I was still wondering in my wilderness of thought when I remembered a book I read long ago titled The Complete Nigerian by the famed journalist Peter Enahohro alias Peter Pan. In his book (which should have been a best- seller if it were for a developed society), he clearly described a true Nigerian and I remember loudness, being full of mischief and hypocritical as part of the many characteristics of a complete Nigerian in that book.

Why then have I been wondering about the loudness and of Nigerians? Why is it becoming a source of worry and concern all of a sudden? It is because for sometime noe is has been assuming a dangerous dimension that if not checked can cause devastation beyond a manageable proportion.

 After the last gubernatorial and presidential polls in April 2007, many Nigerians during and after the elections were ragging about the conduct of the elections with particular emphasis on the snatching and stuffing of ballot boxes, harassment and intimidation of voters, falsification of election results, incompetence of INEC staff etc. The noise and the outcry was so so loud that it was getting to me. I decided then to write a piece for publication titled Shut Up Nigerians, Shut Up! The write up never saw the light of the press as it was misplaced, so how. In the write- up, I asked serious questions about all the noise and hullabaloo being made about the conduct of the polls. I sought to know why ballot boxes should not be snatched and stuffed with illegally thump printed ballot papers.

I also sought for answers as to why voters should not be harassed and intimidated by thugs who were hired, armed and paid by the very people contesting for their votes. I asked why in heavens name should INEC not have incompetent people in its employ. I wasnt expecting answers from any quarters because I had ready- made answers. Everyday of our lives as Nigerians, these are characteristics we display, thats why. Are we not thieves that snatch things meant for other people everyday? Do we not as politicians and civil servant take funds meant for millions of Nigerians with respect to projects execution? Do we not in our exalted positions snatch jobs meant for those who deserve and merit them for our close acquaintances? Do we not shamelessly connive to take monies meant for pensioners and stash them up in a fixed deposit account so it can yield interests for our benefits while the old people wait and die waiting? Do we not deny people we know admission into the University for those we know or have paid us? Do we not falsify the number of workers on especially government pay- roll so as to benefit from the monies accruing to the ghost workers? Do we not sexually harass females in schools, places of work, and on the street? Is crime not a part of our lives? Are the criminals not our brothers and sisters?

Why wont there be incompetent people wearing INEC uniform when we all close our eyes and allow people get away with examination fraud and have their results released with excellent grades they are never able to defend?

Recently, after the Boko Haram crises, another period of shameless noise making began. I was however very pleased with Mr. Femi Falana’s blunt stand on this noise- making issue when he was a guest on Gbenga Arulebas popular TV programme, Focus Nigeria. He decried the hypocrisy on the part of the government and the press over the issue and went on to back his stand. Lets be objective, is Boko Haram the first case of extra- judicial killings in Nigeria? Why all the hype? What about the Apo Six in Abuja and the countless of these type of cases of senseless killings in Nigeria everyday? What about the case of the young man in Kwara State who arrived Nigeria from the USA only a few days before the bullet of a policemans gun made sure he never returned to the US? What about the polytechnic student that was killed by a policeman when the okada rider he was riding on refused to stop and give the now normal handouts of twenty naira? What about the four people killed in a golf car by policeman in Abuja? The list is endless. Extra- judicial killings now seem to be part of the training now given at the police academy.

What has sparked me into writing about these noise and hypocrisy at this time? It is the noise being generated by about our U- 17 National team, the Golden Eaglets. What about? Over- aged players in the camp. So whats the reaction? As usual, a lot of hypocritical mumbo jumbo in the print and electronic media. A whole lot of criticisms have been flying around as some people have even asked for the players to be prosecuted. What a shame! Have our civil service and banks especially not legalized the falsification of age? How many people in Nigeria have their original birth certificates? Have we not all been parading with certificates of declaration of age albeit sworn falsely under oath of the courts? How often do we see corps members that are evidently over the stipulated 30 year age mark? How in heavens do we think young Nigerians will not enter for the cadre competition with falsified ages? He who has not sinned in this issue should cast the first stone. Before I knock off this write- up, let me disabuse your mind from thinking that I am in any way supporting these vices. I am so much against all of them but at the same time against the indiscriminate and outrageous noise and hypocrisy that normally dot them. Lets speak objectively every time we have to talk.

The taxi arrived at a cross road and was facing the red light of the traffic. He stopped. The right thing to do? Yeah! But that surprised my friend and other passengers in the taxi (obviously Nigerian) pleasantly, as there were no on- coming vehicles from the other lanes. He just waited until the light glowed green before proceeding.

Amazing isn’t it because a typical Nigerian would have reasoned, ‘well, since there is no on- coming vehicle and no traffic warden in sight, let me just go on.’ Even at that it will be a Nigerian that still has some sense of responsibility left in him.

I have been trying to reason that maybe it just wont work for us (Nigerians) to be as law abiding as citizens elsewhere except when we are being watched closely or forced because many times even while being watched, we still go ahead and disobey. I am not saying that laws are not broken in even developed societies or that there are no Nigerians that do not obey traffic regulations or other laws as the case may be. I am only trying to show the magnitude and frequency with which ours occur.

I sincerely doff my hat for citizens that obey traffic regulations especially when the law enforcement officers are not within sight. Check out these people: they are found to be almost faultless with other laws. They are people that possess a great deal of patience and how well they succeed at any endeavour they put their hands on.

Many times as parents drive around with their children, they beat traffic lights there by showing their wards that it is ok to break laws. These same parents cannot stand it when the same children they show how insignificant it is to break rules break some of their own rules in the home. In many cases they will go to the extent of flogging the children.

What about Principals and teachers of schools? Are they left out? As they drive to school or home they sometimes violate traffic rules but will immediately arrange offending students for punishment.

As a director or an employer of labour, how do you deal a staff that made a grave mistake? You issued a query or gave an outright sack? Did you violate a traffic rule lately? How did you feel doing that? Are you a Lawyer or a Judge in the court? Have you ever beaten a red light yet sit in judgment over offenders of laws set by the authorities? Many government officials driving in government vehicles do also violate rules put in place by the same government that they are working for.

What I am trying to bring to you here is that if all of us generally keep to traffic regulations, we are building in us a discipline and respect for the law. The other thing that will naturally follow is orderliness which will in turn begin to cause great things to happen in our country. If not, imagine yourself in a primary school break period playground. What do you make of it? That’s exactly the way our life as a nation is. Many of the traffic hold- ups are as a result of impatient drivers trying to by- pass traffic regulations. Let us all work hard to become like other nations where it is a very serious crime to break traffic regulations.

Cheers,

To a better Nigeria.

What is this examination malpractice? It is any form of illegal and unauthorized assistance given to a single candidate or group of candidates in an examination. Illegal and unauthorized in the sense that these actions are prohibited by examination bodies concerned.

Gone are the days when candidates that are preparing either for their SSCE or JAMB examinations had sleepless nights and “exam fever” cringe with fear at the mere thought that an examination awaits them. Gone are the days when students embarked on TDB’s (Till Day Break’s) reading for their exams. Gone are the days when students dreaded examination halls more than they would a prison yard cell. Gone are the days when examination halls were as quite as grave yards just because every student was concentrating on his or her own work and will not dare allow a pencil drop or turn a head around. Gone are the days when it will be a thing of shame for you to be caught cheating in an examination. All of these are shamefully (?) missing today and our leaders and lawmakers don’t seem to be bothered about it.

What we have today are pictures of a miserable society that is digging its grave with its own hands. It has even gone shamelessly beyond that for the society is not only digging its own grave but is even writing the script for the burial rites. The students that are preparing  (?) for examinations are no longer identifiable in the society because these supposed candidates show no obvious sign like reading or positive concern for the task ahead. TDB’s are no longer the order of the day. When it is done, it is either for partying or watching the ever increasing Nigerian Home videos. All of these is because the examinations are always been seen before the examinations or even when they are not gotten prior to the examination, answers are read out, written on the board or better still, solved and photocopied for easy handling. Examinations are now usually like market places with candidates looking over their shoulders into the books of others is as less a crime as breathing air. Today, if you don’t cheat in an exam or go in with “chokes”, you are a jew guy.

The reason for this trend is not far- fetched and I stand to be challenged and corrected: the proliferation of private schools at the end of the eighties and early nineties. If you disagree with me, go back along memory lane if you are old enough to remember. Cases of malpractice existed right from time but those who partook were always at their own. Let me explain this a little: since most schools were either owned by government or run by missions, there were high level of discipline and morality. The advent of the private schools which I refer to as business centres, with reasons which I will explicate on more shortly, things started to deteriorate. Because their main aims of setting up such schools were for profit purposes, morality and disciple were thrown to the wind. Profits and gains were now high up in the cards.

My reason for calling them business centres is that most of these schools have nothing to offer except the business which is the topic of discussion here. You will sometimes hear to management of such schools say (when they have a project to undertake), lets wait until after WAEC/ NECO registration.  This actually is their season of harvest. Private schools it is that perfected and refined the techniques of examination fraud that it has left many convincingly saying it cannot be stopped in Nigeria. They even compete to out do each other in the act by doing so well in their effort to get wonderful results as an advert to get more students to their school for the next registration session.

Now let me talk about the key players that are responsible for this dastardly practice. You might be expecting me to start with condemning the students for their role in the examination fraud syndicate. My first port of call however is at the house of the examination bodies. As a supervisor to WAEC and NECO examinations, I am normally left in awe at why a school whose total student population from JS 1 – SS 2 is less than two hundred should have over four hundred students registered for these examinations. It shows immediately that something is not just right.

These examination bodies give a description of the required sitting arrangement distance for it exams but go ahead to allow the schools more than five hundred students. I stand to be corrected; I think there is no secondary school in Nigeria that has a single hall facility that can conveniently and reliably take more than four hundred students with the original prescribed sitting arrangement and spacing distance of WAEC and NECO. Most government and missionary schools do no have these facilities let alone mushroom business centres called private schools. Furthermore, some officials of the examination bodies have those they take to these school calling them ‘my candidates’ and so connive with such schools to allow malpractice take place by sending supervisors of like- mind to such schools. We have always known that May/ June and June? July SSCE are for in- school students but these examination bodies have closed their eyes to that fact and the schools are having a field day registering even pregnant women, old men and other secondary school graduates. These categories of people are actually responsible for the worsening malpractice problems in school exams. Lets be frank with ourselves, are these indices not pointers that the examination bodies want to allow malpractice to take place?

The next on my list of culprits is very regrettably those in charge of our ivory towers, the starting point for a career in life.  They are actually worse off in my criticism because they play the role of the chief host by providing an ‘un-level playing field’ for these crimes to be perpetrated. Their major concern is an increase in their bank accounts. For most of these private schools, sorry, business centres, no form of dedicated teaching is done. Nothing of a commitment to the building up of the young souls entrusted to them is even considered which is why at the end of six years under their tutelage, answers are either read to or written on the board for them. If you are a proprietor of a private school that does this, I challenge you to confront me and tell me that you were actually putting in your best for those six years to build the children, the same way you were built; or probably you were not. Please tell me that what you are doing is right and I will apologize for this write- up. The schools are as indicted as the examination bodies for all I care because the moment you arrive as a supervisor, they will begin to negotiate the price to allow his teachers ‘assist’ the students. As for the teachers in such schools, consider this fact: if you were brought up this way you wouldn’t have had anything in your head to offer to these students. Writing for them on examination day is exploitation and deprivation of what they should have known. One last thing for school authorities and teachers, they students know that you assistance to them is wrong which is why they have to pay you in advance to do the dirty work for them.

 Supervisors that condone this act I consider to be the most insincere set of humans and my reasons are these. They are supposed to be custodians of the examinations that determine the fate of a nation yet they throw away the trust for a few thousands of naira. Some supervisors even shamelessly negotiate the amount to be paid him before assistance is offered while some even demand that the students gather money right there in the hall for them. The importance of the paper determines the amount to be paid and so Mathematics and English Language normally attract the highest payment. I have often asked my colleagues that of all these years of collecting money from schools and students, what changes it has brought to them. I use to want to find out if they would gladly employ such students in their self owned company. The truth remains that if supervisors do not compromise; to a great extent the integrity of the exam will be retained.

Parents who have fore-knowledge of their children’s academic abilities have found solace in these prominent Business centers by always paying heavy sums of money to register them for exams. Some reasons they give are that they will not be able to afford such a sum the following year for the same examination. Very unfortunately, this wisdom is very shallow as these types of parents fail to look or see into the implications of these acts as it bothers on our tomorrow as a nation. Without even going too far, these are the categories of students that will not be able to defend their results in the university especially at the recently introduced post JAMB tests which has received a lot of knocks for the above reasons.

Sooner or later, these students are withdrawn from the university and then it is back to square one. Do the checking yourself parent, which is more expensive? For the students, it is a pity that more than eighty percent rely on being taught. This is simply because you have refused to do their homework. Some of the students meet the supervisor, gather money for him/her and ask him/her to help them. Help indeed! They help you only but to destroy you and then your money is in their pockets. Except those supervisors that were products of the same trade, they were all schooled and wrote their examinations without any form of assistance. Why should yours be different? Why?

Check out these facts and figures below:
- Despite the malpractice in Nigeria in the last almost a decade, Nigeria remains the poorest in Mathematics and English language in WAEC amongst the other four West African Countries.
- About seventy percent of Private and Government schools across the country indulge in examination fraud.
- More than seventy – five percent of SSCE certificate holders in the last five years are brandishing results that are not their effort.
- Many of these students today have A’s in English but can hardly construct flawless sentences in English or speak fluent well tensed English.

OUR TOMORROW…
Pathetically and most regrettably, our tomorrow looks very, very bleak to be mild. What we are planting will definitely be reaped tomorrow. We have spent many hours arguing, swearing, blaming and causing our present leaders for our misfortunes as a nation. Many of us have argued that unless the “old brigade” is replaced with fresh blood, things will never go right for us. I have since been trying without success to see the truth in this argument. My reason is not far fetched. Our present leaders had proper education and were well equipped for their vocation in life; they wrote their examinations properly and passed through university rightly.

If these well bred Nigerians are squandering our nation’s resources this way, how then can I be convinced that with these examination malpractice bred generation, Nigeria can get better. I am looking for someone to convince me.

See, we are not seeing this problem as a scourge today but I assure us that very soon we will. Very soon, we will not be able to have capable, competent and qualified people in our offices and parastatals. When people like these are employed to work with you, be sure that you will be doing the work of two people.

If they become Architects, Engineers or doctors through these ways, tomorrow you may reside in houses, ride over bridges designed by them and your child may fall into their hands to be treated, what would be your lot?

Our certificates are already being rejected abroad due to its loss of credibility. How shameful for us as the giant of Africa. We must all join hands to expunge examination fraud from our nation. Enough is enough!

My final line goes to those holding certificates that do not really depict their effort. Forever, you will always remember that the result you have is not yours.