"The greatest thing a nation can lose is her conscience"

Three years ago, I was traveling from Ogbomoso in Oyo State to Osogbo and the old car I boarded developed a fault in a small village called Abogunde.

While the driver was fixing the car, I decided to take a walk around the village. What I saw was terrifying. I came across the only primary school in the village which also serve three other nearby villages and the condition of the school left me in a shock.

Children were seated in classrooms built with mud and with big cracks on the walls. I shared my concern with the school headmaster about the fear of the building collapsing who later told me how they have written letters several times to the education authority but there has not been any response from them.

Immediately I heard about the building that collapsed at Lagos Island yesterday, my mind went to that school in Abogunde. Who knows if the building has also collapsed with no press to report the incident? Better still the kids might still be lucky to be learning in such unsafe and unconducive environment.

Over 80 children left their homes yesterday morning with the excitement that they were going to school to learn, just like every other child they deserve to learn in a safe and a conducive environment but that was not the case.

The collapsed building which sent 8 of the innocent kids and an adult trapped under the rumbles for hours to an untimely grave is a representation of who we are a nation. The collapsed building symbolizes the continuous collapse of a nation who is so blessed but chose the path of poverty and mediocrity.

In my opinion, those little kids were murdered by the society that is responsible to protect and nurture them. They were sent to an early grave by corruption, mediocrity and a failed leadership that plague Nigeria at every level.

According to a report, the building has been marked for demolition a long time ago but nothing was done until the building later collapsed killing those innocent kids. Your guess on why the building wasn’t demolished all this while is the same as mine.

The said school on the third floor of an old building was a private school, the question we need to ask ourselves is which authority approved the third floor of an old three storey building as a school for primary school pupils and if the school is operating illegally, why has no one done something about it all this while?

Even if the building didn’t collapse yesterday, it was certainly going to collapse later on. No government in a sane society will approve the third floor of an old building as a school for such young pupils. This is an evidence of how we are sinking as a nation.

A sign of how mediocrity and corruption have found their way to every aspect of our society and the fact that the present system we are running is not only unsustainable but that it is a system capable of destroying itself.

If the Nigerian government had in the least heed numerous calls to fund the education sector and curb the corruption in the sector, we won’t have lost those kids. If Nigeria was working, we would not have a government-approved private school on the third floor of an old three storey building in Ita-Faji, we won’t have over 13 million children the same size as the population of Rwanda roaming the street across Nigeria.

We prefer to spend our resources on senators, governors, and other worthless political actors for wardrobe, clubbing, womanizing, security votes, and frivolous foreign trips than building schools and providing a safe and conducive learning environment for our children.

There are over 17,000 private schools in Lagos State alone and you can check out the buildings some of these schools are using, you will be tempted to ask if we have a government at all. The state governments are intentionally killing the public school system as a way of reducing what they spend on education and this had led to an offshoot of mushroom private schools across the country.

Only a few parents are willing to allow their children to attend public secondary schools not to talk of public primary schools which in my opinion is gradually fading out. This will leave primary school education in Nigeria in the hands of individuals and my fear is where is the regulation that will prevent the type of tragedy that occurred in Ita Faji yesterday.

Dedicated to the memory of Prof. Pius Adesanmi

#IamVincentAdeoba

God bless you for this wonderful and thought provoking write up OP. Nigeria is indeed a failed state. A country that was created by the British without a vision. Except to exploit our mineral resources(OIL) which they still do till date.

The mods should please move more educative posts as this to FP. Thanks

Mods please move this to FP. We can't be viewing cossy boobs and other mediocre topics on NL most times. We need more of this on FP.