Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown
by
Nigeria being what it is, it might be supposed by those with superficial minds, or ethnic biases, that to say or write anything that is not flattering about President Obasanjo, is tantamount to either being unpatriotic or disrespectful. It is nothing of the sort, and there is nothing personal, or that which can be remotely construed as hostile, in pointing out that the nation deserves, and expects better stewardship from him - because it knows that he has the potential ability to do so. Those who hold a contrary view, are entitled to their opinion - after all in life you win some, you lose some - however just your cause!
The purpose and thrust of this new series - "If I were Mr. President" - is not to second-guess, or diminish, whatever achievement the President is supposed to have made, but merely to tell him what his ministers and advisers may be too unnerved to tell him, either out of respect, or fear. Moreso, as there presently prevails, two conflicting views as to how well the country is doing, under the Obasanjo Presidency.
There is the view from "Upstairs" (up-beat) which is manifestly different from the view from "downstairs" (definitely down-beat), and the two opposing views are patently incongruous and irreconcilable. Therefore, I crave the indulgence of all, particularly those with the "upstairs view" of Aso Rock, who may be disposed to fault my intent in these series, to allow themselves, at least, to be guided by the views of Senator J. William Fulbright, who said in his address to the US Congress in 1966 on the subject of "The Arrogance of Power" that, "in a democracy, dissent is an act of faith. To criticize one’s country is to do it a service ... criticism, in short, is more than a right, it is an act of patriotism - a higher form of patriotism, I believe, than the familiar rituals and national adulation. My question is, whether America can over-come the fatal arrogance of power".
The "defence" rests its case, as to why any government, including the Obasanjo government, should not and cannot be above criticism. And, therefore, we too are bound to ask, whether President Obasanjo can overcome his own dangerous conceits, about the best way to govern Nigeria, at this particular phase of its democratic governance, having regard to his adamantine opposition, to the convening of a Sovereign National Conference.
The international best-seller and high-brow entertainment magazine, "Ovation" is where one will least expect, to find a balanced critique of the Obasanjo Presidency. And yet, in its latest edition (March 2001) under the caption: "Letter to Obasanjo", it did just that, and it reads in part, "It is my theory that a lot of things are not working in Nigeria because most of the people in power have no business being there. They are tired and out of touch with current happenings in world affairs ... A good actor quits the stage when the ovation is loudest".
I have chosen Education as my first subject in the new series, "If I were Mr. President", and for rather obvious reasons. There can be no question, that the parlous state of education in Nigeria today, represents the greatest threat to the prospects of technological advance, and the peace and progress of this country in this twenty-first century. The fact that there now occurs a steady exodus of Nigerian College-level students, to schools in Togo and Ghana, in preference to existing Nigerian Colleges, is a damnable indictment of the present quality of education in this country. And that’s a damned shame!
The integrity of Nigerian Universities degrees, is not only in tatters, but in positive disrepute. It is seen mostly first, as the product of a half-baked education (considering that over the last 12 years or so, universities are more often shut-down, than they are open, for lectures) and secondly, they are seen as the product of a corrupt educational system, which makes it possible for unearned degrees, to be awarded to undeserving students undergraduates, for a price.
In this regard, it has to be said that many of the Vice-Chancellors, and members of the University Governing Councils, including the Senior Academic Staff of the various universities, have a lot to answer for. The corruption of the entire higher education system in Nigeria, would appear to have been a deliberate, pre-meditated and diabolic act by those who, seeing that their constituencies could not measure or catch up with the existing standards, decided to pull the whole educational edifice down! A worse unpatriotic and criminal act, can hardly be imagined. But standards are a priori condition, for educational excellence, and we must have standards - there is no getting away from it!
If I were President Obasanjo, I will devote a substantial part of the rest of my tenure, to carry out a thorough and fundamental rejuvenation of the entire educational system in Nigeria, guided by the following pre-possessing considerations.
Legal Framework: I will send a bill to the National Assembly, to be called "The Higher Education Reform Bill", proposing a mandatory budgetary allocation of 10% in the National Budget, for education - at both Federal and State levels, annually, for the next 10 years.
The Education Tax Fund, should under the same Bill, be made mandatorily devoted to equipping and maintaining facilities at all educational institutions.
Standardization: There will be a nation-wide standardization of education, through a syllabus and curriculum harmonization regime, to be supervised by a rigorous inspectorate regime. Institutions that fail to meet the prescribed standards, would after two consecutive warnings, be automatically proscribed and shut down.
All University degrees (particularly 1st class Hons. and Second Class Hons. Uppers) will be subject to vetting by an All Universities Higher Education Board to ensure that national standards have been met. As part of this format, Senior Academic Staff at all Federally funded tertiary institutions and particularly universities, will enjoy a uniform but much improved salary scale, and be liable for "cross-fertilization" transfers to other universities - Vice Chancellors not excluded. This will minimize the effects of the politicization of the appointment of Vice-Chancellors, and the incidence of corruption, made easy by the fact of incumbency.
Infrastructural Development: A limit will be placed to students intake at all federally funded institutions of higher learning to ensure that existing facilities and new additional ones, are commensurate with demands. Attention will be paid to upgrading the requirements of particularly students hostels accommodation, libraries, science laboratories and universities bookshops.
Scholarships: A national policy for the "promotion of excellence in education" will be embarked upon through a generous and well-funded Scholarship Scheme - by both the Federal and State Governments. Research and scholarship at the universities, will be particularly favoured and encouraged, through generous grants and financial assistance.
Science and Technology: Although Science and Technology will be the main focus of education, nevertheless study of the Humanities will not be neglected. This is imperative, if we are to avoid the dangers of a purely "mechanical" education. Indeed, study of the humanities ennobles the soul, inculcates civility and helps to enlarge the instincts of generosity and humanism in the human heart. There can be no rounded and fructifying education, without at least some partial devotion to the study of the humanities.
University closures: The Higher Education Reform Bill should stipulate that no tertiary institution or university, may be shut down more than twice, and only in extremis, in one academic year, and this for no more than two weeks duration - the time that is considered sufficient for the restoration of "law and order", which presumably had broken down. Hither-to prolonged closures of universities for flimsy reasons, are no longer tenable or justifiable -not
even in the interest of nebulous security concerns, at the university.
Cults: All cults activities shall remain proscribed and permanently banned, and students identified as belonging to any cult organisation within the university precincts, may be summarily expelled and permanently banned from re-admission into any university, thereafter.
Lecturers’ hand-outs: This practice has earned a dubious notoriety of sorts, as a result of the wholesale abuse of the process. On one part, it discourages original scholarship and research, and on the other hand it has been used as an instrument of blackmail and graft, by some unscrupulous lecturers. Therefore, under the Bill the dissemination and use of lecturers, "Hand-Outs" will be banned. In its place, government should heavily subsidize the cost of faculty-related text books. And to make this easily available, at universities bookshops and at an affordable price, University bookshops should be provided with a repayable revolving loan facility, on an interest free basis.
This nation can well afford the investment cost of providing a first rate education for its citizens, not to do so would amount to a grave dereliction of duty, on the part of whoever is the nation’s number one citizen and Chief Executive - Mr. President. The fore-going represent only a fraction of what is needed, to restore excellence in our educational system - and it is by no means a panacea for all the ills now prevalent.
We are all diminished by the generational decline in educational standards, which began from about the mid-1970’s when the last batch of relatively well educated graduates were spilled into the nation’s labour market. Today, through no fault of theirs, semi-literate graduates roam the shadows of a non-existent labour market, having nothing to show for their years of undergraduate exertions at the nation’s universities except an NYSE T-shirt.
The poor quality of our university graduates, is attributable to our wobbling, unfocussed omni-directional education policies - often inconsistent and sometimes contradictory. This has now precipitated the need for the harmonization of educational policies and standards -nationally. For instance, a Law graduate from the Ahmadu Bello Law School, should be at par with, and be able to hold his own, against a Law graduate from Obafemi Awolowo University, or for that matter a law graduate from Cambridge University.
With respect to University entry through JAMB, for instance in 1997 only 29 per cent of those who obtained the 200 cut-off mark and above, had access to University. Currently, "only 600,000 students are enrolled, which is about 7 per cent of those eligible, which is below what obtains in Britain at 22 per cent, Japan 23 per cent and USA 36 per cent. Given these constraints and lapses, it is hardly surprising that our literacy rate is 49 per cent, which means that between the ages of 15 and above, 51 per cent of Nigerians can neither read nor write" - (Source: THISDAY, March 14, 2001).
Even when the issues of quality and accessibility have been resolved, it remains for us to determine the end-objective towards which our educational content is targeted. The civilization of the community, and ultimately the government of which it is capable, is closely related to the type of educational discipline, on which its youths are raised and nurtured. This is why Aristotle observed that, "The best laws will be of no avail, unless the young are trained by habit and education in the spirit of the constitution". It is doubtful if our present educational system, complies with this Aristotelian dictum. Considering, for instance, that our irrevocable wish, is to preserve and operate a federal and constitutional democracy, is our educational policy strategically directed towards ensuring that we train and turn out, a generation of class of leaders, whose ethos is in intimate accord with this type of government - particularly in view of the legacy left behind by thirty years of military dictatorship? I fear not!
The pre 1966 educational system, ensured, in intention at least, that emphasis was on training for wisdom and character. What we have today, in the words of President Eliot is "training for service and power", which is purely mechanical/technical and utilitarian and in which the standard to which it is wedded, is neither humanistic or religious, in the strictest sense.
The older or traditional education was geared towards producing a leadership whose primary virtue, was not commercial, industrial or technological efficiency, but wisdom. Today, the cult of mechanical efficiency has superseded humanistic consideration, in our assessment of the value of the type of leadership, being rendered to the people. Imbued with such an expansive conceit of the value of "service", it is becoming more and more difficult, to develop a proper counterpoise to the pursuit of unethical power - towards which service is invariably and unwaveringly targeted. The only credible counterpoise that can be opposed, against this aberration, are sound and consistent educational standards.
Now, I leave you with this parting shot, from one of our leaders, on the issue of the citizens’ right to education: "Tertiary education is a luxury and not a right, Tertiary education is a luxury, a privilege ... to get to the university is a privilege, not a right"— Governor Chimaroke Nnamani of Enugu State.
Ye gods! Upon what meat does Governor Chimaroke feed, that makes him so out of touch with reality? With views such as this, it may not be easy for President Obasanjo to accomplish all these needed reforms, for uneasy lies the head that wears the crown -but let him begin the process - today - NOW!