Nigeria: A Country Whose Destiny Is Laid In The Hands Of The Illiterate -By Ifeanyichukwu Mmoh

It is not every population group that was useful especially in a country’s or an organization’s decision-making processes like contesting for leadership positions or voting for a contestant, for example. This is true for organization’s that desired to make speedy and continuous progress. In fact, it is now a culture to have big corporations and the likes restrict their decision-making around the management board – that was most times composed of only top management persons.

Decisions are a critical part of the life of any progressive organization or country. It is so important that over the years, fewer people are allowed to participate on the board that decided the direction an organization should go at any given time. It does not matter if the organizations’ staff strength was 100 or 1000. What matters is that given the nature of man, every population has come to be categorized into groups that all had their different areas of strength or usefulness.

For a long time, Northern Nigeria has been acclaimed as having the majority (of Nigeria’s population size) whenever it came to politics and decision-making. The south – on the other hand – has remained in the minority and this has left notable decisions that have shaped our history as we see them today under the whims and caprices of the north due to the majority-minority arrangement. After the census imbroglio of 1961 and the recount in 1963, the federation felt it was better then to let the sleeping dog lie.

Nigeria’s President, Muhammadu Buhari

It has been over 50 years since and indications are that the country has not fared any better with this arrangement as it has amongst other nagging realities; simply failed to make meaningful progress either economically or socially. From the population explosion menace to the ever-rising youth unemployment and to the widening gap between the rich and the poor occasioned by corruption coupled with the huge deficit in basic social infrastructures like electricity, road, rail, sea and air ports.

Everything about the system begged for a review of the current arrangement to enable effective decision-making for the progress of the federation from where it is today. Once restructuring was championed as an option to this current arrangement but it did not receive the acceptance it needed to replace status quo. As usual, the north – whose population has neither helped the federation nor has it helped the region of the north – felt threatened that restructuring aimed primarily to devolve power and in the process void the center of the powers it currently had, and refused to endorse it as a viable option.

The reality today, is that the country cannot continue this way. Something needed to done and done very urgently. With emerging contemporary realities, I propose that our total population be categorized into two major groups: the educated population and the uneducated population. By this, I mean that the population with a minimum of Senior Secondary Certificate and up to any certificate higher than Masters Degree be differentiated from the group without a minimum of Secondary Certificate.

I endorse this proposal in line with the recent review of age of persons qualified to run for political offices in the country. The minimum certificate as was put forward by the national assembly then was SSCE/WAEC certificate. Then, within this population of educated Nigerians – for election matters – only folks who fall within the age of voting as required by INEC will participate in elections. Of course, we know that there are persons who obtained their SSCE/WAEC certificates at the tender age of 16 years but the age of voting was 18 years.

In this way, we would have a population of educated folks who understood they are required to passionately participate in shaping the destiny of the country for the sake of posterity. Also, we would have folks who understood the value of exercising their electoral franchise and doing so in a manner that is as civil as possible. The uneducated population would not participate especially in any elections be it at the councilor level or the level of presidency. They would not be required to either vote or be voted for.

In this way again, we have successfully tackled electoral violence and underage voting as well as mercenaries frequently engaged by unscrupulous politicians to foment trouble during elections. In effect, I am saying that the uneducated population should no longer participate in elections in this country whether they are eligible by age or not. The decision for the country’s political direction – I most humbly submit – should hence be made by the educated population only, on behalf of the general population that comprised the educated and the uneducated.

Those politicians who usually relied on illiterate persons to coast their way to power and then turn around to begin to mess up the system (by whipping up tribal or religious sentiments) may either quit politics or now begin to draft policies and programs that will do the following amongst many other equally important things:

1. Make the federation more cohesive socially or strongly bound together.

2. Encourage economic progress for every Nigerian.

3. Guarantee national peace by curtailing the use of sentiments of religion and tribe in politicking.

A whole lot of other important achievements can be accomplished when this happens like the show of character by leadership for the benefit of the younger generation. It does not make sense that folks were sent to school to learn better sense of judgment and each time it comes to deciding the political direction of the country; they comingled with a wider population of illiterates and touts – who most times are the ones with the money to sponsor candidates.

Lately, Mr. President has come under fire for his failure to produce the said certificate that was alleged in 2015 to be in the custody of the military authorities. How can a population that comprised the educated and the uneducated be governed by the uneducated? Of what use then was the educated population if they – like Prof. Yemi Osinbajo – continued to serve as spare tyre in the process of determining the destiny of the federation? It just doesn’t make sense.

Folks flock into the university and the polytechnic on a yearly basis to study only to have their jobs given to folks without certificates and training. Many of those who got paid their pensions recently do not have certificates nor requisite training. This is how many of our once lucrative corporations had died one after the other. It will do the country a whole lot of good if this idea is pursued as an option because with the monetization of our politics (as it currently stands today) comes eventual death of societal values in the process of time.

Comrade Ifeanyichukwu Mmoh is an advocate for attitudinal change, a researcher and authored (THE ORIGIN OF IGBO MARGINALIZATION IN NIGERIA). 08062577718.