Aliero’s own ‘Boko Haram’

In July this year, the insurgence of the Boko Haram sect in some states within the north eastern zone of the country including Borno, Yobe and Bauchi states led to the massacre of many innocent lives, in addition to the alleged extra-judicial killing of the sectarian leader-Mohammed Yusuf by the police.  No word of condemnation […]

In July this year, the insurgence of the Boko Haram sect in some states within the north eastern zone of the country including Borno, Yobe and Bauchi states led to the massacre of many innocent lives, in addition to the alleged extra-judicial killing of the sectarian leader-Mohammed Yusuf by the police.  No word of condemnation was spared by concerned Nigerians to slam the sect, its ideology and activities. The extra-judicial killing of Mohammed Yusuf and a former commissioner in the cabinet of Governor Modu Ali  Sherrif were greeted with no less damning words. Specifically, this column on page 43 in the Weekly Trust edition (volume 12 no. 43) of Saturday August 8, 2009 featured a piece “Boko Haram: matters arising” in which it denounced the ignorance of Boko Haram followers about the position of Islam on acquisition of knowledge. The same article explained how difficult it would be for any historian to write about the development of science and technology in Europe without making references to the contributions of Muslim scholars and philosophers of the translation epoch (750-850AD) in the Muslim world. The piece reads in part: “Perhaps the Boko haram group was not aware that science and technology which gives western education the prominence it enjoys today passed from the Greeks to the west through the translated works of Muslim philosophers”.

In the Weekly Trust edition (volume 12 no. 29) of Saturday May 16, 2009; this column featured the piece ‘A desirable censure’ in which it applauded the censure by the FCT Minister, Senator Mohammed Adamu Aleiro, of school girls being used during teaching-learning periods of school hours to entertain guests with cultural dances and displays. The article reads in parts: “The occasion was the launching of mass transit buses at the old parade ground in Garki Disrict, Abuja. The Minister censured the use of young school-children to entertain the gathering. He argued that those children were supposed to be in school at that time of the day and ordered that henceforth, school-children should not be used at such occasions. This in the view of this column is a desirable censure. We hope the FCT Minister will back up his detest for the practice with an official circular directing all schools in the territory to effect the ban”. However, little did we realize then that the FCT Minister was only making a figurative stricture. Three separate events, to be narrated here, do not portray the minister as a public officer with any reasonable concern or passion for the general state of education in the country. Rather, they reveal him as a covert admirer of Boko Haram!

First, it was reported on page 57 in the Daily Trust edition of Wednesday November 18, 2009 that some schools with boarding facilities in the FCT were closed in order to accommodate participants at the recently concluded 2009 Abuja Carnival. We find it difficult to search out reasons why the carnival, in order to hold, must dislodge students from school and also disrupt their learning. Is it because the minister does not have children in those schools? Or, has the minister decided to prefer Abuja Carnival over the education of the future leaders of this country? In any case, the minister must have been an admirer of the Boko Haram ideology; otherwise, he wouldn’t have succumbed to any amount of pressures mounted by unpatriotic school administrators for an approval to displace school-children when they should actually be learning in their schools. The excuse by defenders of the inapt action that the affected students would later receive extra-lessons is very unethical, unprofessional and not credible in the least.

Second and more devastating, the same FCT Minister had earlier in the year sought and got approval from the Federal Executive Council (FEC) to take funds initially appropriated in the budget for education and health, and use such to build more lanes on the Abuja-Airport and Abuja-kubwa roads. Of course, it’s only a public officer who admires Boko Haram that will divert funds meant for education to other uses such as road construction. Third, the FCT Minister like his predecessors, does not see anything wrong with the annual closure of Government Secondary School, old Kutunku, Gwagwalada for the purpose of providing transit accommodation to intending Muslim pilgrims during hajj operations, which in most cases, comes up when schools are in session. Here, too, we find it intricate to source a reason good enough to explain FCT administration’s refusal to build a permanent hajj camp for intending pilgrims over the years.

We call on our leaders to always examine the corollaries of their actions before embarking on them. No adventure can be more crucial than education or knowledge. The first revelation that came to the Prophet (SAW) was on knowledge. We must therefore shun anything that will undermine the serious business of education such as closing schools for other less important matters. May Allah (SWT) protect us from ignorantly or consciously becoming casualties of heretical ideologies, amin.