My childhood friend was the first to point this hard
fact to me some two years ago and I quote him “Gone are those days when hard
work is the passage to making it in our country” It didn’t make so much sense
when he said it as much as it is making now but I will say he had taken out
time to look at the trend of things carefully before coming to such deduction.
I once heard an elderly woman narrate about her
experience when she travelled to a part of the country and asked a 5year old
what she will like to become in the future: The girl answered “I want to become
the chairman of a local government” and on further asking why that seem to be
her chosen career path, the little girl
innocently answered “So make I chop money” Of course the woman said she shed
tears as to how the mindset of even the very young generation seem to have been
negatively affected by the get rich quick syndrome.
I don’t hear people say they want to become a professor
anymore....How will they anyway when the ones who taught our politicians today
are somewhere with little or no recognition whilst the ones who found their way
into political offices are those who seem to always get the national ‘horrors’
sorry.....honours. When last did we produce a Nobel Laureate? When last did we
celebrate a major discovery? Not that we do not have the human materials, but
when the system will not give a conducive environment neither celebrate the
brains, those who have still got the zeal have sought greener pastures in
countries where they will be better appreciated and celebrated. Little wonder a
research in the USA lately showed that Nigeria have got the highest number of
medical doctors practicing in the USA.
Trust me, if we take a look at other developed
countries, we will find some mind blowing facts about Nigerians and the
exploits they have been doing in these parts of the world especially as regards
education and discoveries. But here where we should be the world power due to
being blessed with super brains, we are either the dumping ground for used and
adulterated products from abroad or we have chased the ones endowed with smart brains
out indirectly when we do not have plans to accommodate, develop, expose or
even give them the required environment to thrive.
For your information, the friend I quoted up there is
somewhere in Europe for his PhD and cannot even tell if he has got plans of
coming back. Really who will when you can tell the world of difference between
where you are coming from which ideally should be your citizenship and the greener
pasture where you incidentally feel better than the place which should be
called home?
Terrorism has contributed to making education less
lucrative in Nigeria as the money voted for amnesty programme in the 2012
budget is way more than that of education. The irony of such poor governmental
decision is that they will still come back to spend much more on the same
children whose education they are almost mortgaging all in the name of amnesty.
It’s simple to figure out.....The children whose education you are not giving
adequate funding now might later take up arms and the government will in turn
pay them more in the future for not giving them the adequate education which could
have prevented them from taking up arms against the government in the first
place.
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