By Rasak Musbau

That the quality of public education in the country is declining is an understatement. The education sector is faced with myriad of challenges such as inadequate budgetary allocation, dearth of infrastructure, teachers’ lack of competency to teach pupils born in the 21st century, declining reading culture of the pupils and abandonment of parental role and many more.

Many parents have had to contend with enrolling their children in private schools operating in inconducive environment with poorly qualified teachers. For the schools with suitable standard, parents pay exorbitant bills.

For this, governments at all levels have embarked on series of projects over the years to reverse the trend and attract more children to public schools.

In Lagos, the key component of the Sanwo-Olu administration’s education blueprint is to deploy technology to fundamentally transform the basic education template, thereby improving the outcome of teaching and learning.

The administration is irrevocably committed to give utmost attention to the education sector, particularly the public school system where much still needed to be done to improve the learning and teaching environment.

As many might have known, the education sector was allocated the highest percentage in the state current budget. This prioritisation is in tandem with the T.H.E.M.E.S agenda in which education represents a key pillar. It is also in realisation of the key role education plays in the 21st century world.

It was against this backdrop that the state government launched the initiative: ‘Excellence in Child Education and Learning’ (EKOEXCEL), on January 25, as one among other interventions to chart a way forward for the Lagos public schools.

The launch followed a two-week intensive training of over 4,000 teachers from various schools and education districts across the state who will be the main drivers of the new initiative to reposition service delivery in public primary schools with special focus on learning outcomes for pupils.

EKOEXCEL is an education reform initiative of the Sanwo-Olu’s administration that is successfully developing more highly skilled teachers; by training, supporting and motivating existing government teachers, to succeed in their respective classrooms.

The reality is that in many facet of our lives, the society is moving from analogue to digital. Hence, the new programme is primed to change teaching and learning from analogue to digital in line with modern trend.

As part of the programme, over 14,000 head teachers and teachers will be moved from analogue to digital mode of teaching, using tablets and updated curriculum. Over 3,000 primary school teachers from 300 public primary schools have also been captured under the pilot scheme.

Among other benefits, the EKOEXCEL Programme is expected to empower teachers deliver at the same level as their counterparts around the world and also provide strong continuous support that will encourage improvement in teachers and pupils. Also, Lagos children can accelerate reading and literacy skills to compete with their peers globally. In same vein, Lagos teachers will become more professional and technologically savvy in their work.

It will also enable teachers become more skilful in helping children learn in a positive environment and equally increase pupils’ enrolment across the state. It also has the potential of increasing participation and enthusiasm among teachers and pupils. Similarly, head teachers will be more efficient in their work, using technology to support teachers while SUBEB and other governing bodies will have adequate data to carry out necessary academic adjustments and infrastructural development across schools.

By and large, EKOEXCEL is a multifaceted, multi-dimensional approach to teaching and learning in our schools. It will make the teachers more efficient as they will not only teach with Android devices, but will also exhibit other classroom management skills they have learnt.

One is , therefore, convinced that the state government’s strategic designing and funding of the EKOEXCEL initiative, a transformational plan aimed at supporting teachers to achieve better learning outcomes in the classroom through training, supporting and motivating of our teachers, is a worthwhile scheme.

Without a doubt, the EKOEXCEL initiative will provide Lagos public primary schools with the technology based up skills, scientific- proven pedagogical approaches and a complete 360 degree support system that will beacon across educational strides.

It is cheering to note that the state government is advancing rapidly with its reform of the primary education sub-sector. The expectation is that the outcome will propel the State to another level- a level that will eventually accelerate the Greater Lagos vision.

It is, however, important that parents play their role very well in ensuring their wards regularly carry out assigned tasks. As the home is the first learning ground for all children, it is imperative for parents and guardians to wake up to the responsibility of carrying out effective oversight functions over their wards and complement the efforts of the teachers by ensuring regular and prompt attendance of their children in school, adequate supervision of homework and to be supportive of all school activities.

Responsibility for laying a solid foundation and charting a way forward is a collective task. Budgetary allocation and actual investment in the sector will only yield desire fruits when every facet of the society plays its role effectively.

From all it has done so far, the Lagos State government is, no doubt, poised to transform the face of public education in the state. It can be recalled that the state government had recently completed the process of massive rehabilitation and renovation of 300 public schools which is the first phase under the public schools’ transformation programme, while the pilot exercise of the school feeding programme tagged “Snack for Thoughts” for pupils in primary 4 – 6 within Lagos Island Local Government was equally recently completed.

All of these and many more initiatives, being implemented will, no doubt, result in significant transformation of the education sector and better future for Lagos State and the country as a whole.

• Musbau is of the Public Affairs Unit, Ministry of Works and Infrastructure, Alausa, Ikeja

Vincent Akanmode

 

THE outgoing week has been a challenging one for residents of Lagos, the commercial nerve centre of the country. Commuters have had to trek long distances to get to their destinations, following the ban the state government imposed on commercial motorcycles and tricycles, known popularly as okada and keke respectively. Law enforcement agents have had a hectic time reining in okada and keke owners protesting the ban on their sources of livelihood while private vehicle owners have had to battle with unusual traffic snarls resulting from the deployment of additional vehicles by residents who previously depended on okada and keke to go to work or return home.

There is no doubting the fact that a way of life has been disrupted by the new government policy. The violent protests in Ikeja, Ijora, Iyana Ipaja and other parts of the city would therefore not come as a surprise to any discerning mind, knowing that there are few things people detest like change, particularly when their means of livelihood is at stake. The use of motorcycle as a means of transportation is almost as old as the history of technology. It, however, did not grow into a phenomenon until the early 1990s when it dethroned cabs and buses to become the most popular means of transportation in Nigerian cities, towns and villages.

Before then, the yellow cab together with the danfo and molue buses constituted the main means of transportation around the city. The motorcycle would later gain its popularity and subsequent notoriety with the advent of the ‘drop’ mentality whereby taxi drivers preferred to carry lone, well-to-do passengers who can charter their cabs and pay good money as against the previous practice of loading their vehicles with passengers who would pay the normal fares. It was not long before taxi drivers priced their services beyond the reach of the average commuter. Smart motorcycle owners saw the vacuum created by the development and moved in to fill it.

With time, the commercial motorcycle, felicitously christened okada in deference to the most popular indigenous airline at the time, became recognised as the best way to avoid the crawling traffic around the city. Thus it became the bride of the poor and was also embraced by the rich in peculiar circumstances. It even became a tool for political campaign as was witnessed in Ekiti State where a governorship aspirant endeared himself to voters by publicly riding on okada to give the impression he was a man of the people. Of course, he won the election. Whether he acquitted himself as people’s governor, however, remains a matter for debate. What is certain is that another governorship aspirant in Osun State sought to use the same joker for electoral victory but the voters in Osun were not impressed.

Unfortunately, while they are faster than buses, augment or compliment the available means of public transportation and help to preoccupy the army of unemployed youths around the country, commercial motorcycles have in recent years constituted a veritable threat to the nation’s security architecture. This is besides their predisposition to fatal accidents on account of which many lives have been lost and many people have suffered various forms of deformity.

Explaining the reasons for the ban on okada and keke in many parts of the state, the Lagos State Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Mr. Gbenga Omotoso, said: “After a robust assessment of the debate on what has been widely referred to as the motorcycle (okada) and tricycle (keke) menace, the Lagos State Government and the State Security Council have decided that the security and safety of lives of Lagosians are paramount. The figures are scary. From 2016 to 2019, there were over 10,000 accidents recorded at the General Hospitals alone. This number excludes unreported cases and those recorded by other hospitals. The total number of deaths from reported cases is over 600 as at date.

“Also, the rate of crimes aided by okada and keke keeps rising. They are also used as getaway means by criminals. Therefore, after consultations with stakeholders, the State Security Council, in compliance with the extant Transport Sector Reform Law 2018, has decided to commence enforcement of the law which bans the operation of okada and keke in six Local Government Areas (LGAs) and nine Local Council Development Areas (LCDAs).”

In one of the stories published in this paper today, an okada rider of northern extraction admitted in an interview with one of our reporters that his movement from Gombe State to Lagos, and those of many other youths from different parts of the north, were sponsored by a particular man from the north. This coming amid rumours that the deadly Boko Haram sect might be using the army of northern okada riders in Lagos as a façade to unleash an attack on the city should be a cause for serious concern.

Sometime around September last year, men of the State Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) in Lagos were said to have arrested a profiled Boko Haram member who had escaped from Yobe at the Ahmadiyya section of Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway while operating as an okada rider. In fact, security agents were said to have first trailed him to Ajah part of Lagos before he escaped to the mainland where he was eventually arrested.

Only on Thursday, the Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, revealed how an attempt made to bomb Lagos while he held sway as governor in 2013 was foiled by security agents who acted on a tip from well-meaning citizens. Fashola, who spoke while delivering a lecture at the fourth annual public lecture of the United Action for Change (UAC) in Lagos, said the security agents intercepted 17 suitcases loaded with explosives, which were smuggled into the state to wreak havoc.

The Minister of Transportation, Hon. Rotimi Amaechi also recalled that his government had to impose a ban on keke and okada during his time as the governor of Rivers State between 2007 and 2015 because criminals were using them to rob and kidnap people. Amaechi, who spoke during a Channels TV breakfast programme, said: “Speaking as a former governor, when I was in Rivers State, they were using motorcycles to rob and kidnap people; and the police could never get them because they were using cars; so I banned motorcycles and we had peace. The number of accidents was also high – the orthopaedic hospital was full every day.”

Certainly, there is no point indulging a practice that puts the lives of an entire population in clear and present danger. I told a colleague long before Fashola became the governor of Lagos State that there were three menaces any serious government in the state must address, namely the menace of Oshodi, the menace of okada riders and the menace of danfo drivers. With Fashola government able to conquer Oshodi after a relentless battle and Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu successfully imposing a ban on okada, the state has the menace of danfo buses left to contend with.

Abiodun Komolafe

 

HAVE you watched the video clips of the gruesome execution of Lawan Andimi and Roypvil Dalyep by Boko Haram? Have you ever imagined what it feels like to take one’s loved ones away with hopes of reuniting with them waning with each passing day? Have you for once paused to ponder the pains and the trauma of Nigerians who have become widows, widowers and orphans as well as those whose means of livelihood have been destroyed by some senseless and evil elements in the Nigerian society? At least for once, put yourself in the shoe of Reuben Fasoranti, the 94-year-old Nigerian, and Yoruba leader, whose daughter, Funke, was killed by yet-to-be-identified persons and you will not be too far from the status of Nigeria’s cup and the depth of betrayal and frustration of President Muhammadu Buhari’s expression of surprise at the upsurge in Boko Haram attacks” in Nigeria.

To be frank, President Buhari’s surprise revealed tons of truth that are buried! The president became surprised because the reality on ground checkmated his thoughts and understanding of Nigeria’s cosmos. What this means is that the nitty-gritty of governance in this country is never rooted in intelligence or hard knowledge. Government policies, projections and determinations all over the world, especially, in developed countries, are based on unassailable facts. In the case of Nigeria, we imagine policy contents; and, once we do that, policy outputs will always be false and ineffective.

The nation state in Nigeria, as we see her today, is a misnomer. The country is nothing but an investment gone awry; a complete but avoidable tragedy, laced with aborted hopes and promises. Despite her rich socio-cultural convenience, here we are, faced with the gory reality of our time, rivaled only in the Stone Age! The centre is fractured, dangerously, even as the people are already taking positions; and it is as if Nigeria is at war with Nigeria! So, whatever might have been the weakness or otherwise of the opportunities for the public expression of anger, Enyinnaya Abaribe was not, in the real sense of the word, far from reinforcing the people’s call on the government to stop using utopian ideas and plastic rhetoric suggestive of Nixonian tactics to feed Nigerians with excuses as if that’s what Nigerians voted for. He was only asking the government to alter its language and maximize capital with greater efficiency, more so as insurgency not only poses great threats to the economy, available indices, which peaked with the United States of America’s recent visa restrictions on Nigerians, have also shown how criminality could lead to loss of income, loss of jobs and loss of peace.

It even goes beyond that! If governance is not based on tactical truth and impeccable intelligence, politics will suffer because it will be played on false assumptions. The citizens will also suffer the reality because the politics in play will no longer be able to address the reality which, as we’ve argued above, confronts the anomalies of its policies. Take for instance the policy against Boko Haram and the kind of huge resources voted into ensuring the defeat of the insurgence. As things stand, there’s next-to-nothing to show for it! Only this year, the Emir of Potiskum was attacked. That he escaped only by the whiskers, after a long walk in the forest, was not without the murder of some of his aides. So, do Nigerians need any further proof to show that the country is not safe?

In terms of transition of power among the political class, the gladiators are also in trouble; for, once a country is challenged securitywise, opportunity for good governance beats a retreat. And, once corruption takes this endemic route, more than never, everybody will be unto himself or herself! Two, accountability will go to blazes. Of course, corruption renders accountability a non-issue! National planning will also have its share of the oddity, showing in bold relief, the fact that governance has taken flight! Donald Trump has now demonstrated how the call for foreign investments can never yield any fruitful results because nobody comes to invest his money in an unsafe environment.

At the political party level, there is no doubt that political parties will start chasing shadows as every political bigwig will just be for himself. Poverty will be magnified and the usual interventions or fire-brigade economic palliatives will not pacify the angst and negative impact of poverty, no matter the hugeness of the funds invested to tackle it. Employment will also become a product of lip service. For the common man, who gets more frustrated by the day through his punitive ‘take-home’ that can no longer take him home, it is a luring road to anarchy. Even, if there are predictions about rain, to comply with them and ensure food security will become problematic because there is corruption in the land. The sadder side of it is that those at the helm of affairs will have to work with false data and false narratives about the reality of issues in Nigeria. Unfortunately, no country plans with false data and makes a success out of it. Try it and you will be faced with false answers because the policies will also be skewed. And, if governance is skewed, all other things elsewhere will partake of it. Besides, there will be tension in the land and chaos will not be too far because the cost of maintaining the peace and security in the country will also go up, with no guarantees or assurances of success!

May the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, grant us peace in Nigeria!

 

• (ijebujesa@yahoo.co.uk)

BY Caleb ijioma

 

Politics before now have been seen to be a dirty game; a game meant for only those who are ready to dip their hands into various forms of devilish practices regardless of how often their conscience speak or how loud the masses cry.

This dirty game which has imprisoned the conscience of many, found its way into our tertiary institutions. It corrupts sane minds and leaders who end up going against harmless students who want nothing but their voices to be heard.

The great novelist Chinua Achebe once said: “The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership. There is nothing basically wrong with the Nigerian land or climate or water or air or anything else.

The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal examples which are the hallmarks of true leadership.”

Taking responsibilities have become a difficult task for student leaders at varying positions in our institutions. To make matters worse, those representing students’ rights under different associations and organisations, don’t seem to fare any better.

Or how would you explain a situation where a student association expected to protect the rights of their colleagues and free them from draconian rules created by the management of their institution, constantly grovels before that same management? Many students leaders of nowadays are fond of this tendencies and in the process sell their colleagues for a mess of porridge.

Imagine another scenario where students during Students’’ Union, faculty or departmental elections, are being disenfranchised simply because the electoral chairman had interest in a particular candidate.

How will you also explain a situation where students who vowed to exercise their constitutional right, their right to peaceful assembly, and their right to protest, met with gestapo police officers who were being sponsored by the school management to scare votes away thereby disrupting the election?

Can one also explain why a SU president after being invited by the school management or state government, agree to a raise in tuition when management of such institution has not given reasons convincing enough for their action?

What will you say about a student leader who led thugs to beat and abduct a campus journalist for speaking against the government of the day?

Read Also: The joke called politics in Nigeria

It’s crystal clear that our leaders who are entrusted with the mandate to protect our rights have suddenly become a political tool in the hands of our various managements and government officials.

Unfortunately, they forget that “Leadership is about solving problems”. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading the troop. It’s either they have lost confidence in you or concluded you do not care. Either way, it is a failure of leadership”

What is the fate of thousands of students whose rights are being trampled upon and our representatives can’t even represent us effectively?

What is the next line of action for harmless students who are being shut out, expelled or even killed, while the very student leadership which supposes to come to their rescues, now smile to the banks after their palms have been greased by those in “Higher authority”?

They soon forget that the most important aspect of leadership failure is the inability be proactive in order to forestall danger. Simply put, most student associations, unions and organisations have failed us.

A lot of evil is breathing down our various institutions but the students’ leaderships do little or nothing because they’ve sold themselves out cheaply.

We are farther away from the truth. This truthswill not set us free if we do nothing about it.

Who will correct the abnormalities found in our various tertiary institutions, the very ones being  sponsored by those in power?

 

In God we put our trust.

 

• Caleb Ijioma is an HND1 mass communication student of Abraham Adesanya Polytechnic Ijebu-Ode

Oyinkan Medubi

 

Not only have the young ones in our schools collectively decided not to know anything, even national intellectualism and intelligence have greatly declined. Adults do not read mind-improving books; they mostly read the numbers on currency notes and maybe specific pamphlets on ‘How to Get Rich Overnight’ or ‘How to Get Rid of your Spouse’

 

IT has ever been so common to see obituary notices in the media begin with something like ‘We give glory to God for a life well lived …’ Someone said such a notice indicates only one thing: the individual has slaved his or her life away to leave substantial goods for the family to share as free booty. Whenever I have seen such a notice, I have asked myself, yes, but what constitutes the life well lived in Nigeria? What horrors did the poor fellow endure?

It is difficult to know by what criteria one may judge the quality of life of Nigerians. Should we use the quality of food or the quality of their conversation? I honestly don’t know for if we were to go by their food, we would be confused. In the same country, it is common to see people dining on exotic items like hamburger or shawa-something garnished with French fries (foreign things!) and there be those who dine on amala and water garnished with oil. Neither has any quality.

We could also use conversations which somehow always seem to revolve around the dismal topic of the handling of the economy or security by the government and how the expected change has not come, yet everyone has changed. Oh yes, we all have become morose and have taken to wearing long, economy-dried faces.

Shall we use the value of our education? Not advisedly; not only have the young ones in our schools collectively decided not to know anything, even national intelligence and intellectualism have greatly declined. Adults do not read mind-improving books; they mostly read the numbers on currency notes and maybe specific pamphlets on ‘How to get rich overnight’ or ‘How to get rid of your spouse’. I assure you, both exist. Our undergraduates are worse; they have no idea of basic things, just like me. Some have no idea what hormones are or which ones are produced by males or females… Then, look at the quality of our politicians. Shudder! Oh coarseness!

Should we go by the kinds of houses Nigerians build? I don’t know either because right in the estate where I live, there lives a man who built a high rise residential building for himself, three floors I think. Anyway, there, on the top floor, the man has gone and planted a good swimming pool. I hope the birds have themselves a good time there. So you can imagine the state of the rest of the building.

Some years ago, I understand some senate leader or the other had built himself a two billion Naira house. Now, I’m wondering where that house is because I don’t think it’s there anymore; I would have heard. Right in my city, on the other hand, there lives a gentleman who managed to build a little bungalow for his family. For window louvres, he has tied his wife’s biggest wrapper; and to keep out mosquitoes, he has taken to playing the flute. Oh joy!

We cannot use kidnappers’ assessment formula either. You know, they gauge an individual’s worth by the dressing, car, house, spouse, relatives, or connections, otherwise called network of friends. Not only are they deceptive, they actually mislead the assessor into thinking that a big house equals a high quality of life.

There are so many things we cannot use to assess the quality of life of an average Nigerian, yet, I guess a few things do exist that we can use. I think we can use an individual’s access to electricity for instance. Availability of the stuff means he/she does not need to dissipate energy looking for fuel; so no sweat, no blood pressure, low heart rate, normal pulse, and good skin tone. Even food is chewed properly like a human being should do it.

Non-availability of energy means that the individual has to crank up the generator (if he/she can get one) to get the fans moving in hot weather. The alternative is to wear clothes already sweated on, i.e., smelling of sweat, soil or days’ wear, and endure harassments from electricity officials. Once, in a western country, I was in a bus with a woman whose mental status was less than certifiably clean because she kept talking to herself loudly while everyone retained the mandatory communal stiff upper lip. I noticed though that she smelt very clean, evidence that she was being monitored and she had access to privileges such as electric machines to wash and iron her clothes. Oh quality of life.

The Nigerian public transportation tells a lamentable story. Not only are your choices limited, you come away soiled from your neighbour’s can of palm oil, kerosene, or the driver’s mandatory spare gallon of petrol for emergencies or fuel shortages that don’t give any notice. The smells and odours you also inhale are enough to fill your lungs to overflowing. The seats are so uncomfortable you rejoice if both legs can feel the floor of the bus/taxi. You’re inhaling exhaust fumes or petrol all through the journey. By the time you get home (if), you are scowling, angry, aggravated, swearing, sad, moody, with blood pressure soaring. In the western countries, the trains, subways, regulated buses were so comfortable for me I ended up in many wrong stations many times. Forgot myself.

Do you get any medical succour for these sad turns of life? Not on your life. Not only do you not get house calls, you don’t even get hospital calls either, and, if you’re not very lucky, no space in the mortuary should you knock off at a wrong time. The public hospitals give no comfort either. I once was in a big teaching hospital and saw that every department had its own generator for essential moments. Non-essential moments had people fanning themselves throughout. Now, what can you say about the other services when even the most basic item, electricity, cannot not be guaranteed our hospitals to enable them function normally? That’s why we all agree that they function abnormally. Oh misery!

And your neighbours? Nope; you have to live with many of your fellow citizens’ unsanitary habits: throwing kitchen and body wastes right by where they eat and sleep. You therefore step on mushy wastes, see murky waters and live with stench filling your nostrils and then some.

So, you decide you want to take your mind off this imposed national misery and go shopping, even if it is only at the windows. First, you discover very few shops allow window shopping; most don’t because they do not have windows. Many don’t even have shops. I mean, the oiling of the economy depends on your patronage, yet to patronize the marketers, you must fight your way through the throng of marketers. Try Balogun market, the hub of Nigerian shopping, and you’ll never forget the experience. You’ll be lucky to come out with your feet.

For these reasons, and more, many have concluded that Nigeria is the poverty capital of the world, where nothing works. In truth, the quality of life here is so dismal that were Jim Jones of Guyana to come here today, many would be tempted to go with him. For the sake of their few possessions though, many would have a rethink.

Honestly, the government is responsible for raising or lowering the quality of her people’s existence. So we say, the government did this to us; let her fix it so that when we all vacate this terrestrial plane, the aliens that succeed us will not be lying in their teeth (as we’re doing now), when they say ‘After lives well lived…’

 

 

SENATE President, Dr. Ahmed Lawan, started it all when he declared, on the eve of the Senate’s resumption from the Yuletide break, that the present security architecture cannot tackle terrorism, kidnapping, and sundry violent crimes. He therefore pledged the Senate’s commitment to working with the executive to forge a new, robust, efficient and effective system.

But no sooner had the Senate President spoken than new killings were reported. In Borno State, Boko Haram attackers razed a mosque, with many lives lost, no thanks to suicide bombers, after a long lull. Of course, there were other reported Islamist attacks, repelled by the military.

Outside the Boko Haram epicentre, death toll had risen to 33 in an attack by bandits in Plateau State, again throwing up the spectre of Fulani-Plateau indigenes bloody face-off. That forced Plateau State governor, Simon Lalong, to order the arrest of community leaders of where the bandits allegedly came from.

Then from Niger State came equally worrisome reports of unprovoked attacks, which local leaders, visiting the president, claimed had lasted three weeks non-stop. That prompted President Muhammadu Buhari to order the Air Force to bomb the bandits’ base to rout them. It was during this visit, by Niger State Eminent Citizens, that the president made the rather controversial quip that he was “taken aback” by the new wave of attacks, which he explained differed from the Boko Haram insurrection; adding that it was another evil being plotted against helpless Nigerians. But he promised his government would be tougher on the criminals.

Meanwhile, in the Yewa part of Ogun State, community leaders held a peaceful protest against marauding Fulani herdsmen who, they said, had been destroying their farmlands with their rampaging herd. These herdsmen, allegedly from Mali, were reportedly chased away from the neigbhbouring Benin Republic, by that country’s gendarmes. A pair of kidnappers, captured in the neighbouring Ibarapa area of Oyo State, also claimed to come from Mali, thus confirming at least two things: Nigeria’s porous borders; and, the central security agencies’ ineffectiveness, to forestall these aliens’ entry, probably because the security troopers are too thinly spread.

However, what grabbed media headlines and fired popular rage was the president’s comment that he was “taken-aback”. Senate Minority Leader, Senator Eyinnaya Abaribe, caused an uproar, during the Senate debate on the matter, when he told the president to quit. That not only caused a partisan firefight in the Senate, it also caused an uproar outside, with the opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) backing Abaribe; but the president’s men countering that the opposition, for cheap political mileage, twisted the president’s statement out of context.

However, outside the formal opposition, not a few among the citizenry felt disturbed by the president’s statement, insisting it suggests the commander-in-chief could be well out of tune with the worsening security situation. That would be dire indeed, if true.

Still, after all the adrenalin invested in rage, what must follow is putting on a rigorous thinking cap to solve the problem, since security is not only key to everyone’s survival, it is the very basis for government, in the first instance.

For starters, there might just be a logical explanation for the flaring violence, as all could be mutations of the Boko Haram crisis, manifesting in sundry forms. Those bandits and kidnappers could well be stragglers from the main theatre of insurrection, who nevertheless escape with small arms, and little else. As these stragglers undetected, move away from the main theatre of Boko Haram, they band together and infiltrate other communities, far and near, wreaking havoc for economic gains. That could explain the flaring of kidnapping, even if it could not fully explain banditry and other mass slaughter.

That the present security architecture has failed to track, capture and neutralise these agents of death would appear easy proof that it is flailing, if it has not failed outright. That is a clear intelligence dysfunction. For the failure in this all-vital area, even of the basic human hue, it is time to embrace a more bottom-up approach, with the full involvement of communities nationwide.

That is why ‘Operation Amotekun’, and its other regional or geo-zonal variants, should offer new hopes to remake a buckled and bungled central security screen. But the communalisation of intelligence gathering and processing could only be a logical forerunner to establishing full-fledged state police.

Away with the conceit of over-centralisation! Nigeria’s current security challenges demand creative federalisation, with robust checks-and-balances, which should curb a sub-national police arrangement of its pre- and First Republic abuses that led to its replacement by the present central police; and be a win-win to all. That is the direction towards which the structure of the security architecture should be tweaked.

Then, the form — and that leads to the all-important question of the service chiefs. But before this, a caveat: security is a very sensitive issue, in which those without adequate information may not dabble. But this caution can only be justified and reinforced, if the public feels very safe.  That is not the case at present; and that would appear why the impassioned interest. Besides, regime security logically precedes and reinforces state security.  This is because self-preservation is the basic law of nature. That is why the president has a lot of leeway over who to, or not to include, in the personnel manning his security apparatus.

Even with that, there is popular belief that the present crop of security chiefs has over-stayed and is now plagued by diminishing returns. That would explain why both houses of the National Assembly have called on the president to dispense with them for fresh blood. That sentiment appears shared too by the bulk of the people.

The president should do the needful and appoint a new set. But it is not just the symbolism of it.  A new set of service chiefs must come with new dynamism, new flexibility and new dramatic results — and it won’t be a bad idea to tie their tenures to demonstrable results.

Over all, security is such of prime importance it is no area to play cheap politics. Partisan rage is welcome, just to underscore the angst of the public. After that, however, everyone should pull resources to rid the polity of this clear and present danger. So, the sitting government should be receptive, just as the opposition — and indeed, the general populace — is cooperative. Only the living play politics. The dead don’t — and can’t.

 

BY SAMUEL ADEBAYO ABODUNRIN  

 

It is a fact that females’rights are infringed upon daily. Discrimination, violence and harassment of females have contributed a lot to  public discourse globally.

The advocacy for ‘women and men, and girls and boys, to enjoy the same right, resources, opportunities and protections’, as defined by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), is raging by the day; a thrilling sign that gender equality has come to stay.

Gender equality is the state of equal ease of access to resources and opportunities, including economic participation, decision-making; the state of valuing different behaviours, and aspirations needs equally, regardless of gender.

The girl-child is given less priority at home than her male counterpart, usually because of the notion that the latter sustains the family name while the former adopts another man’s surname. The cultural belief that the female sex is weaker than the male sex also festers gender inequality. Domestic chores are considered the duty of the female child. She is conditioned to the stereotype of washing and cooking. She is married off at a tender age.

A study reveals that Nigeria has the largest number of child brides in Africa with more than 23 million girls and women married as children. Most of them are from poor and rural communities.

While data suggests a decline of nine per cent in the prevalence of child marriage since 2003, and a projected further decrease of six per cent by 2030, Nigeria’s rapid population growth means that the number of child brides will increase by more than one million by 2030 and double by 2050.

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The girl child is also raped.

The rate at which rape occurs in the world increases on daily basis, making headlines and hitting trends on social media.  In 2012 alone, about 687 cases of rape were recorded in Nigeria.

Daily Sun reported in 2014 how a girl was gang raped by three men on her way back from school. This was preceded by The Guardian’s report about one Masonter Iyanga who raped a young girl. Even the church is not exempted from the rape scandal; hence the motivation behind the #ChurchToo campaign. In October 23, 2013, a report by the Vanguard revealed how a 50-year-old cleric allegedly raped three girls, of not more than nine, seven and eight years.

Besides, the girl child is given less education than her male counterpart.  The auxiliary/local health system is predominated by women with little or no professional medical training. This is because of the notion that too much of education denies a woman a matrimonial home.

UNESCO estimates that 130 million girls between six and 17 are out of school and 15 million girls of primary school age – half of them in Sub-Saharan Africa – will never step into the classroom. For example, in Nigeria, only four per cent of poor young women in the North West zone can read, compared to 99 percent of rich young women in the Southeast.

The marginalisation of women in politics is another form of gender inequality. There is low inclusion of women in top public offices.

Yet, some states in the country have yet to give full rights to women to own property. Such states include Kaduna, Sokoto and Zamfara—where only married women are permitted under law to own a property.

Meanwhile it is important to note that infringement of women rights is ungodly and no religion encourages such. And wherever women and girls are treated unfairly, there is bound to be more conflict and less prosperity.

BY SAMUEL ADEBAYO ABODUNRIN

In recent times, the hope of the average Nigerian seeking admission into tertiary institutions has been dashed. Not because they failed the entrance examination but because of the exorbitant ‘Acceptance Fee’ set by universities, especially the state–owned.

Acceptance Fee is an unregulated, compulsory amount of money set by various institutions to be paid by newly admitted students into the institution without which the admission of such students could be voided or deferred.

This means that newly admitted students must pay any amount set by the institution of their choice as Acceptance Fee before they can proceed to other registrations, failure to do so means such students will lose the admission even after meeting all requirements and passing all necessary examinations.

This Acceptance Fee is unattached to the tuition fee and is not fixed. Sometimes, candidates seeking admission into universities don’t know how much they will pay as Acceptance Fee until after they have been offered admission.

Few weeks after their admission, they will receive circular to pay caretan amount, often huge as ‘Acceptance Fee’. This scenario is even made more complicated when the school slams such fee with a deadline. If newly admitted students are unable to meet up with the deadline, it most times translates to forfeiture of their admission.

Some universities set their Acceptance Fee as high as between N50,000 and N120,000. These charges are a little below what is paid in certain private universities.

This has made so many Nigerians believe that some influential Nigerians have stake or shares in the private universities and are stylishly redirecting the traffic to private universities for their own gain.

Nigerians have to pay so much for sundry examination bodies -WASCCE, NECO etc. JAMB, Post UTME entrance examination or Screening form, and tuition fee before having access to tertiary education.

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This has been the tradition in most state universities in Nigeria, with the Institutions management turning deaf ears to public outcry on this matter.

If a nation must grow, then education must be accessible. This hike in Acceptance Fee by state-owned universities is a barrier to accessible and affordable education evangelised by governments at all levels.

Many have been denied their right to education because of this high and extortionist fees in the universities.

This is why government at all levels and other relevant bodies must come to the rescue of poor but brilliant Nigerians who have not been allowed to have access to tertiary education because of inflated fees.

If Acceptance Fee must remain, then it should be regularised and fixed, so that it is now made affordable for would be students, and then put in public domain.

However, I feel the scrapping of Acceptance Fee should be encouraged. This will be much appreciated by average Nigerians. However, if the status quo remains, I am afraid,  the future of the country’s education sector will be as uncertain as insecure.

• Abodunrin is a graduating student of the Department of Mass Communication, Adekunle Ajasin University Akungba-Akoko.