There is a vicious cycle
that needs to be broken over our great country. It is the culture, civilisation
if you please, of illiteracy. Stark illiteracy I should say. That is to say we
have fully acknowledged our ignorance, accepted our ignorance and progressed in
our ignorance. In recent years we have
celebrated, and that publicly, mediocrity. It is alarming indeed to see the
quickness with which we embrace our very own ignorance. Instead of breaking
this chain, we have dulled our senses to the slavery of benightedness.
In an age where
information and knowledge is abundantly made accessible, it is sad to see how
we adamantly refuse to learn. Our nescience, empty - headedness if you please,
is bewildering. Should it be any surprise how shallow our society is?
Someone once said, "The
importance of education cannot be neglected by any nation. And in today’s
world, the role of education has become even more vital. It is an absolute
necessity for economic and social development of any nation."
Knowing this, what are
we doing to improve education in our country? The value of education has become
so demeaned, it is now a business where illiterate business men employ
illiterate teachers to teach our children and roll out more illiterates.
Any business man who
wants to stand out and be successful knows to employ outstanding professionals
and experts. Government has failed in its duty to the nation. It has failed to
provide the citizenry with quality basic education. It’s a vicious succession
of illiterate leaders, employing illiterate trainers to train illiterate
teachers to grow and harvest illiterate students.
What do we do? Here’s the
debate.
It is Eleanor
Roosevelt that said, "It is today we must create the world of the
future." If knowledge is indeed power, knowledge then controls access
to opportunity and growth which is what we have been crying for as a nation. How
can we as a nation sit still and see opportunities pass us by?
There will be nothing
sadder than to see teachers who cannot read the very language they are supposed
to train with!
It begs the questions;
who trained them? Who employed them? Who has been accessing them for the number
of years they have been teaching? Where are the students they have trained? And
what contribution are they making to the society?
It is cheerless to think
of the problems we have created by our negligence! Is it any wonder that we are
where we are as a nation?
I believe the time for change has come. Government
needs to be overhauled. We need intelligent leaders who are in touch with the
times and the changes these times demand. We need a paradigm shift. Policies
and laws need to address these issues. Education should be given its rightful
place and the attention required to make it worthwhile.
But like Henry Steele Commanger said, "Change
does not necessarily assure progress, but progress implacably requires change.
Education is essential to change, for education creates both new wants and the
ability to satisfy them."
Having said all that, I
must add that, I do not believe in leaving the fate of my child’s future to
government’s ability to create change. The culture of corruption has
bred such deep distrust of government’s intention. Nothing is done with care or
attention. Greed is the very stitch that holds our nation’s leadership and
society’s cloak in place. It is appalling to see the waste of our resources on
projects that die natural deaths due to negligence, disinterest in the welfare
of the people and gross disregard to the rule of law because, of course, it
does not exist in this country. To change would require uncloaking. We need to
divest ourselves of the very seam that makes us who we are today - a corrupt
nation.
We can get away with
anything now. But time and history always pays!
I believe that to move
this country forward, we the citizenry that know what to do, should do the
little we can, where we can. I believe that when Nigeria changes, government’s
role in that change will be little or completely imperceptible. Thomas
Jefferson stated this clearly when he said, "Every
government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The
people themselves, therefore, are its only safe depositories. And to render
them safe, their minds must be improved to a certain degree."
He said
something even more interesting to George Whyte, his legal mentor. He said, "I think by far the most important bill
in our whole code is that for the diffusion of knowledge among the people. No
other sure foundation can be devised, for the preservation of freedom and
happiness...Preach, my dear Sir, a crusade against ignorance; establish &
improve the law for educating the common people. Let our countrymen know that
the people alone can protect us against these evils [tyranny, oppression, etc.]
and that the tax which will be paid for this purpose is not more than the
thousandth part of what will be paid to kings, priests and nobles who will rise
up among us if we leave the people in ignorance."
It is plain that
this is the crime we as a nation have committed against ourselves. Instead of
raising leaders, we have raised kings, priests and nobles to whom we pay dearly
for our ignorance [The elected leader whose greed blinds him to the fact that
his post is temporary imagines himself to be king; the “priest” who draws from our
ignorance to become wealthy and the elected officers, the bourgeoisie].
How comic!
It isn’t the job
of a man, changing our nation’s educational system, it will take every man,
here and there to not only speak up but to go ahead and create change where
each can.
"Education is
the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world."
Nelson Mandela
