Jill Rees: Welcome Press

It’s nice to get letters from readers of this column, even when the response is not as positive as it could be. Contrary to what a reader recently accused me of, I don’t say things just to ‘provoke a reaction’, as he felt obliged to write his thoughts to me about the intentions of Archbishop Peter Akinole’s attempts to split the African Church from the Rest of the World over the issue of homosexuality. I thought long and hard about whether I should write about a subject that still upsets many Nigerians. In the end I wrote about it because I thought it was right that Nigerians are aware of this big difference in attitude between Nigeria and the developed world.

In the liberal, secular nations, personal choice issues such as homosexuality and sex before marriage are almost universally accepted. Even if a lifestyle is not approved of by an individual, the right to live according to one’s own conscience is strongly upheld by all.  Nigerians have the right to know that that is how we think in the north.

For us it is part of the whole human rights thing and ‘rights of the individual’ thing. In the UK in particular, laws against discrimination are enforced fairly rigidly, and any kind of attack or slight against a gay person, a physically handicapped person or a person of a different race or religion will be taken seriously both by the police and by employers.  Even children can’t be bossed around by strangers. Sometimes this goes a bit far. The other day I was cycling down the canal path when a little boy accompanied by his mother, also on a bike, wobbled about unsure which side to go past me on. As I went by him i called out ‘It’s best if you pull onto the left hand side’. His mother yelled furiously after me,

‘You mind your own f*&^%$£ business you f*&^%$£ cow!’ which I thought was a bit over the top in the circumstances. It reminded me of teaching in English schools.

I found it quite sad last week when I came back to teach in school here to hear the children swearing at their teacher.

‘We don’t want to learn’ they say. Because their parents have bought them the latest blackberry phone, iPod and Wii computer games, they see no reason to work hard for themselves.

Democratically mature countries seem to have a disrespect for authority. Even more, a distrust of those in authority. When Priests have been led into the courts in droves for child abuse, our Prime Minister has lied in the House of Commons about Sadam’s weapons of mass destruction, and where the banks with our mortgages collapse, how are we to trust them? Gordon Brown at the moment can’t put a foot right. Whenever he speaks in his own defence, his audience just laugh mockingly. Nothing he says will sound credible, because we can’t tell lies from truth now.

So while I can understand the children for not trusting what their teachers say to them, I feel sorry for them. Human society progresses only by each generation being able to assimilate just that little bit more each time, and this is achieved by listening to those who have gone before. If children won’t listen to their teachers, they won’t be able to learn. Of course this is how the governments want it, only the most liberal of nations, maybe Sweden or somewhere, would want its young people to genuinely be able to work out what’s going on.

Nigerians I guess can see how, when something is handed to you on a plate, it can be taken for granted. The positive side to it is that when many children in the UK don’t take advantage of their opportunities, it is more worthwhile for Nigerians to persist in becoming qualified as much as they can, despite the hardships. If Nigerians can rid themselves of the reputation they have in England for dishonesty and scams, they will be recognised for the hard-working people the majority are, and will become a sought after workforce in an under populated Europe, for those Nigerians who want a spell abroad.

While every Nigerian is aware of the importance of education, as yet the government has not managed to ensure even Primary education for every child, and huge investment in public education is still needed. Even then, teachers will have to be better trained, and this is going take a generation at best. The same problem occurs in Nigeria as in the UK, if the government can’t be bothered to fund education properly, how can we trust them?

Nigerians have picked up on the idea that their politicians and business leaders may not be entirely honest in their dealings.  If you want to join with us in distrusting our leaders, why not take up the correlative? The good side of this mainly negative trend? The idea that everyone is equal and has the right to be themselves. We need  unity among ourselves to keep a beady eye on authorities, secular or otherwise to get through this.

864 words

30 September 2008

©Jill Rees

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