What's the status of education in Nigeria?
by Iniobong Udoidem
Catholic University of America, Washington
After twenty-four years of independence, there are still hard questions unanswered in Nigeria. What is the status of education in Nigeria? Is there a low standard of education in Nigeria? Is it true that Nigerian graduates are non- thinkers and robots? Are we (the professors) not the first generation "non-thinkers" that gave birth to the present- day robots? Can education in Nigeria be designed within the perspective of her historico-cultural heritage?In recent months, there has been a general concern about issues of educa- tion in Nigeria. Among the most recent are the series of articles that have been published in the West Africa, "Nigeria: Whose education?" by Yusufu Bala Usman of the Ahmadu Bello University (Nov 5, 1984); "Education in Crisis" (Sept 3, 1984); "Special Report on Education" (Sept 3, 1984); "Nigerian Education" by Ad'Obe Obe (May 7, 1984); and that by Howard R. Woodhouse of the University of Port Harcourt (Times Higher Education Supplement, March 9, 1984).
The outcry is ironical. Why do people muse about low standards where there has never been a Nigerian standard of education since the advent of the colonial era and the post independence period? When Chief Adebo, a one-time architect and designer of the Nigerian education blue-print said that Nigerian graduates do not think and that the products of our universities are "robots' ', many people thought it was an insult to Nigerian graduates and Nigerian institutions of higher learning. Today, judging from the recent outcry and the number of jobless graduates, it seems that he did hit the nail on the head. However, his fault was and still is, that he and many others seem to lay the blame on students only. The students cannot be but what they have been made to be. The problem therefore must be seen, analysed and understood in its true and wider context.
In March 1967, Julius K. Nyerere of Tanzania, an African statesman, proposed a concept for an effective, independent economic and political development of African nations. His theme was based on the over-stated maxim that "Education is an indispensable tool for National development and self emancipation." Nyerere called for "Education for self-reliance".
Most African nations, especially those who were still celebrating the "honeymoon" of their "new-found" independence adopted the idea but unfortunately not the concept.
Nigeria was one of such countries. The idea was embraced with all enthusiasm. But little did they know that their understanding and approach to education was to be the downfall of that great nation. Education for self- reliance became education on and for dependence. The emphasis was on subsistent education instead of creative education.
The word education has its roots from the Latin word "educare" meaning to draw out. When the concept evolved from the ancient Egyptian priests and the Greeks of old, it was apt and appropriate. Unfortunately, when the concept of education was transferred to the "newfound" colonies its definition shifted.
The Gowon military administration heralded the theme of education in the seventies when it said "Education is a very powerful instrument for social change in a process of dynamic nation building... the federal government is committed to creating... an educational system capable of ensuring that every citizen is given full equal opportunity to develop his intellectual and working capacities both for his own good and for the good of the nation."
A conviction of this nature on what education means, explains why Yakubu Gowon, after being ousted from office as Head of State had to go to London to have himself "educated". Sadly enough, no-one dares to see this as a betrayal, a disavowal of the natural deference, insight and knowledge that Africans naturally accord their ruler. Gowon's ill-advised decision to be "tutored" in a British university was, in fact, a testimony to the world that he was indeed an "illiterate" when he was a head of state. For this reason therefore, history will perhaps have him exonerated for launching Nigeria into an education programme and system that was to result neither in the improvement of the self nor in the proper development of the nation.
Ten years after the Gowon administration, the Shagari civilian government emerged with the same parody: "Not only is education the greatest force that can be used to bring about redress, it is also the greatest investment a nation can make for quick development of its economic. political, sociological and human resources." What a lofty idea!
In January 1984, as part of the justification for the military take-over, Brigadier Sani Abacha said "our educational system is deteriorating at an alarming rate". But what system was there that we could call ours? What precisely was the Brigadier referring to? He seemed to have echoed what Adebo preached in 1974 when he said. "I don't think that what is coming out of our universities is satisfactory at all. They are indolent in public life. They don't think and teach themselves. We are producing robots."
In matching the political dreams of the Gowon and Shagari administrations with the social reality of the 1984 Buhari administration, one finds that the concept of education in Nigeria to this date is nothing but a mental bric-a-brac. The real problem is that the conceptual structure of what education is in the Nigerian context is yet to be defined much less understood. As Howard R. Woodhouse of the University of Port Harcourt, Nigeria noted in his letter of May 21, 1984 (West Africa), Until Nigeria he mature enough to question the underlying educational philosophy at the basis of her educational system, universities and colleges will continue to fill 'buckets' and produce 'secretaries' obsolete, sterile and uncreative, poor graduates who are practitioners of a profession and cynical or withdrawn citizens."
The word education has its roots in the latin word "educare" meaning to draw out. When the concept evolved from the ancient Egyptian priests and the Greeks of old, it was apt and appropriate. Its aim was the titillation of the creative minds. To draw out of the citizens what they originated. Education therefore served as a "socratic midwife" in the nativity of knowledge.
Unfortunately, when the concept of education was transferred to the "newfound" colonies, its conceptual definition shifted both in meaning and function. Education now meant letting Africans learn what the Western world had created. Hence the phenomenon of the "Bucket theory" and the "Banking" system. To be educated meant the ability to speak and write western world languages.
Thus from the onset of the advent of western education in Nigeria, Nigerian youths became dumping grounds and their teachers vessels of colonial ideas. Today, "we" the Nigerian scholars, professors and academicians are nothing but products of a systematized docketing process designed for the perpetuation, manipulation and distortion of African creative power. Here the biblical anecdote finds a fulfillment. "A blind man cannot lead a blind man."
"We" the teachers have borrowed knowledge and of the little we have borrowed, we impart a "recycled" knowledge to our younger generation. Because it is a recycled knowledge it lacks substance, originality and creativity. The result is what Adebo had observed, the production of robots.
The problem of Nigerian graduates therefore is not that of "over- production" or "under-production" as some seem to think (see Special report on Education, West Africa, Sept 3, 1984) but that of unproductivity which has stemmed from a mis- guided system of education. Worse still are those trained in overseas institutions with make-belief knowledge who come back home to parade their ignorance under the canopy of "I learnt from the horse's mouth".
How can the students or graduates be able to "think" and "teach' themselves or be productive when they have nothing they can call their own. Even the diploma which schools have given to graduates as certificates of being "educated" have been described by critics as "meal tickets". Sadly enough, when meals are not forth- coming at the presentation of such tickets, the emotional response is indolence. Indolent not because they are tired but because of lack of knowledge of what to do or where to go.
Their education did not prepare them for self-initiative and creative inventions. Thus the graduates and their diplomas remain valueless and worthless. This is what I characterize as the real character of illiteracy, unemployment, brain-drain and man- power waste in the Nigerian society.
The problem of Nigerian graduates therefore is not that of "over-production" or "under- production" as some seem to think, but that of unproductivity which has stemmed from a misguided system of education.
The truth of the matter is that anyone who learns what he believes or claims to know from another without domestication, although he might have all the principles, explanations and proofs of the whole system in his head or his fingertips, has no more than a historical catalogue of what others had originated. Because this has been the way we have been educated, we mumble-jumble jargons that we know not the meaning.
We form our minds and beliefs on what others have told us. And because our faculty of thought has been tailored and doctrined to be imitative, we have lost our creative capacity and hence remain unproductive. In here lies the fundamental problem that is responsible for the African economic malaise and political mediocrity.
What would be the meaning and definition of education in the Nigerian context if we let go the current under- standing and practice of education as learning how to read and write foreign languages, learning how to assemble and drive German, Japanese and French made cars, learning how to use western made communication equip- ment like the telephone system, radio, television, computers etc. without the slightest knowledge of their internal originations? Because of the present system of education, Nigerians have become consumers and not producers, users and not makers, recommenders and not institutors, care-takers and not creators, inventories and not inventors, recipients and not donors of knowledge. Where do we go from here? What is education without all the accessories of western imperialist vestiges? Education in its original meaning connotes drawing out. What have we drawn out of the African minds?
Before "we" the professors and makers of educational policies begin to point accusing fingers on students and young graduates, let us first examine our conscience. Are we not the first generation "non-thinkers" who gave birth to the present-day robots? As for us "professors", we have already been destroyed, defaced and deracinated. For the good of our progeny, it is imperative that Nigeria must make a halt and re-examine and redefine what education means for her.
The recent joint conference held in Lagos between the Nigerian Education Research Council and the Zaire-based African Bureau of Educational Sciences (BASE) was very encourag- ing. The theme of the conference "Modalities of integrating productive work into the school system" was most apt. I do agree with the voices at the conference, that if Nigeria and, indeed Africa as a whole, is to make any headway, the present education system must be "overthrown violently" and be replaced with a system that will enhance creative thinking, originality and productivity.
This is not a call for intellectual and cultural isolationism, but a demand for authentic attitude and proper openness to western civilization and technology. An attitude that will be characterized by originality aimed at either improving what is found and where possible offering an alternative. This is what I call contribution. For this end, indigenization and domestication which have been proposed before but wrongly implemented are here suggested as workable effective strategies; indigenization meaning the increase of the utilization of indigenous resources, and domestication a form of utilization which involves making imported versions of knowledge more relevant to the local society. It is a fact that western civilization has influenced Nigeria's developmental process but it must be noted that the attendant aggravation of Nigeria's technological and intellectual dependence outweighs its positive contribution.
This is not a call for intellectual and cultural isolationism, but a demand for an authentic attitude and proper openness to western civilization and technology.
If we are to inherit the concept of education, we have to understand it as a process of giving birth to knowledge. A process of creative originality. Such knowledge must uniquely be a grand- child of African heritage. Not until "we" the teachers become heirs of African creative inheritance, our students and graduates will continue to be "non-thinker". And unless Nigerian students begin to be creative in their thinking, the graduates will remain robots. Not until the system of education is changed the Nigerian minds will never be free to innovate.
The irony of it all is that I have to speak and write here in English - non-Nigerian language understood by Nigerians. But if what I to be have said in this paper is a commentary on myself as a Nigerian, then there is an element of necessity and truth in what I have called for. It is imperative that we must redefine and redirect our concept of education. Such a redefinition calls for a redesigning that will catapult Nigeria's economic independence, political autonomy and technological innovation. This hope will not be realized unless the new system is based on Nigeria's historico- cultural heritage.
Perhaps the future generation in studying the history of our defacement will give us credit for self-awareness in the redefinition that paved the way for what they became.
