By Prince Ejeh Josh
Decades ago, Audrey Hepburn, a British International Best Dressed List Hall of Fame inductee, renowned actress, and humanitarian, trickled a bombshell that forcefully made an inroad into the global media, challenging humanity, and rattling the minds of those standing aloof, unflustered and akimbo to man’s collective adversaries. First of these were the huge impacts of education as catalyst for nation building and human capital development. Adverse to this would be the catastrophic crash of human civilization in a society bereft of education, or where education is considered secondary and subordinate to social profligacy.
There have been arguments, in line with Audrey’s rational thought about the immutable correlational testimony underlying quality education and a culture of societal transformation from a primitive and insipid setting to a society triggered by innovation, science and technology. In recent times, one could see this style of education playing out by the Tesla’s CEO and Chief Engineer at SpaceX, who has been predicted, according to Bloomberg, to be the first human on earth to hit trillion of dollars. Musk had argued, rightly in my opinion, that people must not confuse or muddle schooling for education or interchangeably exchange both. Education is far, both in distance and in destructive quest to crush the establishment, to challenge the prevailing belief, to fail in order to innovate, and to appreciate such failure as part of the quest to break the ground for new knowledge by creating a new environment for human comfort.
Conversely, schooling, as often if not as it’s the ubiquitous case in Nigeria, is constricted in nature, straitjacket and encourages no brain wave in students. It’s a pack of academic regulations and rules basically handed down like a mythical oral tradition. The world is radically taking a competitive departure from classrooms to the field of innovation where the global good, the key to the economy, the route to human capital development as an escape trajectory from poverty, underdevelopment, intellectual diminution are encapsulated in innovation inspired by technology. This has and would never occur through the rule of the thumbs as principally found in Nigeria educational system where emphases are on theories without results.
Perhaps, disturbed or anxiously agitated at the speed at which many countries, Africans’ inclusive, are sweeping and striking at the heart of innovation and development, while Nigeria remains entangled in a wasteland of underdevelopment, on the 30th September, 2021, a foremost lawyer, writer and an information maestro, Hon. Steve Oruruo, struck! He struck at a gold, or perhaps, hit the jackboots. It was a priceless ornament of thorns adorned with pride like garlands. Steve had embarked on this laborious, exhausting and tortuous journey of redefining the course of education to meet the world’s best practices. This might have appeared paradoxically to the average reader, however, that might exactly capture the tempo and mission of what had transpired that day. The paradox, in the course of this narrative excursion, may be clearer to appreciable extent.
Education is fundamentally essential for emancipation, and one wonders why Nigeria has not been freed from it’s many daunting challenges in the face of proliferation of schools and hundreds of thousands of professors. Sadly, the answer is unchallenging. We overburden ourselves with the a faulty or with a wrong epistemological yardstick. Professorship in Nigeria ends in the classroom. Production or productivity from their research is zilch. They’ve got the books but lack the mental capacity to translate their amazing ideas into consumables. They believe, bluntly and rudely put, in what Musk referred to as, “school” rather than in education. Perhaps, academic or paper professors. This is understandable, ab initio. However, the will to search for the mental emancipation of the nation’s academic system from schooling to education has been inhibited and impaired by colonial vestiges and intellectual aloofness often from those in academics.
How would the narrative of this malaise be reworked? Steve had an answer. Emphasis on quality education rather than quality schooling that produce a bunch of theoretical drivel without socio-economic and political values. Education transcends the classrooms. It affords students or people in the academics the liberty to break convention, think insanely, exploit weird imagination, conceive ideas that conflict with celebrated but limited establishment and see failure as a genuine part of the process of achieving those great ideas. In education, there’s always a possibility in everything the mind can conceive. This was the focus and goal of Steve.
Bearing in mind Audrey’s impregnable thought on quality education, Steve became self-convinced that the effort of the government, both federal and state could be complimented by pushing through the odds and breaking the jinx of innovative education. Audrey had underscored her well articulated point when she stated that; “A quality education has the power to transform societies in a single generation, provide children with the protection they need from hazard of poverty, labour exploitation and disease, and give them the knowledge, skills, and confidence to reach their full potential.” Nelson Mandela’s appreciation of the impacts of quality education for a just and stable global order was encapsulated in his terse but powerful aphorism that education is the most powerful weapon which can be used to change the world. Changing the world with a quality education, for Steve, must start from somewhere. It’s a collective responsibility rather than hauling all the burdens on the government.
Lending his own contribution towards a quality, sound institutional system, Steve galvanized both human and materials resources for this lofty job. On different occasions, I had even made entreaties to him to prune down on his spending and save for himself against rainy days. Perhaps, such appeals would not beguile and prevail on his love for education, and his incredible zeal for a better generation of future leaders. I’ve had a ample of opportunities to witness Steve’s awards of scholarships both to indigent students and brainy students from aristocratic class, sometimes, for a full session and in other cases, for a term of four years. This runs into millions of Naira funded from hard earned money from businesses and labour toiled by him. Often, he would tell me, “Josh, we don’t need the media. We must do this work with zeal and commitment knowing that this is an opportunity to serve God and humanity.” His tentacle of benevolence has cut across students of different higher institutions in Enugu State and beyond. From the University of Nigeria, Nsukka and Enugu Campus, to Enugu State University of Science and Technology, to Institute of Management and Technology, to Peaceland College of Education, to Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka , we proceeded to Ebonyi and Abia states for this intervention. And the clincher? He has given a new lease of life to many who couldn’t afford expensive education.
In his recent outing, many of us had insisted, prevailing on him to allow us the opportunity to make reports and go into the media not as a way of showing off his acts of magnanimity but to enkindle and inspire others who had long but fruitlessly nursed the idea of reaching out to less privilege. This singular act would spur many into walking the aisle of a new dawn for humanity rather than basking in the enthusiasm of procrastination. The outing was millennial and this reinvigorated my faith in humanity. We can make the world a better place if we want. It’s a choice. Steve has made a better choice, costly though, but it’s both intellectually, physically, spiritually and psychologically satisfying. The sacrifices for a better future for our children through quality education would go along way in sparking them to ingenuity and encouraging them to look at other climes and race to catch up with them. In life, and probably in religious belief, the general argument that there’s no competition in destiny does not apply to education, and indeed, science and technology. There must be a competition in global education in order to achieve a milestone in creating an enabling environment. Those countries that are racing and fiercely competing in science and technology through affordable quality education are today leading the world in innovation, discovery and invention. They dictate the pace of global economy, and create a better living standard for their citizens. It’s time for Nigeria to unbound itself and join the global trend.
On 30th September, 2021, at the Akpugo High School, in Nkanu West local government area, we saw a man who took his love too far for humanity. He broke the barrage of discouragement and conquered the barrier of innate venality to the state of selflessness. The programme, which came under the auspice of “Awards of Brilliance” was targeted at rewarding creativity, excellence, innovation, brilliance, to triggering reading culture among the students. Sponsored by the Steve Oruruo Foundation, the project was an incredible testimony that one should not wait to be reminded before creating a better world for the people around them. Steve had cautiously avoided the temptation of allowing politics or its guise to creep in when he shut the door against media jingles, social media frenzy, political invitations, or advertisement stunt. He, instead, looked the other way, engaging school teachers, university lecturers, entrepreneurs, technocrats, and professionals that would agitate the minds of the students to think critically and see life beyond schooling to education as a multi-faceted route to becoming or achieving their dreams.
The awards and prizes presented at the programme, running in millions of Naira, including sports kits were all fascinating, and we’ve got lessons to learn. Education, not schooling. Presenting sports kits and other sports’ items, textbooks to students across board, notebooks, standing fans, iron, food items, certificates, reading lanterns and lamps, and other instructional materials is a deliberate design to make them think of limitless possibilities in education. With the men on ground, offering scholarships to a good number of students, reeling through their stories from grass to grace, borne out of hardworks, diversification of ideas, I could see the students breaking the convention of convenience, moving away from the normal to seeing themselves as able to achieve extra-ordinarily.
But Steve had refused to take the glory. Incredible! He made it clear that the glory, encomiums and commendations should go to the Governor of Enugu State, Rt. Hon. Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi for setting the agenda in education, for his innovative style of leadership, for giving him the opportunity to serve as a Special Adviser on Information, for supporting him in all his plans and for the unassailable confidence the governor reposed on him. Hopefully, this legendary path toed so far will continue to encourage others to do more for humanity. Steve has given us the hope that he has got that genuine leadership qualities to rework the system and move humanity to the next level.
