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Tag: endangered

  • Endangered species

    Endangered species

    • Robbers’ consistent raids on university hostels must be condemned and punished

    The town, broken and decayed, just shred the gown: turning students in citadels of learning into helpless targets of opportunistic crimes!  

    That might sound as grim poetry: the town as metaphor for a society riven with crime; and the gown: students, in vast campuses nationwide, as sitting target of criminals who somewhat have turned tertiary institutions a growth area!

    University campuses once seemed sacred spaces and their lucky community, of students and dons, a special species free from crimes of the outer society.  

    Not any more! — and the latest example is the Tai Solarin University of Education (TASUED), Ijagun, near Ijebu-Ode, Ogun State.  That tragic violation came with own galling metaphor: the late Dr. Tai Solarin, educationist of first rank and societal purist of no mean feat, would have flinched at such a plague on a school named for him!

    In the wee hours of October 24, robbers invaded an off-campus private female hostel in Abapawa, a satellite community in Ijagun, the university’s host community.  They not only rid the girls of their valuables as cash and phones, they also raped four of them.

    This robbery and rape must meet the harshest of censures of the civilised community.  The Ogun State Deputy Governor, Mrs. Moimot Salako-Oyedele, has already rallied to the situation, visiting the school for an on-the-spot assessment; and rendering the violated prompt medical help.  They are all now at the Sexual Assault Referral Centre (SARC), of the Olabisi Onabanjo University Teaching Hospital, Sagamu.

    That is all nice and commendable.  The Ogun State government has also pledged itself to weaving a more impregnable security network around its university communities, aside from the police getting cracking to nail the felons.  That is equally welcome.

    Still, for how long will the government continue to secure the stable doors after the stallion had galloped clear?  With the increasing numbers of robbery attacks on off-campus hostels, a pattern is emerging: robbers seem to see the academy community as soft targets, with little or no security.

    That must change.  This brings to mind the Federal Government’s Safe Schools Initiative (SSI), aimed at protecting the school community, from all forms of security hazards, under the charge of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC).

    Only in August, Ahmed Audi, the NSCDC commandant-general, ordered the decentralisation of locals’ training for SSI — a scheme in which the host community is integrated into the security architecture of the school in their area.

    Read Also: Robbers sexually-assault TASUED students

    Such training, aside from the regular police anti-crime interventions, is exactly what Ijagun, Ogun State, and other host communities of tertiary institutions all over Nigeria need.  The intelligence of segment of SSI should surely help to bust intended crimes, even before they are carried out.

    Even then, state governments — that often flee from integrating students campus accommodation into their tertiary education development plans — should ponder a change in policy.  Though there have been a few breaches, hostels that robbers attack are mainly off-campus facilities.  

    That suggests that facilities on campuses are generally safer.  Though such a policy change would require a higher quantum of funding in a time of vanishing resources, it would save lives by reducing vile and opportunistic robberies.

    But en route to  a policy change, private investors in student hostels must prove their capacity to secure their facilities, as a pre-condition for the government and the university authorities approving such investments.  If the investors make money from these hostels, then the safety and security of the student occupants must be top priority.

    Meanwhile, the Ogun State government must walk its talk to arrest and bring to justice the TASUED criminals.  That should be prompt and without further delay.

  • Endangered university system

    The modern world is anchored to education especially at the university level, understandably because robust human capital – the gateway to socio-political stability and industrialisation can never be engendered without it (education). Industrialisation is the strong vehicle for sustainable economic growth and development in myriad of ways. In other words, education is basically about the promotion of skilled manpower for development within the confines of local, regional and trans-oceanic geographies. Given this scenario, Nigeria can only be an exception at its own peril. This awareness underscored the reason why the University College, Ibadan was established in 1948, following the recommendations of the Elliot Commission of 1943. UCI was affiliated to the University of London. However, the project had some teething problems or challenges such as low enrolments of students and high dropout rate.

    Consequently, the federal government set up in April, 1959 the Ashby Commission of Inquiry to advise it on the higher education needs of Nigeria for the next 20 years. It is on record, that before the submission of the Ashby Report, the government of the Eastern Region had quickly founded its own higher institution called University of Nigeria, Nsukka. University of Ife, Ile-Ife (later re-named Obafemi Awolowo University) and Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria were established in 1962 (in line with the Ashby Commission’s recommendations) by the Western and Northern governments respectively. In 1962, University of Lagos was created by the federal government. UCI became a full-fledged university during the same year (1962). By this token, University of Ibadan and University of Lagos became the first two federal universities in Nigeria.

    During this period, Nigeria had a population of about 45 million. The newly created Mid-Western Region also established its own university in 1970. It was named University of Benin. All these regional universities later metamorphosed into federal institutions. They are popularly called the first generation universities up to now. The number of universities in the country has been increasing exponentially since this period. Today, Nigeria has 180 universities and more than 60 “janjaweed” or “wuru-wuru” (unapproved) ones criss-crossing our landscape. The Nigerian Universities Commission (NUC), first established by the Act No.1 of 1974, is saddled with the responsibility of approving applications for establishing universities in the country, based on general and specific guidelines. This service and regulatory body underwent some amendments in 1993 under Decree No. 10 of 1993.

    Currently, over 300 applications for the establishment of new private universities are being considered by the NUC. Certainly, more individuals and organisations will soon submit their forms. Our dear First Lady, Aisha Buhari was/is also legitimately planning to establish a university to be named Muhammadu Buhari University. This is to be located somewhere in the north in honour of her husband. I’m not unaware of the need to create a greater space for qualified young candidates to gain admission to the university, since the human population of Nigeria is now 201 million. But in doing this, we must not cast caution to the winds. Private universities are not an aberration provided high standards occupy a conspicuous position in the scheme of things.

    Thus, for example, some private universities are doing very well in the United Kingdom and United States of America. Those in the UK include University of Buckingham, Regent’s University and St. Mary’s University. Again, US has such prominent private universities as Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and California Institute of Technology. They are some of the best universities on our planet. Some of the relatively prominent private higher institutions in Nigeria are Covenant University, Ota; Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti; American University of Nigeria, Yola; Bowen University, Iwo and Igbinedion University, Okada. Although the above-mentioned schools are struggling to improve on the standards of their programmes including teaching and research, they are still light years away from the expected level of excellence.

    Poor funding leading to a gross lack of facilities and inability to attract very experienced, world-class teachers/professors remain a devil to wrestle with. This is in addition to the imposition of a very regimented life-style on students. Excessive regimentation on students is an anathema to creativity and/or innovation. Freedoms of thought and expression within the framework of common sense are sacrosanct. Excesses or draconian measures in the name of discipline reduce most private universities in Nigeria to the level of secondary schools. Professor Oloyede – the Registrar of JAMB was thoroughly dismayed recently at the low standards in most private universities in the country. His complaint was/is rooted in patriotism. Where are the other stake holders? They don’t care a hoot! Mediocre university education has now reached epidemic proportions.

    Today, almost every lawmaker in Abuja is struggling to get a university approved for his village for political and/or commercial reasons. Sometimes, these politicians see private universities as a status symbol. Most candidates who write JAMB examinations are too academically weak to become university students. They should go for vocational education instead of making a nuisance of themselves in the long run.  Half or “quarter”-baked graduates would not be able to remain afloat the stream of modern development. Consequently, Nigeria would begin to experience more economic imperialism.  Chinese, Japanese, Britons and Americans among other foreign nationals even with polytechnic certificates would be ruling our industrial landscape if NUC failed to halt the drift towards weak university education. Even our public universities need greater funding so that they can enlarge and enrich the available facilities with a view to admitting more qualified candidates. Sub-standard education is a danger to the heart and soul of any society.

    Permit me to illustrate here, an aspect of the state of the nation’s university education. The recently approved curriculum by NUC for Archaeology was a retrogressive change. Old courses that had been expunged by the departmental/central authorities in Ibadan more than three decades ago are now being showcased as products of a new curricular reform. Such courses include Pleistocene Geography, World Prehistory including Archaeology of the Near East and Science in Archaeology. NUC wants us to be teaching “Archaeology of Jericho” in Nigeria in the 21st century. This is exceedingly ridiculous!  Indeed, this is the time we should be engaging more than hitherto in Archaeology as if society matters. That is, archaeology with a special emphasis on knowledge applications. West Africa has to be the runway as` we focus on archaeo-tourism and peace/conflict management among others. The “Walls” of Jericho-encumbrances to academic excellence and market-sensitivities must be dismantled now. We would be doomed to greater failure if the federal government refused to rescue Nigeria which is sinking fast to the bottom of the ocean of modern education and development. This simply means that Nigeria’s university educational system is in dire need of a radical overhaul involving federal, state and private institutions. Most of them are to a large degree, a mockery of factories for intellectual productions.

     

    • Prof Ogundele is of Dept. of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Ibadan.

  • Our girls remain endangered

    The recent debate over how Nigeria has treated its young started from a foreign source. Bill Gates is not one to join issues with anyone, except where his business is concerned.

    Clearly, he has decided to make Nigeria his business, coming here year in year out, bringing along a piece of that $65 billion dollars he doesn’t really need in the effort to kick out polio. He almost succeeded too, except for a stubborn strain of the disease found recently to be camouflaged in the ‘koro’ of Borno State, like a debtor running from a creditor.

    Anyway, polio is not why Mr. Gates is trending. At the last expanded National Economic Council meeting chaired by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, Uncle Bill gave our economic plan a rating of ‘e get as e be.’

    ‘’People without roads, ports and factories can’t flourish. And roads, ports and factories without skilled workers to build and manage them can’t sustain an economy,” he said. That is to say, we don’t have the infrastructure or the manpower to grow the economy.

    This generated mixed reactions.  Opposition started popping champagne. The government disagreed furiously.

    I guess Uncle Bill got this feedback so, in a CNN interview later, he justified himself with this telling remark. “As a partner in Nigeria, I am saying the current plan is inadequate. Nigeria has all these young people and the current quality and quantity of investment in these young generations; in health and education, just isn’t good enough.”

    We must agree that we can do a lot better for our young. And we young people must also agree that we can do a lot better for ourselves and our children. Not just in health and education but also in the very lucrative areas of entertainment and sports.

    There have now been two major incidents of girls kidnapped from school. Bravery should not be a criterion for going to school. We are already afraid of our teachers. We don’t have to add the fear of abduction to it.

    I have an eight-year-old daughter and for me, the whole saga is proof of our inability as a nation to protect the life and wellbeing of the girl child. Boarding schools for girls all over the country are so easily accessible that not just terrorists and kidnappers, but other paedophiles have been known to take advantage of this for nefarious purposes.

    In Lagos where I live, just two years ago, police arrested 32-year-old Chinoso Okonkwo, for allegedly taking out 10-12 year old school girls in Surulere to a hotel, during classes, for use as commercial sex workers. Last year, the gateman of a girls’ school around Abuja was arrested for pimping out the girls to men who gather in the evenings to have their pick.

    Incidents of rape, domestic abuse and sundry crimes against girls are on the increase as we fail to offer real protection to these most vulnerable members of our society. It is getting so bad that the girl child in Nigeria might soon qualify as endangered specie.

    There is one thing that most paedophiles and rapists have in common. They are men. They are men who have mothers or sisters. As we talk about governmental interventions on the one hand, we cannot ignore a decay of values on the other.  From our homes, we must remember what it means to instil respect, discipline and above all – love.

    Speaking of love and respect, I cannot forget how my mother, Luchia Feubodei thumbed the fingerprints of these values on the hearts of my siblings and I. It has become our moral compass.

    The other gift my mother gave us was a good education. Unfortunately, the recurrent decimal about the serial tragedy of kidnaps is the obviously poor education that these girls are getting from these dangerous schools. In nearly every interview, it is saddening to note that the girls could hardly express themselves in the English language, requiring a translator to do the honours.

    Ordinarily, there would be nothing wrong with this – but our syllabus is in the English language.

    In their sitting Tuesday, the Senate in plenary read a motion lamenting the standard of education in the country as exemplified by poor WAEC results. The Minister of Education has been called to come and explain this debacle.

    Yet the reasons are easy to see. The UNESCO recommends that 15-20 percent be budgeted for education by nation states. Nigeria manages to budget less than 6-7 percent annually, or some N60 billion out of an N8.6 trillion budget. By the way, Ghana and Ivory Coast both budget at least 30 percent annually.

    Moreover, most teachers, as shown in Ekiti, Edo, Sokoto, Katsina and recently Kaduna states, have no business in the classrooms. So we can neither guarantee the safety of, nor provide quality education to our girls, yet as Uncle Bill, “If they (Nigeria) can get health and education right, they will be an engine room of growth not just for themselves but for Africa.”

    We need to all stand up and take account. This is not a battle that will be won by governments and NGOs. This is a cause that we must find worthy within our own hearts. The remedies and the changes must start from each and every one of us; in our homes, in our schools and in our workplaces. They are our future. Let us not endanger that future.

     

    • Aiyeola is an ambassador for the ONE campaign, dedicated to fighting extreme poverty and preventable disease.

  • The pensioner as endangered specie

    SIR: Like the saying goes, anything that has a beginning also has end, and in most cases most people look forward to a happy ending in whatever they do. This is not the case of most Nigerian workers; Nigeria has become a nation where no one prays to be a pensioner. Retirement in the time past is a thing of celebration and every worker, both in government or private sector look forward to, it was a thing of honour and pride after retirement to be identified as a senior citizen.

    Today, retirement in Nigeria has become a thing of sorrow, anguish and rejection; hardly would a week pass without the news of pensioners barricading the streets in protest demanding for their arrears or retirement benefits. At the last count about 22 states are heavily indebted to their pensioners; most of these pensioners have been reduced to perpetual beggars begging for every crumb to put body and soul together. Majority have died waiting to collect their pension while many of their colleagues are suffering from life-threatening diseases with no hope in sight when they will be paid.

    The question begging for answer is; how did we get to this sorry pass as a nation? As I write, retired Edo State local government workers have been in the street protesting non-payment of their monthly pension and have also resorted to fasting and praying calling on God to come intervene in their case. From Edo to Kogi, Abia, Benue, Oyo, Ondo, Ekiti, Osun state etc. the story is the same. In Imo State, in order to meet up with the burden of paying up the arrears of pensioners, the state government has slashed their salaries to 40%.

    The retired workers from federal government are not left out in this; every day pensioners across the federation are faced with the daunting task of traveling to Abuja, moving from one ministry to another, for data capturing, filling of forms and dropping files. The plight of pensioners across the country is nothing to write home about, one out of every three families you see have passed through the experience of either being owed retirement benefits or those whose pension don’t come regularly and yet, we are told pension operators have been able to manage six trillion of pensioners’ contributory scheme. With such huge amount saved, why are they subjected to impunity or in worst cases left to die without enjoying the fruit of their labour?

    While pensioners are left to their fate, most of our retired governors who are presently in the Senate are also receiving pension from their various states including housing allowances and also collecting same as serving senators. What an injustice? We rob the poor to service the rich who do nothing but to impoverish and deny our children a better life. This explains the reason why most Nigerian youths don’t believe in the system but, rather, prefer to go die in the Mediterranean Sea trying to cross over to Europe.

    To the Nigerian pensioners, will the end ever justify the means?

     

    • Joe Onwukeme,

    unjoeratedjoe@gmail.com

  • Nigerian child, endangered specie

    SIR: This year’s Children Day may have come and gone and for the umpteenth time we have celebrated with no real value added to the life of the Nigeria child.  My mind is preoccupied with the morbid thought that what the adults and elites gather to celebrate is actually the death of the Nigerian child. The hypocritical activities planned annually for the day is actually meant to drive the death knell in. The Nigerian government can be likened to an undertaker, supervising the death and burial of our children with relish. Nigeria pretends to belong to the civilized world by being signatory to international conventions and treaties on the rights of the child, particularly, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the child. But in reality, through actions of omission and commission supports the exploitation, dehumanization and decimination of the Nigerian child.

    The Nigerian child in this context refers to the millions of children residing in such slums as Ajegunle, Makoko, Somolu, Mushin etc. and these settlements are not only limited to Lagos alone. They practically litter our entire landscape. Included in this category are the children in the Internally Displaced Persons Camps (IDPS) who to no fault of theirs are refugees in their own country.

    Truth is the Nigerian child lives a life that is futile and hollow. Children are a very significant and vulnerable group in society which accounts for why in sane climes conscious efforts is put in place to protect and nurture them to full potentials. This accounts for why John F Kennedy, former US president referred to children “as the world’s most valuable resource and its best hope for the future”.  Nelson Mandela, former President of South Africa, on the other hand said “There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children”.

    The high incidence of infant mortality deaths is a clear demonstration of our soullessness. This is because in this age of artificial intelligence, robotics and other advancement in all spheres of life, especially in medicine, we are losing our children to such preventable deaths such as polio, measles, cholera, malaria etc. Children are subjected to all forms of degrading and dehumanizing treatments. From hawking on the streets, to being used as domestic helps, to being married off as children all in the name of religion, to child rape, to being objects of domestic violence. The list is hopelessly endless. The case is made worse and hopeless in our clime because those saddled with the responsibility of promulgating laws that will guarantee the good life for them are too preoccupied with matters of greed and looting. They have also in our recent history have openly endorsed pedophilia.

    It is such a sad commentary that from Lagos to Sokoto; from Port Harcourt to Zungeru – in fact, across the six geopolitical zones, the population of out of school children is alarming. Children who are pickpockets and robbers, to children who are abusing substances, to children recruits as political thugs. The sum total is that we are a nation at the precipice. Bequeathing our future to malformed children. The conspiracy by all and sundry in not providing the right environment for the Nigerian child is one that will haunt us sooner than later.

    All is stacked against the Nigerian child. He struggles against all odds to come into this world, albeit unwillingly to parents who can barely take care of him while in the womb. While here, if he able to survive his early years it will be due largely to factors of providence and miracle. School is a struggle, feeding a problem, healthcare simply nonexistent. The elites run the risk of feeling insulated. These unattended to children will grow to unleash unimaginable terror on society.

     

    • Michael Ose,

    Lagos.

  • Nigeria Police endangered

    The Nigeria Police Force is no doubt endangered species. And there is also no doubt that policing in Nigeria is the most dangerous job in the world. It is almost like if you enlist with the police you are signing your death sentence. It is not an exaggeration that the force’s personnel are the most uncared for in the country if not in the world. Their living conditions are appalling while their self-esteem arising from the shabby treatment meted to them is at its lowest ebb.

    I must have written about the Nigeria Police more than 20 times dating as far back as 1974, but more pointedly in 1976 when the then Ogun State Commissioner of Police Mr Chris Omeben lamented that the police personnel were abandoning the force in droves. Regrettably nothing seems to have changed since that era. The only difference is that due to mass unemployment, those in the force cannot afford to leave.

    The Nigeria Police cuts a sorry sight. Their pay is very poor. Their condition of service is nothing to write home about while their barracks and offices are derelict and suitable only for pigs. Some of the windows in their offices have fallen off while many of such offices have no toilet facilities. You can hardly get drinking water in most of the offices and even in the barracks.

    And yet these are officers and men whose quality of training and service is comparable with the best anywhere in the world. Many of the police personnel have more than one university degree while a good number have received professional training locally and abroad. I dare say that they work hard and come rain come sunshine they are usually found at their duty posts.

    Unfortunately because of the few bad eggs amongst them the Nigeria Police do not enjoy the appreciation that is due to them from the public. The Nigerian elite are amongst the most corrupt in the world, coming perhaps second to the political elite in the US, yet they expect the Nigeria Police to be angels in the midst of devils. The roguish politician who brings home tons of Ghana Must Go bags expects his Police aide to be amused.

    The thrust of this article is the serious danger the Nigeria Police are exposed to on daily basis. In neighbourhoods, on the streets, on the highways as well as at establishments and institutions they are assigned to guard, the police are always at serious risk. They are sometimes ambushed and murdered in cold blood.

    Any time I pass by the Nigeria Police on the highway, my heart is full of pity for them. I see them as sacrificial lambs tied to the post for gods to devour.  Sometimes ferocious armed bandits numbering about 30 in say two or three vehicles would simply overrun the police. This is more precarious at night when the police patrol the highways. And in this era of kidnapping and ritual murders the plight of the police has become more dangerous and life threatening.

    Even though the federal and state governments try to provide crime fighting equipment and gadgets, such provisions are not as sophisticated as the weapons and armoury of the criminals. To make matters worse, stiff necks in successive governments have turned deaf ears to the cry and clamour for police decentralisation. The Nigeria Police establishment is the only one of its type in the whole world. There is no other police force that is under single control. But for terrible political selfish considerations, those who have found themselves in the commanding heights of the country’s political leadership have refused to institutionalise community policing which has been the norm in all sane countries.

    Given the abnormally high level of mass unemployment, the unprecedented level of general poverty, and the high degree of restive and restless youths denied admission to higher institutions, and the reckless looting by the political elite it is strange, very strange that crime rate in Nigeria is this low. Credit for this low rate of crime must go to the efficiency and self-sacrifice of the Nigeria Police. If the injustice and deprivation currently enveloping Nigeria were to exist in some other countries, say UK or the US, crime rate would have been uncontrollable.

    There are two things that require immediate action if the serious predicament of the Nigeria Police is to be resolved. The first is the immediate decentralisation of the force. Every local government must have its police while the states also have the state police while retaining the federal police, in a truly federal setting. Living conditions of the force at all levels must be improved including provision of modern barracks and decent office accommodation across board.

    With the establishment of local, state and additional numbers for the federal police, the police-civilian police ratio would tremendously improve. Right now the total police strength put at around 370,000 is not sufficient for Lagos State alone! Nigeria with a population of 192 million, making her the seventh most populated country in the world requires police strength of at least one million.

    Salaries and other personal emoluments must be revised upwards immediately. Paying Sergeants a paltry N50,000 a month is grossly unacceptable. With the serious hazards attached to their job, no police man or woman should earn less than N80000 per month.

    The Nigerian public must be sensitised to show more appreciation for the herculean task of the police. Government itself must treat the police more nicely than it is doing at the moment. Everything should be done to boost the morale of the police while desisting from assigning ‘boy-boy’ jobs to them. Political office holders should be prevented from treating the police as errand boys and girls. I hope the NGO –  Police Friends Foundation PFF would lend its weight to dignifying our police personnel and its institution.

  • Southern Kaduna’s endangered species

    Sir: the level of ethno-religious intolerance in the polity is quite worrisome. We pride ourselves as a nation with impressive number of religious men and women who have won global acclamation, yet same can hardly be felt in our social interactions. Sadly, the younger generation are fast catching up with this culture of needless antagonism of persons with different ideals, beliefs, culture and norms. This is regularly on display on different social media platforms where name calling is now the order of the day.

    With the alarming spate of killings in Southern Kaduna, which could have called for a declaration of a state of emergency in other climes, it is evident that lives do not count for anything in this part of the world. Hence, it is understandable that the Presidential spokesperson, Femi Adesina can declare that President Buhari must not speak on everything happening in the country.

    Of note, when an important member of our nation dies, we have condolence messages from the Presidency, but when hundreds of peasants are massacred, we find excuses. Admittedly, President Buhari must not speak on everything. We do not really expect some empty threats, or vain promises. But a proactive government would take necessary actions to curb this menace promptly before the tribal and religious differences put a chasm among its citizenry.

    The Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El Rufai declared that the attackers are foreign Fulani herdsmen, who were avenging past attacks on them and their livestock. However, concerned Nigerians have rightly expressed their disappointments with the state and federal governments’ manner of handling this seemingly endless bloodshed, precisely due to the ethno-religious undertone.

    Remarkably, the United Nations (UN) had earlier this year reiterated the urgency for concerted efforts to curb the illegal trade in wildlife products that are threatening the planet’s biodiversity. This is in conformity with the principles governing wildlife management which aims at protecting wildlife species such as: elephants, rhinos, turtles, whales, lions amongst others hunted, killed and smuggled for their meat, fur, skin, and tusks. The level of poverty in the country had made many to now resort to the animals once regarded as prohibited for daily meals and trade for survival. Regardless, there can be no justification for cheating nature. Likewise, the despicable level of ethno-religious intolerance has made many become preys to their fellow humans.

    Hence, in an effort to take stern action to protect wildlife resources and for sustainability of the planet and species that are under threat for future generation, President Muhammadu Buhari had recently signed the Endangered Species (Control of International Trade and Traffic) Amendment Act 2016 into law to address the cases of illegal hunting and trafficking of wildlife and to bring the penalty provisions in line with economic realities.

    Of note, it is important to appreciate that the average Nigerian is endangered due to inability to access the basic necessities of life. Precisely, residents of Southern Kaduna have become endangered species requiring succour lest they be devoured by their adversaries.  The least of our worries should ordinarily be security as we bid farewell to 2016 and the accompanying bitter recession, but that has recently become our top priority as evident in the numerous ethno-religious crisis and upsurge of crime in our polity. It is expected that urgent measures would be taken to curb the killings in Southern Kaduna since some persons now pride themselves as having a right to deprive others of their right to life without any legal consequences.

    Michael O. Ogunjobi,

    Lagos

  • ENDANGERED SPECIES

    ENDANGERED SPECIES

    • Miserable lives of youthful commercial sex workers in Lagos shanty community
    • ‘Men ask us for sex without condom’

    As the evening wind swirled on a particular Friday night in Ajegunle, a Lagos community widely reputed for its shanty nature, Mercy puts her nubile body on display at the entrance of a dilapidated building located a few kilometres away from the Federal G government press house. Her abode is one of the thriving pubs whose entrance is ruined by a broken ditch steaming with sewage on one side.

    Ajegunle is known for housing football talents and music stars who, in spite of the depravity of slum life, rise to become stars. However, that accolade is gradually eroding. A booming youth population and lack of economic opportunities appear to be fuelling the rate of prostitution in the area, as buildings are now being turned into abodes where cheap sex and drugs are freely displayed.

    “I am from Benin. I came here to hustle. I want to help my family,” said Mercy, one of the commercial sex workers housed in New Life, a building which doubles as a pub and provides accommodation for many street ladies. With a fair skin and slender look, Mercy is one of the well-to-do who can afford a tiny space to herself. For that ‘luxury’, she parts with N5,000 as rent and N1,000 to ‘sort’ police men who are often there to raid.

    School stopped for Mercy at JSS 2 in Benin where she attended Western Boys Secondary School. Men, some of whom are from the Navy Barracks, sometimes pressurise her for sex without condom in exchange for a hefty sum of money.  The 19-year-old, who has witnessed two of her colleagues taken to the village on account of “a strange disease”, nurses a silent fear. “If I test positive to HIV, na die be that”, she said in a flickering pidgin accent.

    ‘N7,000 salary not enough to pay my bill’

    Hope, petite and pretty with a husky voice, stands at the entrance of a brothel on Tolu Street, Ajegunle.

    Tolu Street, located in the central part of Ajegunle, is a den of atrocities. A place favoured by touts and drug dealers for relaxation, it houses five buildings where ladies of the night are logged to provide sex and sex-related services.

    Hope worked in a hospital in Benin as an auxiliary nurse where she was paid N7,000 as monthly wage. Not enough to foot her bills, she moved to Port Harcourt in search of greener pastures on the advice of a friend. She left Port Harcourt some few months back when income began to dwindle.

    “You need to have stamina to be able to do this work,” she told the reporter as she sat on the small bed in her dim light room. Hung on the wall is a picture of Jesus.

    “Someone will climb on top of you because of N500, but what will you do? I have to survive. I am the second of five children and I have to be there for my younger ones.”

    Hope’s story resonates with many Nigerian youths who are forced to become adult before their time. Some are lucky to use their talents to earn a living; others are pushed to living on the street where they sell their virtue to make end means.

    Recalling her most sordid experience, Hope speaks of having to battle with men who wanted more than sex by refusing to get up when their time expires.

    Teenage prostitution, like other crimes, is man-made and most times are as a result of social conditionings. Often times, victims are faced with dangers of contracting deadly diseases. For Hope, she is not enlightened on how to protect herself with a female condom.

    “Most girls here are used to falling ill. Sometimes we do fall sick because of the stress of the work. That is why I spend Mondays to relax. We fall sick to typhoid and malaria.”

    Aged 20, Hope said her mum was heartbroken when she told her the true nature of her profession.

    She added that there appears to be a spirit of addiction which makes it difficult for young ladies to stop the work even after they have raised the capital required to start a business.  She said: “Do you know that even when I go home, I still miss this place? There is a bad spirit in this work that when you enter, it is hard for you to come out.”

     

    Backbone of the family

    Against the backdrop of white sand beds, Mercy Ovie makes her abode on a stilt built with planks in Otodo-Gbame, a depraved community in Eti-Osa Local Government Area, which can be accessed from a labyrinth of paths. A ravishing beauty dressed in a black jump suit, which accentuates her fair skin, Mercy has grace to her carriage and appears different from the lot of other girls numbering over 30 and scattered in different quarters of the pub section.

    Asked her name, she retorted: “My real name or my Ashewo name?”

    Mercy Ovie, 24, from Agbor, Delta State, came to Lagos for the first time on May 24, 2016 in search of the Golden Fleece. A friend connected her to Otodo community. In Benin, she was into cosmetics, which she started selling after finishing her O’ levels.

    Citing the reasons she went into prostitution, she said: “My family depends on me. I cannot just sit and watch them suffer. I was six years old when I lost my dad. We are nine, including my mother. My elder sister trained me right from KG to SS3. She has children of her own, so she has to take care of them.”

    At the time the reporter met her, her birthday was the next day, when she would clock 25.

    “If I have money to celebrate, I will just send it home. The few months I have been here, the experience has been rough. But I thank God that I am not begging for food.”

    The environment where she and her colleagues carry out their trade has a foul smell. There is no toilet. They also have to deal with defecating in nylons and throwing it into the lagoon.

    Since she charges N1, 000 per customer, does she have to sleep with 10 men to make N10, 000 in a day?

    “Sometimes, men will come into my room and demand for pull-off, that is pull my clothes and everything, and I will charge N4,000. Some will beat it down, others won’t. So it is not a must. I have 20 or 10 people before I make N5,000. There is no fixed price. It depends on the amount of fun the person wants,” she explained.

    “You feel pains here,” she said, touching the lower part of her abdomen. Asked whether she has sex during her monthly period, she said: “Sometimes you can have sex with it and nobody will know. We use cotton wool to block the hole.”

    Confessing that she is not enjoying the job, Mercy said she would be ready to leave the trade when she is able to raise sufficient funds to start a business.

    Fiddling her Samsung smart phone, she gleefully announced she was checking to select pictures suitable for a Facebook post to announce her birthday. The image of a four-year-old boy adorns her wall paper. This, she said, is one of the burdens of care she is saddled with.

    A rolling stone gathers no moss. This saying typifies the case of Kemi, a native of Ibadan, Oyo State, who used to be a trader.

    She said: “I started in January. I was a trader. I went to Togo to buy goods and customs men seized the goods worth N250, 000. A friend linked me and I came here to start another life.”

    Her tiny room contains a mattress and a medium size black box containing her clothing. Other objects in the room include a pack of condom, a lubricant and a roll of tissue.  Kemi, who had her secondary education in Benin, Edo State, said she often encounters customers who do not want to use condoms.

    “Some even pledge to pay more, but I have never been tempted to do that,” she said.

    Kemi lives in disguise since her family members are not aware of the nature of her job. She enthuses about love but she is not ready to commit to anyone.

    “I have met nice guys here, but I cannot fall in love for now because I know I will not be faithful to the person. So I put that aside.”  She is indifferent to the possibility of government banning prostitution.

     

    First a slave…

    At one of the street corners in Ajegunle, Inieti stands among the line of girls in a pub dubbed Calabar Girls Corner. The roof of the building appeared to have been smeared with fire. Although music blares from loud speakers, it is not a place where there is space to drink and wine. It is a place of quick fixes where customers come and go.

    “I was suffering the time I gave birth out of wedlock in my village in Calabar.   The person who brought me here said she was a trader in Lagos and needed my assistance in her businesses but things changed when I got here. I was forced to serve her by paying back N150, 000. When I finish working, she would enter the room and collect the money from me.”

    She blamed her father, who refused to send her to school for the twists in her life. “He did not marry only my mother. He married seven women and my mother is the last,” Inieti intoned sadly.

    Azeez Olaniyan, a resident of Ajegunle, said the location where Inieti plies her trade has been in existence for close to 20 years. “Anything after 10 pm, they are very aggressive. You cannot pass this place again,” he added.

    Commercial sex work is not legalised in Nigerian law, but having pimps operating brothels is a common thing. All the brothels and pubs visited by our reporter are managed by men who recruit the girls and charge them for accommodation and security.

    Worthy of note is that a large number of these sex workers had limited information about STDs and majority mentioned that they never visited a clinic for treatment.

    Betty Abah, a women and children’s right advocate, who is also the Executive Director, CEE-HOPE, an NGO, is of the opinion that the increasing rate of prostitution in impoverished communities in Nigeria could be traced to poverty. She also fingered negligence by government and those vested with the duty of showing love, concern and sense of responsibility in those people.

    She said: “We have seen a steady rise in teenage prostitution with all its ugly consequences as poverty bites harder, because whichever way you want to look at it, these people want to cling to the daily threads of survival and commercialising their bodies is the only way out for them.

    “When people have no means of survival, receive absolutely no form of welfare support from their government, when their parents have no kobo to their names and therefore cannot fend for them and they have been given zero education and zero skills, prostitution becomes for them a ladder out of starvation and death.

    “In Lagos, like many other states in the country with big urban centers and extreme poverty among the ‘bottom millions’ in the fringes where teenage prostitution and crime have become prevalent, I lay the blame right at the doorstep of the government. This is because they have the resources to engage these people, empower them and improve their lots, but most times, they are detached and outrightly insensitive. They choose most times to criminalise them.

    “My organisation works with young people, especially girls in slums across Lagos, and we have seen abundance of stunning talents. These are people that should be engaged by government so as to harness these deep, varied and untapped potentials, but not our government. They stigmatise, exclude and even dehumanise them with evictions and all sorts of anti-poor policies and actions. And when they truly turn into criminals out of sheer frustration, they begin to invest billions in armoured tanks and all sorts of security gadgets to keep them in check.”

    Urging society to desist from labelling girls embracing prostitution as a way of life, she pleaded for a sense of hope to be instilled in them. This, she said, would help re-channel their energies and human assets into something positive.

  • Re: Our endangered value system

    SIR: Professor Olatunji Dare’s article “Our endangered value system”, (The Nation, March 29), was very instructive. Next to the agitation for a new constitution that reflects a true federal structure, the other matter for which I have continued to be vocal is our fast changing values. It is about time this matter is brought to the front burner.

    How did we come to this pass? A situation where nothing matters except crass materialism. Among the Yoruba, there is what we call omoluabi which I often like to define as ‘all that is good in a human being’. It is the quintessential human being. When we say in Yorubaland that a person is an omoluabi, it literally means that he/she is a person of integrity, a trustworthy person, a selfless person, a charitable person, a respectful and respectable person, a philanthropist, a humanitarian, a just person, a lovable person etc. To be an omoluabi, was the pride of a Yoruba person, but this value that is all good and used to be desired and aspired to by us all is fading and fading fast.

    In order to attain the change we want at a fast but more realistic pace, we need to change our attitude. This is one of the first things the Buhari administration should have embarked on. It is that fundamental. The foundation of the building block on which all other changes are premised is an attitudinal change. When we cultivate the right values, then all other things will follow. However, what we have done so far, and the reason the change is seemingly slow is that we have put the cart before the horse. As soon as the government was sworn in in May 2015, there should have been a pronouncement on the establishment of a national reorientation programme which would set the tone for the change we need and the goal we aspire. The advocacy would build up a groundswell against our current unethical values.

    A programme reminiscent of his first coming in 1983- the ‘War Against Indiscipline’ (WAI), but this time more elaborate would have worked wonders as it did at that time. By now, many of the criticism being levelled against his government would have been properly taken care of. What we have now leaves much to be desired. It is like a one man riot squad rather than a situation where we are all involved.

    An examination of the classification of society into two models by Robert Putnam, namely ‘Civic Community’ and ‘Predatory Society’, shows clearly that Nigeria fits squarely into the description of a predatory society. In order to change Nigeria from a predatory society to a path of development as epitomized by a predominantly civic community, we must have a cultural revolution. It is obvious that Nigeria will not develop and neither can it be effectively governed in a predatory society. It is therefore imperative to educate and establish new expectations and civic norms through a concerted reorientation (attitudinal change) programme. I believe that this should be a priority of government now.

    • Tokunbo Ajasin,

    Akure,  Ondo State

  • Wood carving endangered

    Wood carving endangered

    •We need to save the Benin phenomenon for its cultural and commercial values

    It may indeed be a sign of changing times that a land noted for its fascinating sculptural treasures made in various media is reportedly facing a crisis of sorts in the production of wood carvings. It is a cause for concern that Benin in Edo State, which formed the core of a famous ancient kingdom, may be losing its distinctive wood-carving capacity. This may well be true of carvings in other media too.

    What makes the development particularly deserving of attention is that it is the wood carvers themselves that are sounding the alarm. A concerned university-trained Benin sculptor, Mr. Festus Enofe, who provided a history of the problem, was quoted in a report as saying: “Wood carving used to be carried out by Wood Guild called Igbesanmwan, when it was under the control of the Oba of Benin. Then, the carvers were working for the Oba. It was a part-time work, as the carvers did their farming occupation to survive.”

    Enofe said: “After the Guild era, when carving became commercialised, it was booming – tourists were coming to Benin to buy carved works – but it has dropped now.” He blamed this on, among other things, the lack of an enabling environment for carvers. “There are no incentives, no encouragement to those involved in producing artworks,” he said. For a country that aspires to gain from cultural tourism locally and internationally, this is not the path to follow.

    Other factors in this narrative of decline, according to Enofe, include negative taxes imposed on art patrons at the country’s international airports where customs officials allegedly often seize contemporary artworks under the mistaken impression that they are antiquities.   Enofe also said: “Religion is a barrier to artwork. These days, people tend to see carvings as images of demons, which can attract bad spirits. It is an erroneous perception.”

    Perhaps more fundamentally, another Benin sculptor, Mr. Emmanuel Uwumwonse, identified a critical learning gap as a contributory factor endangering the wood-carving trade. According to him, “When we started learning, we normally did it after school hours, especially during holidays. We went to the workshop to work with our father, to raise our school fees. These days, you hardly see children doing that. Children no longer do so because they do not see any future in sculpture.”

    Clearly, modern conditions and consequences are at the heart of the problem. The economy of culture has not been modernised in tune with new realities. The truth is that the age-old traditional craft can no longer be realistically practised in the old ways. The practitioners need new perspectives and fresh approaches.

    Furthermore, the promotion of culture requires promotional space that is sustained by the relevant authorities. The importance of an enabling environment for the craft to thrive cannot be overemphasised.

    Certainly, it is not that carving has gone out of fashion, considering that art schools and centres in the country still teach the skill and students still learn it.  The missing link is that the structures of cultural promotion are weak and wobbly.

    It is counter-productive that the concept of Arts Endowment Fund remains largely alien to official cultural managers at the various levels of administration in the country. That is the right path to take.  As things stand, the fortune of fine art and artists, and by extension, the performing arts and artistes, is unduly tied to narrow commercialism which stifles a desirable flowering of talents.

    It is a noteworthy testimony to the rich artistic ambience of the old Benin Kingdom that the internationally celebrated Queen Idia Mask Head, symbol of the 1977 African Festival of Arts and Culture (FESTAC) held in Lagos, is credited to Benin sculptural tradition. The original artifact was among those carted away by British invaders in the 19th century, and a replica had to be produced for the festival.

    Regrettably, this richly creative tradition has been impoverished over time and may yet further decline without urgent remedial steps.