North Is Unlike Before II -By Omar Muaz

NORTH IS UNLIKE BEFORE II

It is high time we buried our political and ethnic differences. For the future of the North must depend in the main on the efforts of ourselves to help ourselves. We cannot do this if we are not working together in unity. Indeed, unity today is our greatest concern and it is a duty of every one of us to work in order to strengthen it. Bitterness due to political differences will carry North nowhere and I appeal to all our elites to try to control their political interest.

The truth must be said, the North is the hub of illiteracy which has become a time bomb on which we sit and it would explode in no time… And when it does; there would be no one who would survive, not even the elites themselves… Because one of the problems of our dear North is our elites, they use our population for their political interest.

As for education, did not our forefathers warn us that there would be a regretting day for us if we didn’t educate our children? I think the days are here, now! Not for once, we had ever stood against Islamic Education, all we have been doing is calling for its reformation. Almajiri system of education was, in fact, the best system of Education in the last four to five decades. But the system today is thoroughly under jeopardy of condemnation per se.

North is our pride and being the most populated part of the country pleases. To me, we should utilize the population logically and if we do, we shall soon bask in our tales of triumph. North shouldn’t be the one who stands afar off, enviously watching the southern part of the country exalting… The North wouldn’t be satisfied with its high number of poor as compared to that of the South. On the contrary, we stand to protect the North, our home.

On this; a statement that comes from DFA Ambassador during the Youth Council Summit organized by National Youth Council, Yola North Branch flashes my mind, “Unlike China, our population (In the North) is just a liability… “

From the books written by the writers of highest eminence —the poems penned by the world recognized poets— the songs sang by the utmost singers, I have come to realize that the North is unlike before.

When we are talking of North, we don’t just talk about its population, but we, inclusively, talk about its elites. How our forefathers struggled to get Northerners the independence they were dying for, and its economy.

Do you know since the second half of 19 century, “Around 1851, the ancient city of Kano (part of the North) was producing 10 million leather sandals and exporting 5,000 hides, annually? They also produce saddles, leather pillowcases, and bookcases that were then exported to North Africa, especially Morocco, and then sold to Mediterranean traders. These products were referred to as Moroccan Leather and were in high demand by Europeans who didn’t know that they were made in Kano” Historyville.

Lately, huge reserve of oil have been discovered in the North. Virtually, all the nation’s resources of power are in the North (Kainji dam etc) and 80% of the food the Nigerians are eating including livestock are from the North. But unfortunately, today, we give birth to terrorists and bandits more than the Southerners do.

Imagine, the Northerners have been producing the 10 millions leather sandals or even more than that annually; we would have been richer than five African countries joined together. But today, I can’t Imagine what the North is becoming. We cannot deny all that we have achieved, but we would have to gone farther had it been we, persistently, followed the footsteps of our forefathers.

The last time I posted the first episode of this work, a friend of mine by name Osama Abdullahi II commented, “North is an open-Pub for everyone… The acceptance of the Non-natives is the major factor of this problem (the backwardness of the North) although, North is the populous but the non-natives increased the population of the North. Since the North isn’t their birthland, they do whatever they like. By so doing, the rate of corruption and bribery increased…”

So, to his experience, depriving the non-natives from entering the North will definitely lead us to the North we have been dreaming of.

It’s a fact that North is unlike before.

To be continued…