nigeria’s mode of worship today and sanity will return fully to our society with required serenity.

    Today, with importation of ashes as a replacement for salt, religion, like politics, has become a big business in which greedy merchants and charlatans are desperately engaged for unbridled avarice and unlimited aggrandizement at all costs without consideration for decency and even conscience. In that case, of what use is the claim of religion without conscience?

    Commercialization of Religion

    Commercialization of religion which enables private individuals to invest in building of castles, as business ventures, has seriously diminished the value of religion in taste and in substance. In Nigeria, today, our only respite, as Muslims, is that Nigerian Imams are not engaged in hateful sermons and public incitement to boost their religious businesses that fetch them private, executive jets illegally at the expense of their congregations.

    Were Nigerian Imams also to commercialize Islam and preach hatefully like some self-hipped charlatans in the name of religion, Nigeria would have ceased to be a country by now.

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    Warning

    Those who take religion as a ‘do or die’ business that must fetch them luxurious lifestyle should know that they do not have monopoly of provocation and threat as the patience of Nigerian Muslims is getting exhausted.

    Elasticity has its limit.

    Yellow Journalism

    When journalism was a real profession in Nigeria, its practitioners knew that they were like Eskimos living in Igloo. If anything happened to Igloo, the Eskimos’ lives became exposed to danger. Today, however, it has become evident that journalism is just a matter of nomenclature.

    What matters to the journalists of today, especially in the Southwest of Nigeria, is the conspicuous immoral padding that reportorial entails. That profession is now virtually a matter of cash and carry in favour of the highest bidder. That is why news reports these days are mere expression of wishes and fabricated stories with which to justify the brown envelopes that serve as padding for most of those parading themselves as journalists.

    As for the politicians, nothing is strange. It is a common knowledge that the enclave in which they dwell is the real home of the Lucifer. But to think that their ruinous actions can continue unabatedly is nothing other than self-deception. Where are the politicians of yesteryears? To be forewarned is to be forearmed. Long live Nigeria!

    Shehu Shagari: The Demise of a Presidential Icon Following the announcement of the demise of Nigeria’s first elected Executive President, Alhaji Shehu Usman Aliyu Shagari last Friday, the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) issued a press statement with which it condoles with all Nigerians including the family of the deceased. The full contents of the statement are as follows:

    When the media waves came up with breaking news announcing the demise of a Nigerian political icon, Alhaji Shehu Usman Aliyu Shagari, last Friday with a reverberation effect across the world, many Nigerians with rich experience in various aspects of life began to dust their diaries for a recount of the episodes that propelled the deceased to have made history as much as he was, himself, made by history.

    Like an Elephant

    The late President Shehu Shagari’s life was like a huge elephant surrounded by blind men and women of letters and substance.

    To describe the features of that proverbial elephant, each of the persons that surrounded it would only be able to give an account of the area he/she is able to touch on the body of the mammoth animal and not the whole of it.

    Besides, Alhaji Shehu Shagari was such a household name, that no serious political operator or aspirant can afford to discountenance in Nigerian history without incurring an expensive cost.

    Religious Concern

    However, the aspect that concerns the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) most in Alhaji Shagari’s life’s odyssey is religion.

    It can be recalled that it was he (Alhaji Shagari) as Nigeria’s first elected Executive President, that approved the sum of N10 million each for the commencement of building a National Mosque and a National Ecumenical Church in Abuja at a time when naira was really strong and the foundation of Abuja as a city was just being laid.

    That Presidential gesture, which no religious group rejected, was a confirmation that Nigeria is indeed a multi-religious and not a secular country as being mischievously peddled in certain quarters for selfish reasons.

    Today, the two houses of worship are conspicuous in Abuja with their grandiose postures to the finite attraction of foreign tourists who see them as symbols of national unity.

    Maitatsine Crisis

    It is historically unforgettable how the late Executive President tackled diplomatically and militarily, as then warranted, a frightening national crisis engendered by one Cameroonian charlatan called Muhammad Marwa Maitatsine in most parts of Northern Nigeria in the guise of religion during the country’s second republic. It was his presidential determination to keep the unity of Nigeria intact that checkmated that devastating menace.

    Alhaji Shehu Shagari was, though, a quiet and easy going personality, nonetheless, he never wavered in taking necessary decisions in the interest of national unity in the country.

    His Lifestyle

    As a Muslim, Alhaji Shagari never hesitated in upholding the principles of justice, fairness and equity which his religion (Islam) emphasizes.

    As a teacher in the early part of his life, he was exemplary in touching the lives of his students positively and in grooming those students for future leadership.

    As a politician, he displayed such a special trait that distinguished him as a template designer and a dark horse in Nigeria’s political racecourse.

    His Political Sagacity

    This man’s political sagacity was like a major Faculty in the University of Life, into which many forward-looking leadership aspirants in Nigeria were eager to seek enrolment for specialization in African political education.

    Alahji Shehu Shagari was the eminent Dean of that faculty even as the vibrancy of his tenure which remains unequalled till date is a testimony to the template he set for Nigeria’s democratic dispensation.

    Lesson to Learn

    For Nigerian generations of the colonial era as well as those of the first and second republics, a major falcon of reference has flown away forever leaving some of his surviving peers to mere dreams in communication encounter.

    The Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) under the leadership of its President General and Sultan of Sokoto, Dr. Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, CFR, mni, and the entire Nigerian Muslim Ummah hereby commiserate with the Federal and Sokoto State governments as well as all the citizens in the country imploring them to learn from the exemplary lifestyle of this icon and emulate it for the progress of Nigeria.

    The NSCIA particularly condoles with his family and Chieftains of the Sultanate of Sokoto State among whom he was a front liner in his life time.

    We pray the Almighty Allah to repose the soul of Alhaji Shehu Shagari in etrnal bliss and grant his immediate and extended families the fortitude with which to bear the agony that may arise from his demise.

    “Surely we are all from Allah and to Allah we shall all return”. “Inna Lillah, wa inna ilayhi raji’un”.