BY COMR. A.A FUNTUA
Why our leaders feel responsible only for the education of their children, and not for those who voted them in to office?
You’re busy attending your kids’ graduation ceremonies overseas, snapping and uploading pictures on media, expressing the depth of your merriment as such. While on the other extreme, however, you’ve inevitably forced the poor masses at the expense of struggling to finish an ordinary 4 years degree in (4 + x) years. Where X here stands for an undetermined infinity! Could it be 4 +1, 4 + 3, 4 + 5 etc. Today in Nigerian medical schools, there’s a reasonable number of medical students that have already spent 10years and above, they’re still in school yet the future is much gloomy, for they’ve no hope graduating anytime soon considering the lingering circumstances of ASUU-FG saga!
You have out of negligence, made it a passion that Nigerian public universities must embark on yearly series of warning and indefinite industrial actions. As a government you mean no solution for conducive academic atmosphere for Nigerian students nor the lecturers!
The poor masses in Nigeria only can merely afford public universities, for the private ones are costly and inaccessible. Yet, the government is deteriorating the system, so much so that if care isn’t taken, even the public universities may soon become inaccessible to the masses. Annoyingly, this is all despite the available resources we have, which the leaders are appreciating 80% or more!
I guess when the people in power decided to dumb-down education in order to make it easier to control the masses, they thought it was a good idea at that time. But the sad reality is that; it turned out to be a horrific idea. For no nation ever prosper with backwardness in education!
Students’ daily lives have changed rapidly. College education remains the best investment students can make in their future. Schools and universities have been closed down for months, almost getting to a year. This has significantly traumatized Nigeria’s education system.
The students sustain injuries with regards to psychological, psychosocial, financial, moral, and spiritual amongst other perspectives of their lives. It’s a pity actually!
Education is the most powerful weapon with which the world can be changed. Once you denied a person the right to education, you already succeeded denying them all other rights. Because the whole theme of education is to change one’s way of thinking, to change one’s life for better, to make one feels self-worth, self-esteem and self-confidence, to make one able to think of, approach the, and interact with their environment positively.
Honestly speaking, who has no education is completely finished!
Our progress as a nation can be no swifter than our progress in education. The human mind is our fundamental resource, which can be nurtured in no else way via education.
Now the scary part is wondering what methods people in power will use to cure this chronic cancer. Of course, there is always better and more logical ways to consider when it comes to problem solving. We just hope that; while looking forward to settling the scores, the people in power shouldn’t apply the same school of thought that got us into this mess in the first place. Everything in this country can potentially improve, if the standards of the education system are improved.
People in power are not evil, but are just possessed by misinformation, which causes some of their actions or otherwise inactions to be deplorable, destructive and vicious! Pretty much the same thing that happens to the general public when they are misinformed.
For many of us, this period of slowing down has actually drained our energy levels, rather than revive them. Doing nothing has taken far more energy than anticipated, leaving us feeling exhausted at the end of each day.
We don’t know what the future holds or how long schools will stay closed. But, we can try to shape each day to be positive, creative, exciting and rewarding.
Lastly, we are calling the federal government to simply open the windows and let the students breathe well.
Comr. A.A Funtua is a 500 level student of Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto, Faculty of Agriculture
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aafuntuwa99@gmail.com
