By Msonter Anzaa
If the words of the JAMB registrar are to be believed, then about three hundred and seventy thousand Nigerian children who are qualified by the UTME standard, will not have a place in any of the nation’s tertiary institutions next year. It means they would have to sit for the exams again and will continue sitting for the exams until death do them part. Nigeria ’s education system is as rotten as Nigeria itself. Once upon a time, going to school in Nigeria was not as difficult and as stressful as it has become today. Everybody knows that education in Nigeria is not what it should be. In fact, this kind of education cannot serve any useful purpose. Experts and major stakeholders believe the problem with Nigerian education borders on teacher quality, infrastructure, policy inconsistency and general neglect. As someone who has a direct interest in the education sector, it is difficult for me to write on this topic without personal sentiment. In any case, some amount of sentiment backed up with hard facts is hard to dismiss.
On July 13th Professor Dibu Ojerinde, the JAMB registrar told newsmen after the technical committee meeting on admission in Kaduna that: “We have about 867 000 candidates who scored above 180, and yet the available space is for about 527 000. So the remaining 366000 candidate will have no place. That is the point, except access to tertiary institutions is enhance, we will continue to have this lot of people waiting endlessly for admission,”(Tony Akowe; JAMB Says Admission Into Tertiary Institutions “Is Survival of the Fittest”. The Nation, July 14, 2010 P.6). He only stated a well-known fact. We know and our governments also know-that our tertiary education system, like its primary and secondary counterparts, is decayed and decaying. The reasons are also known and I won’t waste my ink on them. What I would like to know is why not all those who are qualified for tertiary education, can get it. Don’t tell me the spaces are limited. Is there no land or money to expand the system?
Expectedly since the professor made that statement, no one in government- not even the House of Representatives that was desperate to be seen as concerned about the plight of Nigerian students seeking university admission- has said anything. It does not matter. Why should such a trivial issue distract a government from doing its “work”? When the House of Reps wanted to talk about university admission, it instead passed a feeble motion calling for the dismissal of the post-UTME. one expected the honorable members to ask the executive to increase the percentage allocated to education in the budget when it passed through the House. The House did not. Recent Nigerian governments have a notorious history of neglecting the education sector and then maintaining a pregnant silence whenever issues affecting the sector are mentioned.
Were it in other lands, the Education Minister would be on national television telling the people what the Federal Government is doing to alleviate the plight of those candidate who will not go to school next year. Bur the nothing- dey- happen mentality we have here ensures we do not care. The registrar stated clearly that except something done, some candidate would continue seeking admission endlessly. To leave the about three hundred and seventy thousand hapless candidates to themselves is to punish them for being born in a land called “ Nigeria ” - a land where a problem is a problem only when it affects those in authority. And it is not their fault because no one chooses where to be born.
Martin Luther King Jnr. once told an angry crowd during the civil rights movement in the United States that: “There comes a time when people get tired…tired of being segregated and humiliated, tired of being kicked about “(Gloria Mikiowitz; Dr, Martin Luther Jnr. The Authority of Wisdom). I believe we have reached a stage when Nigerian students and parents get tired; when they get tired of being fooled and deprived. This is the time I want to see fellow candidates get tire of sitting for the UTME endlessly. I want to see them get angry and march to the authorities demanding the enforcement of their right to education. I want to see us begin to hold these people to account. They must tell us where our funds are spent and how. They must also tell us whom they represent. They must tell us whether we belong to ourselves or to Nigeria . The authorities, that is, the Federal and States Governments, must tell us whose responsibility it is to provide us qualitative and functional education.
As it stands now, prisoners in Nigeria have more hope than Nigerian students seeking university admission. The prisoners know when their jail term expires and thus can look to the future with hope. The Nigerian child on the other hand does not know when or even whether his or her university admission would come and therefore has nothing to hope for in the future. And going by the love our governments have for us, we are likely to remain UTME candidates for ever. The time to end this slavery, I think, is now.
