₦airaland Forum

Day-One: In The Beginning

It started in a quite classroom with over 80 students somewhere in a town located in one of the eastern states, we were attentively listening to our Maths turn History teacher as he held us spellbound to a historic revelation of our dear country with rapt attention as if our upcoming Junior Secondary exams depended on it, this wasn’t in our curriculum, as far as we were concerned, this should be in a social studies course but who could teach us history like this, every detail from the formation of our country Nigeria to the Civil War was dissected, meticulously, he spoke as if he was there when it happened, I never saw my class so quite like that, nobody was sleeping, every eye was fixated at him, if someone farted loud enough, everyone will hear and know who did it. I’ve never seen my classmates so quite at any subject, not even in his own subject Mathematics, we were sacrificing that period for history and I dare say, no one cared.

He spoke right into the next period, good thing the next teacher was absent, it’s not every day you hear your own history from an unbiased and eloquent perspective, dealing out blames to who is due, absolving stereotypes and trashing out propaganda every parent taught their ward. Two hours and counting the lesson tarried, no one was complaining, nobody took excuse to go ease themselves, and suddenly, the history lesson came to an end. Immediately as if the class was released from a spell, it came alive, stools creaked, feet grazed the floor making that unpleasant noise every teacher dread, one teacher took time to explain that it means the students are no longer interested in what he’s teaching and no teacher likes that, I remember how he flogged a particular girl mercilessly for doing it just minutes after he spoke about it, well school was over, the closing bell has been rung, that was what brought the impromptu history class to a sudden end.

Then suddenly, a voice cracked up from the back, “Excuse me sir, I have a question” I know that voice, everybody knows the voice, that was Dorothy, one of the older girls in the class, she should be in her late twenties then, but unlike the other big girls, her command of English was top notch, she was the epitome big, bold and beautiful, she always wow new teachers with her diction and even English accent, most new teachers second guessed her and will always call her out at the end of the class, probably to know why she was in the class, so I thought. She was the type that makes you conscious of your English usage after hearing her speak. I later got to know she was a maid to an expatriate family for a good part of her childhood and teenage years, for some reasons, she didn’t had the opportunity to go to school when she was with them.

Then her question came, “Sir, how do we make this country better, I mean, we can’t keep trading blames, someone got to do something, where do we start”.

Then the teacher replied, though half the class was standing, others were on the move to go for the closing assembly, “It’s simple, but I guess that will be a topic for another day, but we can’t use our Maths class for this again, probably when you have free period or during recess”, “How about now, we can skip the afternoon assembly, those who want to go can go, to me this is the most important part of what you’ve been telling us” Dorothy interjected.

Then Sir Kelvin, that was what we called him, with open palms and a squeezed temple turned to the class and asked “Do we continue?” the answer came in a chorus, “Yes sir”, then there was some quietening murmuring, which he understood and captured in his reply “If you have something to do at home, you are free to go”, as much as one third of the class left. While they were making their way out, Uncle Kelvin, picked a chalk and went to the black board, wrote the sentence “One for All, All for One” then held on for the class to quiet down. In a few seconds, tranquillity was achieved, restored as it was before the interruption.

“One for All is bullshit without all for One, why are people afraid of soldiers, even if it’s just one of them, who?” he made gesture with his hand raised up to see if anyone will attempt the answer, surely, Dorothy came to the rescue “Because his colleague will come for you if you wrong them and because they are protected by the law”, “Good, imagine if the same principle is applies to every citizen, the concept of One for All and All for One is not new, who has a bible here?” he asked, quickly, somebody brought out a bible, “open to the book of John 11:50 and read” “You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.” My classmate Uduma readout in a voice shaken with zest and obvious nervousness, it was his first time doing something like this in class, my quite, shy and introvert classmate, though small in stature will always stay at the back, hidden amongst the big boys, I guess today’s discussion really got to him.

“We can see that the concept of One for All and All for One is not new, and across history, any nation or civilization that wants progress and development has this as their core tenet, it’s not just the literal meaning of this statement, it goes beyond that, listen, I don’t mean you should sacrifice yourself for the country literarily, now let me explain, all the vices that can bring a nation down” he went to the board and drew a big circle, he wrote vices inside and proceeded to enumerate them, Laziness, bribery, advance fee fraud, misappropriation of funds, embezzlement, money laundry etc. “When they are planted like seeds, they grow to affect so many persons and creates a wave of more sophisticated vices in the future, take an instance, if a road is budgeted and awarded to be constructed in this community and the politician decides to embezzle the money”, he pointed out the window, everybody knew he was referring to the road just outside the school fence in the direction he was pointing at, that road is always awarded by each administration, the most they do is grade and laterite it, which makes it worse during rainy season. “Now, cars get damaged and add up to millions each year due to the bad nature of the road, accidents happen and robbers operate on the road, it’s possible that a student can lose his/her sponsor on that road, this will cause hardship or withdrawal of that student from school which consequently may affect the kind of life he lives and his impact in the society. Fast forward two generations later, the sum total of the hardship that bad road has cause users might have introduced 10 to 15 more vices, be it armed robbery, cultism, kidnapping etc. The concept of One for All entails that if this politician had the people at heart, he would have sacrificed the immediate pleasure of embezzling the money and would actually done something positive, which like vices also multiply too, but One for All is bullshit if there is no All for One, I don’t hold it to the politician if he embezzles money, I hold it to the community for allowing that happen.

If a community of over 20,000 persons, will allow a group of less than 200 to desecrate their intelligence, then that’s just exactly what they deserve. And Karma, do you know Karma?” A bit surprised at the turn of thing, we went for this, this is where it was gonna make sense, “Law of Karma” our CRS teacher sings with this, who doesn’t know law of karma, we replied in affirmative, then he continued, “It doesn’t exist, what you call karma is mere coincidence and it happens to everyone, it can even happen twice to a so called victim will the villain goes scot-free, if you allow your Local Government Chairman to loot you dry, he will use the money to send his kids abroad, and you know what, they will do just fine, get the best education, come back and continue from where their father stopped, they will lead your children as governors, loot again, send their kids abroad and they will come back to lead your grandchildren at the Federal level and Karma will be found No Where. The world is not fair, lions kill antelopes every day, are you gonna be a Lion, Antelope or an Elephant who doesn’t kill and can’t be killed nor allow killings to occur in its domain? Choose wisely”.

That was a fatal punch, we looked at each other in the bid to confirm if it registered to as a surprise to them too, we all were, but it’s been surprise, surprise all noon, so we were absolved in the world of surprising information we were oblivious to all our lives.

The school was already deserted; we were the only people in school except for some few persons in other classes who may be coping notes or doing their assignments in class. There was a silent agreement somewhat in the air which everyone noticed that the class should end here, maybe hunger was the whisperer, I can tell myself that this was it. Sir Kelvin noticed too and said the “Finally” word.

“Finally, remember the new golden rule, One for All and All for One, any society, group, association, state, country that holds on to this will flourish, anything otherwise leads to abysmal failure, I think we can call it a day here, we shall continue when we have the time in the future”. “Thank you, Sir”, from different batches filtered in, he nodded as he picked up his books and cane, the class was in a mini turmoil, there will soon be a mad rush for the door, I will wait for the rush to be over, too hungry for all that. I gradually started picking my books from my locker to my bag, by the way, the bag looks like one JW people use, thanks to my dad, my classmate always tease me about that.

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