WEDNESDAY COLUMN BY USSIJU MEDANER
info@medaner.com, justme4justice@yahoo.com
It is about time the north woke up and set straight its identity within the Nigeria nation. The leaders of the contiguous region cannot continue to allow politics and whatever other considerations to overshadow the reality of what the region is and is capable of manifesting. For decades, almost since independence, the region, Northern Nigeria has been beleaguered by the general and ominous misconceptions and stereotypes that have overshadowed its vast potentials. It is time to change the narrative and showcase the region’s strengths, to address its weaknesses, and to highlight the opportunities that abound within. And this is a task the leaders of the region must embrace fully at this material time.
The north, an underrated entity, has been viewed casually – and if not naively – by numerous strangers to the region, and mostly all other regions of the Nigeria nation, through the lens of poverty, insecurity, and underdevelopment. These are erroneous as much as the forced narratives are far from being accurate. The north, the real north, is home to the largest population in the country; the home to the largest deposits of solid mineral resources, including gold, iron ore, limestone and so many others. The region remains the undisputable food basket of the nation; the agricultural hub of the country and the highest contributor to the national economy from agricultural produce and raw materials.
This region must wake up from its slumber; recognise its many strengths and weaknesses, and leverage its pool of strengths for growth and development. It is obvious that no other region in the country can boast of the rich cultural heritage and history the north presents. Not even the entire other regions in the country can compare in size and quality to the vast availability of arable lands, holding vast agricultural potential in the country. We are talking of a region strategically located for trade and commerce, not only locally but also internationally. If population size would still remain a nation’s greatest asset, then, northern Nigeria holds the ace.
The region only waits due leadership and organised administration of its vast resources, to turn around the region’s challenges to positives that will steer the region to greater heights. The north cannot afford to continue to present itself as a region on its knees and begging for sustenance from the centre and other regions of the country. It is an aberration that must end, that the north would accept to be called continually as the educational disadvantaged region of the country. We have gotten everything needed to unlock the educational potential of the region.
The north must resolve to change the narrative. The region must set a timeline of activities for itself to eradicate illiteracy absolutely from the region. We must make education attractive, affordable and mandatory for our people by applying all modern and local approaches to aid all participation by all. I will recommend the mandatory use of our local languages for teaching in our schools and in all subjects, from primary level up until the end of secondary education in the region. Teaching in our mother tongue will go a long way to improve learning outcomes, most especially, in early childhood education. It would also make education more accessible to prospective learners who may have challenges with the English language.
We must make the decision to leverage effectively and efficiently on Artificial Intelligence to improve learning in the region. With a population of children and youth that are already equipped with the capacity to self-learn as a result of the nature of Islamic education they are exposed to, an AI-powered adaptive learning system would help tailor the education system and process to individual student’s needs, ability and learning style. Adapting AI – tutoring systems would also go a long way to provide one–on-one support to learners and help to fill gaps in teachers availability and expertise, and provide access to high quality educational resources, like videos, interactive simulations, and virtual laboratories.
Our readiness to address the negative educational ranking of the region must also see us addressing the current Almajiri school system in the region. While preserving the need for Islamic education, the Almajiri schools would have to be integrated into the formal education system, allowing them access to a broader academic curriculum and better resources. We can as well design a vocational training and skill development program to absorb a good number of the Almajiri students, where they acquire practical skills that place them in a better position in the society. This inclusive education, providing the Almajiri student population across the region with opportunities to interact with students from all backgrounds and promoting social cohesion, will play a very critical role in addressing the poverty and socio-economic challenges faced by the Almajiri student population and their communities later in their lives.
To achieve these educational objectives, the region must be ready to engage in mutually benefiting partnerships among state governments in the region, NGOs, and private sectors operating within the region, to provide resources, expertise, and much needed funding for the initiatives. Enlightenment that will create community engagement and participation is also a very critical factor for the success of the program, to ensure relevance among the targeted population, and the sustainability of the program. We must as well set in place at the regional level a high-ended Monitoring and Evaluation system to readily assess the effectiveness of all educational initiatives of the region, identifying areas for improvement and future programming.
We must go from this to effectively address the seemingly insurmountable challenge of insecurity in the region. We must look beyond the federal government interventions and devise a local solution to the problem that has already undermined the capacities of the region on many fronts.
It is time the north converges to devise homegrown responses to the unending insecurity challenge in the region that keeps undermining the realisation of the immense growth potential of the region. We must solve the problem from within our ranks. This will include a whole range of community-based initiatives, including the re-establishment of traditional security systems across the entire communities of the region, community policing, where local police officers work closely with community members and strong vigilante groups to serve as the region’s direct affronts to element within the region that are orchestrating criminal and insurgent attacks against the region. Our readiness to address the region’s insecurity will also drive us to prioritise economic development of the region via extensive job creation and entrepreneurship that technically eliminate or reduce poverty and unemployment that directly contribute to insecurity in the region.
The third stage of response to the insecurity in the region should be investment in social and cultural initiatives. We should expend resources to revive and promote our local cultures, traditions and values that help build community cohesion, resilience and communal life albeit a modernised one. This should strongly include a regionwide youth engagement and mentorship program that helps to prevent radicalisation and promote positive role models. It is equally important that we recognise the need for interface dialogues and reconciliations to ensure sustainable coexistence of all the people in the region; taking off undue religious tensions and conflict.
The last component of the region’s responses to insecurity should be the employment of technology and innovations. Leveraging technologies such as drones, CCTV cameras, creating local security apps that allow citizens to report incidences of crimes and attacks in the region to boost effectiveness of responses and response times as much as communities’ engagement would altogether consist of homegrown remedies tailored to the specific context and security needs of northern Nigeria.
Another serious issue the leadership of the north must be ready to address is the lingering infrastructural deficiency of the region. Addressing this huge concern would require a multifaceted approach; to bring the north to the level of infrastructural development that matches the inbuilt status of the region. This development must undoubtedly begin with creating a purposeful transportation infrastructure for the region; upgrade and expand the region’s entire road network to improve connectivity and facilitate seamless trade, revive and expand the railway system across the region to provide efficient and cost-effective transportation as well as uplifting the air travel infrastructure in the region.
This should be closely followed by the region’s energy infrastructure. It is about time the region fully changes its energy narrative, powering itself more effectively and efficiently on its own terms. This should begin with the harnessing of the region’s massive solar and wind resources to generate electricity by key actors such as the state government, individually and collectively building capacities to generate electricity, and continuously promote off-grid energy solutions for the region, as much as it is feasible and practicable
This should also be followed by the development of water infrastructure for the region. Developing and upgrading the water supply system for the entire region must not be debatable. Beyond water for domestic usage, development of irrigation systems to provide water to support agricultural development in the region must also be on the burner. We must also do the needful to bring the region’s communication infrastructure to par with what is needed to provide adequate communication within the region, as we pursue with all determination, creation of affordable housing, via strong urban planning and development across the region.
To get the infrastructural commitment work, the region must design a strong institutional framework to define and implement the region’s infrastructural planning, regulatory environment and capacity building to manage and maintain the region’s infrastructure. We cannot continue to be a region waiting for handouts from the centre to develop ourselves. The north must wake up; our leaders must set a new pace for the realisation and developmental projections that define what the region is capable of becoming and implement to the letter actions and projects that will deliver the north of our dreams to all northerners.
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