CHINWE IFEZULIKE-ODITA
An Octogenarian who witnessed pre-independent Nigeria and experienced post-independence Nigeria has explained that the country needs restructuring in order to move forward.
According to him, ” a four-wheeled vehicle can never run properly on three wheels and neither can a two wheeled one run on one alone.”
” A house that has a poor structure at construction will eventually collapse.”
Take, for instance, the human body, it has a structure and virtually everything man makes, he learnt from the creator who gave structure to everything he created: man, birds, lower animals, plants etc. All these things have structures.
Mr. Eze who spoke candidly to Champion Newspapers, said that he experienced the colonialists and later on our indigenous administrators and explained that the white colonialists were better administrators because they obeyed the rules and planned everything ahead of time.
Take for instance education; there was always about thirty pupils, students in a class in their time. This was to ensure that the teacher will be able to supervise each student effectively.
The missions ran the schools then and taught pupils and students morals and uprightness.
The textbooks were the same nationwide; Oxford English learners and Longman Arithmetic were used throughout the country.
A class of form one could have seven arms but the same thing was taught and each class had a manageable number of students for the teacher to impact.
As soon as the local administrators took over, and Government took over the schools, things started changing and you started having forty, fifty, sometimes even a hundred students in a class.
The textbooks are different from on school to the other, state and geographical areas.
The textbooks are also frequently changed and siblings may not inherit their older siblings textbooks.
This has not helped the pockets of parents.
Since then our education has been nose-diving. Before someone who has finished standard six can get employment in the civil service and make an impact. I did not go to a formal secondary school. After standard six because there was nobody to train me, I had to get employment with the church mission and I studied on my own and passed the West African School Leaving Certificate with distinction.
I was then given a scholarship by IBM to study in the university.
Mr. Patrick Sunday Eze who is 88 years old, told Champion Newspapers that what is ailing the country today is population explosion and corruption.
People no longer have the fear of God and greed, avarice and unbridled desire for wealth have consumed the citizens.
He said that if we can restructure and get back to the initial regional governments that were in existence, where the premiers were truly working to improve the lives of their people.
The regions competed with one another in growth and development. That is what we need. Every part of this country would have developed considerably if we were still running the system.
The premiers of the regions tackled agriculture, education, and technology robustly and the regions were developing at a good pace.
However, one must admit that population explosion and corruption have dealt ill with the nation. Now, each subsequent leadership performs worse than the previous one and there is so much hunger, insecurity, godlessness and poverty in the land.
It may be difficult to get back to what we used to have because it has taken decades of moving in the wrong direction.
Apart from that, those who are benefiting from the current system would not want restructuring
However, if we want progress, development and unity, restructuring must take place and we must put an end to corruption.
We must remember that if we do not get the structure of a house right, its collapse is inevitable.
The way forward for Nigeria is restructuring, it’s not this constitutional amendment that is being bandied about.”
For a better society
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