The allegations on Dikko Abdullahi

In Nigeria today, the value of people is only important and relevant to the extent of the specifics of the individual. We have in the last several years seen worst categorical stereotyping by people against those who are of different national groupings. For instance we saw how certain sections of the country celebrated the Salisu […]

In Nigeria today, the value of people is only important and relevant to the extent of the specifics of the individual. We have in the last several years seen worst categorical stereotyping by people against those who are of different national groupings. For instance we saw how certain sections of the country celebrated the Salisu Buhari Toronto saga and turned a deaf ear with similar allegations believed to have been proven in the allegations against the then Lagos State Governor, Ahmed Bola Tinubu regarding certificate forgery.

When Festus Keyamo and his gang began the Dikko persecution, I knew it will, though not see the light of the day, be treated as one of those restlessness of the busy body legal practitioner who desperately wants to catch the national attention on any minor   issues by extreme sensationalization.

The most unfortunate aspect of such a Keyamo agitation is that otherwise very brilliant young Nigerians who ought to dispense much of their skills and energies in the evolution of a veritable polity have unfortunately been carried away by the ecstasies of sensationalism to the extent that it is increasingly becoming difficult for the nation and its people to benefit from the quality brains of such individuals and even groups.

Yes, the Comptroller General of Customs was appointed amongst a range of Assistant Comptroller Generals, the stakes were high especially when viewed against the backdrop of those in senior positions of Deputy Comptrollers who automatically were told to go as soon as an ACG was appointed.

It is equally not unexpected that such an appointment would naturally elicit some ill feelings especially amongst those who either aspired to be or had preferences for some other persons to be appointed, but the degree of hostilities that ordinarily would have followed this paranoia in my view was taken to an extent that only the blind would see the allegations as serious given their very content and context.

To anyone who went to secondary school in Northern Nigeria up till the second half of the 1980s, the issue of forgery or exam malpractices in the conduct of secondary school external examination certainly was mere news. It was not an incidence that was known throughout the area because of the sanctity of such examinations.

Secondly, those of us who hail from the old Kaduna State that left college in 1979 or 1980 or even 1981 didn’t have to cheat in examination in order to find what to do. The system was couched in such a way that apart from remedial programs aimed at redeeming deficiencies, there were institutions for various grades apart from the obvious opportunities that very many of us had under the PRP government’s education program which saw several young people sent to Eastern European Universities for various courses.

I am prompted to write on this issue for several reasons among which is the fact that having gone to school with Dikko Abdullahi at the secondary school level, it will be uncharitable to sit and look while cheap mischief is being labeled against an individual and by implication the system that produced very many of us.

For the records, it is an insult on our collective integrity for anyone trying to achieve selfish desires by denigrating the very institution that has molded the characters of several of us. I think it is most suitable for those who are not happy with the appointment of Dikko Abdullahi to try their games in or around the custom service area and come up with facts if they find him wanting in the discharge of his official responsibilities instead of hanging on to cheap blackmail.

 More unfortunate is that supposed intelligent people are at the forefront of this particular failed attempt at dragging the integrity of the CG in the mud.

My plea to people like Festus Keyamo is that in their desperate drive to popularity, it is important that they take a look at the consequences of their methodologies on the integrity of the Nigerian system. I dare say that Mr. Keyamo was simply drawn into this confusion blindly because he does not have the facts of the matter.

I believe very sincerely that Dikko Abdullahi did not need to cheat before going to Bulgaria to school. He did not need to cheat before enrolment in the Custom Service, and didn’t need any more certification to have risen to the level that he was before his recent appointment. In any case, where are those raising the dust today when he and others were contending for the current job?

Let it placed on record that certainly the allegations of forgery against Diko Abdullahi was a concoction of those who are either bitter that they could not have the appointment of the CG go their way or simply those who are desperate to destroy any achievement as long as it is not in consonance with their wishes, aspirations and expectations.

Cases of examination malpractices, certificate forgery are certainly not traits of my generation of Northern Nigerian extraction. It is a new development to most of us. Those who have been used to it ought to know that we can carry our cross. We can beat our chests and pride in the fact that we are no exam cheats and grew to the positions that we find ourselves in factually without having to forge any papers.