Youth has forever been a perennial and a generational problem from Plato to our own Nigerian Modern Times in which Nigeria's President Buhari lastly criticized Nigerian youth for being "lazy." He may rue the day for saying that, considering the high levels of youth unemployment and poverty providing the fertile recruiting grounds for Boko Haram and other forms of useless terror in Nigeria. Those people are certainly not lazy. Lazy? His predecessor in that regard the Great AWO had said that "The trouble with our youths is that they sleep too much" followed by the later day saint Abubakar Atiku already on the campaign trail, trying to hustle the youth vote with his "I want to become president because a lot of young people require my tutelage and experience"
On the campaign trail in Turkey, that was Erdogan's constant theme . the future of Turkey's youth, that the Youths represent Turkey's future
Indeed, the young become old , or rather, grow older
'The old order changeth yielding place to new
And God fulfills himself in many ways
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world..." etc. etc., Morte d'Arthur
Once a young man himself, now avuncular and hopefully a lot wiser Dr. Anthony A. Akinola is warming up to his old position of "YOUTHS OF ANY NATION COULD BE LAZY." With a little variation in emphasis, he has now shifted slightly from being merely apologetic and understanding to being even more explanatory and is placing some basic demands on youths, as is indeed the function of the Yoruba elders. They love giving advice. In responding to Dr. Anthony A. Akinola's latest opinion piece, there's precious little to disagree about even if it was meant to be a little disagreeable and to thereby generate if not indignant disagreement and hostile dissent, then at least some well-meant public reaction:
From Plato to our own Nigerian modern era, youth has been a problem - sometimes it's as if the Octogenarian (old youths) or soon to be Octogenarian authorities had not once passed through the seven ages of man, in fact had never been young or youths at all, had always been wise, mature and old, born to assume power and authority. Socrates himself - a Mr. In-Between - ( so I see him) took the then brave and honourable path of hemlock as self-inflicted punishment or an escape route when on trial for teaching and preaching a foreign philosophy and thereby corrupting the youth. Today that "foreign philosophy" might well be" Western Education" as variously defined, if not in the general humanities, then certainly in the History of Western Philosophy , a staple diet and so it was for me as an undergraduate with that subject as a subsidiary. Little did we know then of the East, maybe a little through Schopenhauer and never was a chap like Dewey ever mentioned.
I am a little worried by the implications in the paragraph that begins, "The British society is so structured that when a child tells you of his or her age it would be more than mere guesswork to know exactly what stage of education he or she has attained " and ends with a snide broadside at ex-President Goodluck Jonathan : "Your degree in biology or zoology, even when at the doctoral level, may not have prepared you adequately for a career in politics." - As if the suggestion is being made that for Nigeria too, Professional politicians are to be recruited from mostly the class of PPE at Oxford.
One should hope that future Nigerian leaders are not culturally divorced from their roots. ( In the early sixties at any given time there were about three hundred Nigerians enrolled or studying at various colleges in Oxford. Where are they now?
Needless to say, the very last paragraph is a disaster and one wonders , is there a specific individual that Dr. Akinola is pointing at :
" The general poverty in the grooming of our political leaders suggests that we lack a capacity to engage counterparts elsewhere in coherent articulation of economic and political issues"
On Monday, 2 July 2018 22:29:11 UTC+2, anthony.a.akinola wrote:
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Anthony Akinola <anthony....@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, Jul 2, 2018 at 10:12 AM
Subject: GROOMING FUTURE NIGERIAN LEADERS-Punch
To: Anthony Akinola <anthony....@gmail.com>Grooming future Nigerian leaders
When we make comparisons between different societies, it is important that we do not take things at face value. It is attractive for anyone who argues for a generational change in political leadership (not-too-young-to- run) in Nigeria, for instance, to point at Great Britain where David Cameron became Prime Minister at the age of 43,or the United States of America where Barack Obama was President at 46. A more critical evaluation of leadership in Britain and America should focus on the grooming of the individual for the role that he or she will play in the future.
Not the least due to factors that are not unconnected with their stage of educational, political and economic development, children in some societies tend to achieve maturity much earlier on than in others. In Great Britain, for example, the age of consent is 16. When a child has attained the legal age of consent, he or she becomes responsible for their omissions and commissions. At 18, a child is assumed to have become 'independent' of his or her parents. By 21, it would be in exceptional or curious circumstances that one would still want to live under the same roof as one's parents. Parents in Britain do demand and collect rent from children of working age who choose to live at home. Of course, it must be admitted that Nigerians of means do take care of their parents in their old age.
The British society is so structured that when a child tells you of his or her age it would be more than mere guesswork to know exactly what stage of education he or she has attained. It is an age group thing; those who have chosen to attend university would have started their degree programmes at the age of 18 and finished by 21. Those of them who, for instance, want to go into politics choose relevant subjects for that call. At Oxford and Cambridge, for instance, future politicians are most likely to be studying Politics, Philosophy and Economics or Law. Most identify with political parties based on viewpoints and they do voluntary or paid work in their local constituencies, particularly at election time. They imbibe the culture of rigorous debating during their apprenticeship. Your degree in biology or zoology, even when at the doctoral level, may not have prepared you adequately for a career in politics.
The point one is trying to make here is that the David Camerons and Barack Obamas of this world made their choices quite early in life. Although they might have become leaders at relatively young ages, their experiences in politics could have been that of about 20 or more years. The suitability, or otherwise, of a candidate for a leadership position becomes important from records of past behaviour. The type of company you keep at school and the marijuana that you may have smoked at a relatively innocent age could, surprisingly, be an electoral issue that comes to haunt you in later life. Those who engage in cultism and other forms of criminality should be made to know that they have written themselves off from important leadership positions in society. So, there is an element of parental grooming in all of this.
Obama knew very early in life what he was aiming at. Even at a very early age he told one of his teachers that he wanted to be the President of the United States. Prior to becoming state senator at Illinois and first-term senator in the American Congress, he had engaged himself in various community activities. His books spoke clearly for his future intentions. One is still looking around for that book in which any of our presidential aspirants may have told us about his or her background and their vision of society.
The general poverty in the grooming of our political leaders suggests that we lack a capacity to engage counterparts elsewhere in coherent articulation of economic and political issues. We are deficient in the understanding of the history of our nation, as well as in the cultures of our diverse peoples. Future political leaders must be brought up to understand the different cultures and religions and evolve a new society where prejudices no longer predominate our ways of life. Our politics exists only at the elementary stage and this can change if future leaders are deliberately and properly groomed to assume important roles in our society.
Dr. Anthony Akinola sent this piece from the United Kingdom
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue+subscribe@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
No comments:
Post a Comment