Senator Kabir Marafa is the Vice
Chairman, Senate Committee on
Petroleum Resouces (Upstream).
He represents Zamfara Central on
the platform of the All
Progressives Congress. He is one
of the most vocal opposition
senators. In this interview,
Senator Marafa said it is ungodly
and hypocritical to discriminate
between degree and Higher
National Diploma, HND, in the
workforce.

He also speaks on
other issues. Excerpts:
The bill to end dichotomy between degree and HND scaled through second reading in the senate, has the Senate the
political will to abolish degree /
HND dichotomy?
As far I’m concerned, this is one of the hypocrisy that is
prevalent, unfortunately, in our
body polity in the country.

The fact of the matter is that the first degree holder happens to be in the civil service earlier than the HND (Higher National Diploma) holder or polytechnic graduates.
So, they have been the ones piloting the affairs of even, the
Ministry of Education and all other parastatals and they always feel threatened by the HND
holders.

This is the fact of the
matter. I am an HND holder. I graduated from the famous
Kaduna Polytechnic. I made bold to say that I competed favourably
with First Degree holders in a federal parastatal of note.
Immediately after graduation, I started working with the Kaduna refinery and in that refinery; I
met products of other
universities in Nigeria who we worked together.

My appointment was confirmed before most of them. During
that time, members were made to pass through on-the-job
training among other process, for six months. We discussed and debated over a lot of issues together especially concerning
the practical and theoretical aspects of the job.

There is nothing they can show me to
prove that they are better than me. The truth is that the
leadership at almost all the strata was being occupied by degree holders and for whatever
reasons, they feel having the HND
holders to pass through the system like them, would be a
threat to them. You could see even from the pattern of debate
on the floor of the senate on Thursday.

You don’t need a
soothsayer to tell you that most of those who made their
contributions were hypocritical.
Hypocritical, how?
For instance, somebody said
there are polytechnics that are operating from a two-bedroom
flat. The truth of the matter is that we even have ghost
universities that are not in existence at all. Like one of my
colleagues said, that in this current age of computer,
communication and
technological advancement, we
have open universities whereby
one can study from his bedroom and earn a degree which would
be recognized by everybody. So,
simply because we have a polytechnic that operates from a
two-bedroom flat, does not mean that all polytechnics are bad.

Somebody also talked about requirements for admission into
polytechnics. It has been variously argued that examination is not the true test
of one’s ability. Now, a lot of our retired and serving military officers passed through the Nigerian Defence Academy when it was just a three year programme but because of this craze for degrees, those who went through the system then,
because they have the
opportunity to become the political leaders of Nigeria, they were able to change the system
to a degree awarding institution.

But can anyone tell me in all honesty that the graduates of
NDA now, who are degree holders, are better than the
products of the same institution, who are not degree holders in
those days? The bottom line is that, we all got it wrong.

The dichotomy has nothing to do with the admission
requirements. The ungodly thing we are doing in this country is to say that the HND holder cannot be promoted beyond a certain grade level and nobody can
defend that wicked injustice.

I was discriminated against when I was at the Kaduna refinery at the entry point, at that
time; a lot of my colleagues are now being frustrated after they were promoted to certain levels.
They were told point blank that they cannot proceed beyond
certain stages until they acquire additional qualifications.

That was happening after they had probably spent four years of training and excellent performance on the job for over
25 years. I started working with the Kaduna refinery in 1985 and my colleagues that are still there now are still being told that they cannot be managers.

This is ungodly, it is unconstitutional.
What is the implication of the
HND/Degree holders’ dichotomy bill being referred to the Senate
Committee on Education?
It is highly unfortunate and the
highest case of hypocrisy because the committee, first of
all, is being dominated by degree olders.

Source: VanguardNG