Abia - Time to Tell Own Story

The old adage has it that the taste of the pud-ding is in the eating. Indeed such should be the apt description for the recent giant strides recorded by Abia State government in the education sector. Just recently, the state came out tops in science and mathematics exhibition ratings organised by the Science and Mathematics Teachers for primary schools in the country. The event held at Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.

Probably because it is Abia, it is most unlikely that the feat will not dominate public discourse, lest the state will be accorded its due and such ripple effect may likely alter the plan of detractors.

Be that as it may be, one glaring thing is that the feat has rekindled the confidence of stakeholders, especially in the education sector, moreso with the damage-control by stakeholders in the sector globally. It is equally a boost to the untiring efforts of the state governor to leave legacies in the state during his stewardship.

Before now, the fate of education in Abia was nothing to write home about. Even though it is not really an isolated case, but since the damage was not done by the present government, we can ignore and overlook it, yet we will not give the present government its due.

I was to stumble on the comment by one of the arm-chair critics who takes delight in casting aspersions on the state government and its officials. This time around, his grouse was that the government was giving out vehicles to some jobless youths as a means of empowerment when states in the North made plans to sponsor their citizens for overseas training. But I know he was simply advertising ignorance.

It is not unlikely that his sentiments are buoyed by our traditional penchant to give preference to paper qualification without any adequate back-up in terms of practical and basic knowledge. At best our people are in dire pursuit of those " core" professional disciplines not for anything else but the misconceived values the society has placed on them at its own detriment. Little regard is given to the salient but very vital areas that lubricate the wheels of the economy. We are also burdened with the class regimen of salutary academic degrees.

Whereas it is the obvious absence of the basic technical know-how that has plunged our country into the pitiable abyss of condemnable status of a consumer-society, we have often misplaced knowledge with paper qualifications. We have even upped the stakes today to include complementary foreign degrees to announce our accomplishments just as those who do not understand the essence of vacation now use Western summer peak to show "they also belong".--VANGUARD