UPE, WAI and Udoji

VIEW FROM THE GALLERY BY MAHMUD JEGA

I was wondering on this Sallah Day what happened to numerous schemes, programs and agencies that Government rolled out in the last 50 years, and what this country would have been like if many of them had delivered even 10% of their tall promises. An official told me recently that the Federal Government of Nigeria never does away with any scheme or program, once instituted. That all the schemes we were hearing about since our childhood days are still around, embedded as units and departments in various ministries and in the padded federal budget.

He told me, for example, that the War Against Indiscipline [WAI] campaign of the Buhari military era, 1983-85, is still there as a unit. Is that right? Then why are Nigerians no longer queueing up at petrol stations and markets, still throwing empty water bottles from the windows of cars, government offices and banks still flying the national flag beyond 6pm come rain come shine, and taxi drivers sneaking past traffic lights without consequence? Is it because Major General Tunde Idiagbon is not there?

The Ethical Revolution that President Shehu Shagari launched in 1983 probably still exists as a unit in some ministry. Was it the one that soldiers modified into WAI and Idiagbon promoted with the sternest of miens? On one occasion in 1985, a smile escaped from Idiagbon’s lips during a cultural troupe performance. The following day, a newspaper carried a front page picture with the banner headline, “The day Idiagbon smiled.”

I hear that the Green Revolution program that President Shagari launched in 1980 still exists in the budget of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture. Then why is everywhere looking so pale, when Nigeria should be verdant with green crops everywhere? What about Operation Feed the Nation, OFN, that General Obasanjo launched in 1976? He ordered every Nigerian to cultivate whatever land was available in his backyard. Millions of people did. We saw videos on NTA of the military Head of State working on a farm right inside Dodan Barracks, with a hoe slung on his shoulder. In which ministry is OFN hiding today?

Where is MAMSER, the agency for mass mobilization of citizens [towards which cause, was never made clear]? Nigerians are very good at spontaneous mobilization. In recent years alone they created Boko Haram, ISWAP, Ansaru, bandits, MASSOB and IPOB, running far ahead of government’s mobilization. I was told that even General Obasanjo’s Jaji Declaration of 1977 still exists as a unit in some ministry. If so, then why is Nigerian society not fair, just, humane and African, as he extolled on that occasion?

According to my informant, Mrs. Maryam Babangida’s Better Life for Rural Women program is still alive, tucked away in the Federal Ministry for Women Affairs, which itself arose out of the Women Affairs Commission that Better Life gave birth to. Indeed, my informant said Mrs. Maryam Abacha’s Family Support Program, FSP, and her Family Economic Advancement Program, FEAP, are also alive and well, as units in either the Presidency or some ministry.

Where is DFFRI, the Directorate of Food, Roads and Rural Infrastructure of the Babangida era headed by Air Vice Marshal Larry Koinyan? It was a very good agency; it built a lot of rural roads in order to facilitate the evacuation of farm produce to the markets. If it is tucked away in the Federal Ministry of Works, why is Minister BRF only talking about expressways and not rural roads? DFFRI should never have disappeared when agencies created at the same time, such as Federal Road Safety Corps, are still thriving.

What about NALDA, National Agricultural Land Development Authority? There is still a lot of land yet to be cleared in Nigeria. If NALDA is tucked somewhere as a unit in the Federal Ministry of Agriculture, why did Chief Audu Ogbeh have trouble finding land to set up RUGA and Cattle Colonies? Why did Sabo Nanono find it difficult to ensure than everyone can eat to his fill with N30, with NALDA tucked under his belly?

I was just wondering. Where is UPE, whose launching I attended as a school kid in 1976? We were told then that it was Universal, Free, Compulsory, Primary Education. 46 years later, it is not universal because millions of kids are not in school. It is not free because though tuition fees are not paid, the schools circumvent it with many other fees. There are no freebies such as we used to get from the old Native Education Authorities, such as a bar of washing soap every Friday and highly enriched protein milk. UPE is not compulsory either, because parents who refuse to send their children to school are walking free on the streets. It is no longer Primary but is now called Basic. Someone even said it is not education because many pupils emerge from the schools much as they went in.

If my informant is right, the catchiest and most publicized scheme of the 1980s, Health For All by the Year 2000, still exists as a unit in the Federal Ministry of Health. From 1975 when this scheme was launched, there was a poster on every street corner in Nigeria heralding this promise. Since the target date elapsed 22 years ago with much ill-health still around, I hope bureaucrats have amended it to read by the Year 3000. The slogan was so catchy that other sectors copied it, and we soon had Food For All By The Year 2000 and Shelter For All By the Year 2000. Not one of them was delivered.

Where is RUWATSAN, the Rural Water and Sanitation Program of the 1980s? It must be tucked away somewhere as a unit in some Federal Ministry. When I read recently that government launched a scheme to eradicate open defecation, I thought that was one of the promises of RUWATSAN. It is a shame that we are coming back to the same promise after nearly 40 years.

When Professor Olikoye Ransome-Kuti was Minister of Health in the 1980s, everybody in Nigeria heard about Oral Rehydration Therapy, ORT and Expanded Program on Immunisation, EPI. Every mother in Nigeria learnt to mix salt and sugar, and millions of screaming and shrieking babies were taken for immunization against the Six Childhood Killer Diseases. Many of the young Nigerians now active on the social media would not have been here if not for God’s grace through ORT and EPI.

In the 1980s, nearly every Northern state had a World Bank-assisted Forestry Project. They nurtured tree seedlings, sold them cheaply, created shelterbelts and woodlots, while Heads of State and governors annually launched tree planting campaigns. Where are those projects now? The Great Green Wall of trees that President Obasanjo promised in 2000AD to build from Borno all the way to Sokoto, how far has it gone after 22 years?

It was Babangida who banned cigarette smoking in public places. That scheme succeeded beyond our wildest imagination because these days, one could go for weeks without seeing anyone smoking a cigarette. 40 years ago in Nigeria, cigarette was more ubiquitous than the recharge cards of today. Much less successful was Babangida’s order in 1990 that Nigerian couples should have a maximum four children each. Where is that population control program? Is it still a unit in the Ministry of Health?

Where is the National Committee Against Apartheid, NACAAP, once headed by Mr. Sam Ikoku and later by his brother Prof Chimere Ikoku, domiciled in the Cabinet Office? Is it still there? Just because apartheid rule ended in South Africa in 1994, why is NACAAP not fighting ethnic cleansing in Bosnia Herzegovina, Kosovo, Palestine and against the Rohingyas of Burma? Is apartheid not apartheid?

Where are the Religious Preaching Boards that existed in every state Cabinet Office in 1978? Today’s preachers are much more cantankerous than those of the 1970s. Since these boards probably still exist as units somewhere, why are they not vetting preachers and issuing them with licenses before they can preach? Is it the constitutional freedom of speech? Is the Constitution crazy to allow every mad person to preach?  

These days our Ministry of Foreign Affairs has many projects in the cooler, probably existing as moribund units. In the 1970s, we often heard from top officials that “Africa is the centerpiece of our foreign policy.” These days, is America the centerpiece of our foreign policy? Most probably, the “concentric circles foreign policy” propounded by External Affairs Minister Prof. Ibrahim Gambari in 1984 still exists as a unit somewhere in the Foreign Ministry. As probably does the “Concert of Medium Powers” that his successor Prof Bolaji Akinyemi propounded in 1985. You mean there are no concentric circles and no medium powers in our foreign policy today?

Look, why has there been no Adebo and no Udoji in this country since 1974? Any young person who does not know what that means should please ask elders.