JURY IS OUT FOR CANDIDATE BUHARI!
By Samuel Ajayi
What would have been the news was if Buhari announced he wasn't running. His announcement was no news. His recent efforts at rapprochements with Tinubu were the background works. You may ask John Oyegun!
For Buhari, the jury is out. In 2015, he was protected, propped up and dressed in borrowed garbs. Above all, it was all about what he WOULD do. And not what he HAS DONE.
In 2018/19, these are the new realities:
* Buhari now has parameters that can be used to assess him vis-a-vis former leaders. The esoteric propagation of the messianic capabilities he has is been lost FOREVER!
* The contrived veil is off and the contrived myths have been broken. So no one can deceive us again about his daughter being married to Igbo man or his cook being from Ekiti State.
* Gone are the tales of a very spartan President who would prevent his family from coming close to the seat of power and abuse their privilege. The son of a poor father does not fall from a $56,000 motorbike!
* The myth of a strong-willed and no-nonsense president has also been demystified. Buhari has shown that he does not have the courage to sack erring aides or take strong decisions.
* The lies of being a father-figure have also been debunked. From his actions and appointments, he is not for nobody. He is actually for "some bodies".
* Gone are the myths of a very intelligent president. If a leader keeps saying he is not aware it shows how much he is not in control of his regime.
* The sympathy of the media he UNFAIRLY enjoyed in 2015 is gone for good. Now, he must buy his own goodwill. And it doesn't come cheap. There is always a crucible!
Finally, Buhari must face a debate. As the sitting President, he cannot run away like he did in 2015. He was the under-dog then. Today, he is the chief salesman of his own brand. A challenger cannot ask a sitting President for a debate and he will duck it.
Now, Buhari and his crowd will now understand the DIFFERENCE between mounting the soap box and say: "I WILL DO THIS AND THAT... " and "I HAVE DONE THIS AND THAT..."
The former exists in the insolent realm of FANTASY while the latter operates in the stifling cosmos of REALITY.
The jury, for Candidate Buhari, is ruthlessly out. .
[4/23, 4:25 AM] +44 7886 544247: “This one breaks me all the time...
Yesterday I was telling my younger brother of how I heard of a certain science teacher in my locality who went online to get values for physics practical experiments last year instead of doing the experiments with his students and they all failed when the results came out....
And my brother remarked...
"He didn't get his values from the right site na."
He further enlightened me as he had done before, on several sites on the internet where by sending recharge cards of N400 naira, students have access to questions and answers of the exams they are writing, real-time. With a subscription of N800 naira the answers are sent directly to your phone, with N400 naira you have to go online to get your answers.
These sites always have all exam papers, probably a day or two before the exams. And they have the solutions too. And they are several of them: Naijaclass.com, Examcrown.com, Exponet.com, examsort.com, Gurus.com, etc. doing adverts, competing for patronage like legitimate businesses.
On these sites are the testimonies of Nigerian students. "Thank you XXX for making me pass." "God bless you for saving me." "You people are the best, I have so so distinctions." I just saw the testimony of a student on Exam Crown who got 7 A1 and a B3 from using their service.
I went to one such sites yesterday at the risk of getting a heart attack. I always knew they existed but had deliberately avoided them. And lo, in front of me were solutions to the physics exam students were sweating in the hall on yesterday. The solutions online were posted on the 19th, a day before the exam. Students typically have access to the solutions a few minutes to the commencement of the exams, of course to make maximum 'sales' as PINs could be shared if the answers were released earlier. Several of these students still need the cooperation of invigilators and their schools to use their phones in the exam halls to access the answers, while others take advantage of large examination centres to do their thing surreptitiously. Visit one of these sites and see how so damn easy it is to pass. It breaks my heart as a teacher.
My bro says those sites basically insult NECO. Their own questions are online two days before the exams, sometimes they do bonanza and give people answers for free for NECO exams. When WAEC sends teachers specimen lists ten days before the exams these guys have them online weeks before the exams.
See what education in our country has been reduced to. Why will our students read when they can pass with N400 naira recharge cards? Why will they not laugh at the teachers that try to make them study hard? When a budget of 4000 naira will get them through ten subjects. Why do we train students for six years in secondary school and not let them write their exams because we are doing "business"? Why does everything about this society has to be about making money?
So we have students getting 8 distinctions now and 300 in UTME yet having no substance in their heads. These ones will gain admissions into university, blocking the chances of the good students who legitimately got their 5 credits and 220 in UTME. So many of our good students won't gain admission. My John James couldn't gain admission with a score of 260+ in UTME last year. God'stime is a great student but he'd be lucky to gain admission with his 280+ this year.
Why are we so messed up as a country? Why does insanity thrive so openly? Who are these Nigerians who are destroying this system for pecuniary gains? Aren't they the same Nigerians who complain daily of the state of this country? Aren't they the youth who should be the future of this country? The same young people who cry daily of how our father's generation failed us? Have we all gotten to the point were we've decided that Nigeria is irredeemable and the only course of action is burning its rubble to ashes?
The rot in education is particularly sad, because it has ripple effects, spreading across all sectors. Imagine students using these sites to get 8 distinctions and 330 so they can go study medicine and surgery to become doctors. Imagine them wanting to become engineers, scientists, lawyers, etc. They'd most likely have to oil their way through school and come out deficient in whatever fields they find themselves in...even with great results.
Are our exam bodies unaware of these sites? Are we saying nothing can be done? Can the phone numbers these recharge cards are sent to not be tracked? Can the sites not be shut down somehow?
I just don't understand this country. Tiring.
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