New Merchants of Light!

By Anietie Usen

The short documentary film lasted for just six minutes, fifty eight seconds. The impact however may outlive generations and possibly secure a place in history.

As the very touching documentary scrolled to an abrupt end, arousing a mixed feeling of sympathy and gratitude, the select audience inside the exotic Banquet Hall of the Government House, Uyo, Nigeria, broke into an emotional applause that lingered longer than usual.

From where he sat, surrounded by his deputy, Senator Akon Eyakenyi and other key officials, Governor Umo Eno of Akwa Ibom State, the host, struggled with his emotions, fighting back tears that welled up his eyes. But he failed. At last, he fished out a white kerchief from his trouser pocket, removed his blended bifocal lenses and wiped his eyes. Not one dignitary was left with a dry eye inside that beautiful ornamented hall. It didn’t matter that the Governor’s guests occupying the better part of the hall were not the high and mighty. They were just a group of 39 poverty stricken village school children that the Governor was grooming and bent on sending them to the United Kingdom for a taste of a different life.

The documentary film showed the village kids and their poor parents in their dilapidated thatched houses with mud walls. Their parents and neighbours spoke in utter amazement of the miraculous chain of events that had suddenly turned their children into the cynosure of attention. And the excited children themselves, proud of their feat against all odds, spoke confidently about their journeys to the top 39 out of about 290 children that vied for the same opportunity.

Clearly, what these children lacked in comfort in their scruffy and rundown rural setting were well compensated for by their high IQs, native intelligence and academic excellence, in their rural secondary schools. They were all SS2 students, top of their classes as documented in their schools’ broadsheets and drawn from the 31 LGAs of the State. They spoke in fluent and nearly flawless English, some of course with the accent and influence of their mother tongues. But without a scintilla of doubt, all of them could square off comfortably against their contemporaries in choice secondary schools anywhere in Nigeria.

They were supposed to be 31, one each from the 31 Councils of the State. But the extra eight scored the same marks with the top 31 and the Governor granted them a waiver to join the programme. They had fought a good fight from nine students drawn from three rural schools in 31 LGAs. Their fame had already spread beyond their schools to various surroundings communities. Even their parents and siblings were not left out of the celebrity status.

Most of them in the documentary said they had however never left their remote and squalid communities to the city. But seated here in the festooned Banquet Hall of the Governor’s Lodge, their eyes were darting everywhere in bewilderment of the glitz and glitter of the Governor’s residence.

They had come a long way, literally speaking, to rub shoulders, as it were today, with Governor Eno this morning. A rigorous screening and merit-based selection process that took six months had seen the 39 scaling many incredible hurdles. The Governor, through the Commissioner of Information, Comrade Ini Ememobong and the Commissioner of Education, Mrs. Idongesit Etiebet, had already sent the children to the British High Commission in Abuja for their visas. It was the first time ever that they saw an aircraft, let alone fly anywhere.

This morning, in the Governor’s Lodge, they were in very high spirit. Their confidence had soared like a falcon on flight. They were immaculately dressed in white T-shirts and white caps to match. The Governor had brought them into his banqueting hall among other things to fete them. When a child washes his hands very clean, as the local adage says, he can eat with the elders. But this occasion was not just about dining and wining. The Governor had also brought some respected clerics, including Prelate Isaiah Isong and Dr. Sylvanus Ukafia to pray for the children and their minders just before they jetted out to the UK.

But before the prayers and buffet came the surprising documentary film detailing the lives of these impoverished children and their struggling parents in their homesteads, put together by the Ini Ememobong-led crew. It was the zenith of this sombre event. The Governor captured the moment graphically in his brief, emotion-laden send-fourth remark.

“I wish the Commissioner of Information did not show us that documentary film. But it’s good that there is a record like this to show the background of these children and to prove that God has a purpose for each and everyone of you children sitting here today”, the governor said, speaking directly to the fortunate children.

“As you grow up, this documentary will help you look back and focus on a greater future that awaits you. If God can select you from the crowd and place you on this novel educational programme on merit, it means He has great plans for you and you can tell the story of how you got here when you grow up”, the governor said.

Vouching for the integrity of the selection process, the governor said there was no favouritism or unfair preferential treatment given to any child that made the list. “I know that there are some people in my position who would have included any name they wanted in the list. But I say this under God that I never recommended any child for this exchange programme. My instruction was simple: go to the rural areas; look for brilliant underprivileged children who would not have otherwise enjoyed this opportunity and enlist them in the programme. That’s all. This is to tell you children that where you come from does not determine what God wants to do with you tomorrow”, the governor said.

To inspire the children to aspire further, the Governor told them the story of how, at a tender age, he had the opportunity to represent Nigeria in an international debate. “Many years ago in my secondary school, God gave me this opportunity way back in Lagos, where I represented this country in an international debate. Many years later, my little daughter, Ebenezer had that privilege to also represent this country in Qatar in an international debate. Many years after, my little niece had that same opportunity. The experience has never left me…So I challenge you to ķnow that you have a limitless opportunity as you begin this adventure in the arms of God.

“You are by no means inferior to anybody who went to any school anywhere in the world. Let it register in your mind that you can make it, you will make it, you should make it…That’s my greatest desire for you… This is your Government House. If you work hard and keep your focus, as you grow in life, this seat (of the governor) could be yours tomorrow. Let this visit to the Government House also tell you that, one day you can even be the President of Nigeria” the Governor said.

It was the kind of pep talk the young minds needed to fire their imagination as the first batch of the 39 touched down in London Gatwick Airport on August 29, 2024. From village to London, overnight, excitement was in the air. Their joy was pure and palpable. A few months back, they never dreamt of venturing beyond their villages. And now these villages boys and girls, aged between 14 and 17, were walking the streets of London, smiling from ear to ear, shepherded by Ini Ememobong, a man they simply know as ‘Uncle’, and Idongesit Etiebet, their ‘London Mummy’, along with a team of minders, medics and counsellors.

From London to Oxford and from Cambridge to Coventry, it was, for the children, like Eddie Murphy’s 1988 movie, Coming To America. “Their program in the UK consisted of what is called tasters sessions and courses which are basically an introduction to university life and learning, using the tools of immersive education”, ‘Uncle’ Ini Ememobong said. It was an opportunity for the children to experience the training usually given to university students in advanced countries, prior to payment of fees. It is primarily for potential university students to have some insight into particular courses they hope to study before they assume studies in earnest.

At Imperial College London, a world-leading university for science, technology, engineering, medicine and business (STEMB), the children who are science and engineering oriented spent sessions, working in the laboratories, while those interested in arts and other courses underwent their taster sessions at Coventry University, recognised globally for its expertise in peacebuilding and business related degree courses.

At Oxford University, they told the Ibom 39 that there are colleges where they must become a PhD holder in seven straight years from the day of their admission. They do not have to work or do any other thing, except study and research. In that college, school fees are not only paid for the students by various sponsors, students are paid allowances and made absolutely comfortable to focus on their studies, for the benefit of humanity.

Said Ememobong: “They heard that there are children in this part of the world who virtually live in laboratories, while research and development grants are made available for them… To this end, His Excellency the Governor sees the exchange programme as one of the incentivization programmes in our education sector to complement and supplement other ongoing educational investments. You know he has already put in place a bursary programme for students in tertiary institutions, WAEC fees are being paid for all final year students in secondary schools and there are special grants for students living with disabilities. But this Edutrip to the UK is his own way of incentivizing scholarships for young brilliant rural children to study hard and secure a better future. It was a mix of immersive learning and experiential teaching for them here in the UK”.

In terms of experiential learning, the Commissioner of Education, Idongesit Etiebet said the exchange programme was “profound and awesome in this aspect”. They visited the science museums, the museum of natural history, the greenwich royal observatory, the maritime museum and national gallery of arts. They went to Cambridge and they saw where DNA was discovered. They saw things and places they knew about only in their textbooks, leading to the demystification of many issues that were abstracts to them before now. Said Mrs Etiebet: “For purely rural children who had never lived in the city, the travelling alone by road, air, sea and railway had an enormous impact on their lives and opened up their minds not just to the opportunities that abound and await them in the near future, but to the challenges they left behind at home… So whether they were in the underground train, or the surface train, or in electric buses, they were like, what is the problem back home? Why are these things not in Nigeria? I think they can never be the same again”.

The children themselves confirmed what the Commissioner of Education said. “I really enjoyed this programme. It is a real eye-opener for me. I am so fortunate to be one of the beneficiaries. I visited and now know a lot of places. We were at many universities and we learnt a lot. I wish I could have another opportunity to come back to London for studies in one of the higher institutions we visited. I owe a lot of gratitude to our competent governor, who made this wonderful experience possible for me. Kudos to the two commissioners and other officials who took very good care of us in London”, Abigail Nyaknno Friday, from Ibesikpo Asutan LGA said in flawless English and diction.

“I have now been exposed to another side of life which is so different from what I had experienced all my life. This experience will help me academically from this time onwards. I was amazed and very impressed by what I saw at Imperial College London especially as it relates to my passion for electrical engineering. I promised myself that when I return to Akwa Ibom, I will study harder so that I can find my way back to Imperial College London as a student in Electrical Engineering”, Elijah Dominic Anso of Community Secondary School, Mbokpo Eyo Akan in Urue Offiong/Oruko LGA, said.

Esther MbetAbasi Okon, who found her ferry trip on River Thames very memorable, also wants to return to Imperial College in the nearest future; while Godswill Samson Asuquo, who is no longer content with life as a village boy, is targeting Cambridge University. “Like all my colleagues in this special programme, I want to thank God and our dear Governor for making me one of the lucky participants… One of my best experiences was the visit to the time fixer, known as the chronophage, in the Cambridge University. The lesson I learnt there was that time waits for nobody”, he said.

Parents of the Ibom 39 are not left out of the celebration. Emmanuel Friday, father of Abasiama, who hails from Etim Ekpo LGA, summed up the joy of the 38 other parents whose children made the Edutrip to the UK. “I have never boarded an aircraft in my life let alone travel out of Nigeria. But seeing that my child, the child of a poor village farmer like me, has done so at a very young age gladdens my heart, and raises my hope for a brighter future. I pray for life to see him become a great man in future, and I pray for this good man that God made a governor, that the Almighty God take him to greater heights in Nigeria”.

Close watchers of Governor Umo Eno have hailed him, not just for his focus on rural development, one of the five pillars of his ARISE Agenda, but his programmes in agriculture, infrastructure, security/safety and education. His novel idea of exposing rural children to opportunities abroad, which he hopes to sustain, has been compared with the heroic effort of Ibibio founding fathers of the legendary Ibibio Union, who were the first ethnic group in Nigeria to organise a communal overseas scholarship for their sons in 1938.

Spearheaded by the first President General of Ibibio Union, Obong Samson Udo Etuk, an indigene of Etinan, the beneficiaries of that overseas university scholarship, included Late Sir. Justice Udo Udoma, the Chief Justice of Uganda (1963-1969) and father of Senator Udoma; Late Obong Bassey Udo Adiaha Attah, the father of Obong Victor Attah, Governor of Akwa Ibom State (1999 -2007); Obong Ibanga Udo Akpabio, the uncle of Senate President, Chief Godswill Akpabio; Dr. Obot Essien Antiabong, Hon. James Lawson Nsima, Dr. Asuquo Udo Idiong and Obong Sampson Udo Etuk, a distinguished educationist and development crusader par excellent, who later opted out of the scholarship to sponsor himself in order to preserve his integrity as the First President General of Ibibio Union. These pioneers of communal overseas scholarship who are known and celebrated as “Merchants of Light” left behind a profound impact in the history of what is now Akwa Ibom State.

A new generation of torchbearers have arisen and are shining from the stable of Umo Eno’s ARISE Agenda. They are not from the flourishing bloom of the elites, but from the roots of rural poor or what Frantz Fanon, the Afro- Caribbean philosopher, would call ‘the wretched of the earth’.

History is in the making!

*Usen wrote in from Uyo, Akwa Ibom State