I initially wanted to ignore the lies published by the Punch. It’s disappointed that a national newspaper like the Punch will give an audience to lies without verification. But it will be a disservice to nation building and cohesion if we keep quiet while some individuals and media houses spread hatred across the country.
You can accuse ABU of anything but not the accommodation people irrespective of who you are and where you are from. ABU doesn’t really care where you come from. It is still the most accommodating university in Nigeria. ABU got an award for that from JAMB. And as lecturers in the university, we try to make our students understand that we are human first before tribe and religion divide us.
Everywhere has got its share of violence in Nigeria. A lawmaker was murdered in SE a few days ago and another one missing without many words from the South. The good thing about us in the North is that we condemn whatever we feel is wrong irrespective of who is involved. During the Sokoto incident, many people condemned the blasphemous act and the murder and insisted that it was wrong for anyone to take the law into his hand. Abubakar Widi-jalo, Adamu Tilde, and others were loud about that. When Amadu Maikanti was alleged to have stolen 80b naira from public funds a few days ago, there were many attacks on him from the North, unlike the State Accountant General that have allegedly gone with N117b from Rivers state. When we felt that the appointment of Dr. Pantami as a professor by FUTO was not OK, it was northerners and Muslims that were very loud about it. That is who we are.
Meanwhile, I left Lagos for Zaria in March 1993 when I got admitted into ABU. That was my first time going beyond Okene up north. I graduated, served in Kano, came back to Zaria for MSc, got employed, and still living in Zaria. For all these years I can’t speak Hausa, the language of the people of Zaria and it’s never been a barrier for me to get anything. If I come to your office and you said I am supposed to understand Hausa and start speaking the language, I will start speaking Ebira too. Then, we laugh over it. That is ABU. I use to jokingly tell my friends and colleagues that they should give me a beautiful Hausa lady to marry if they want me to learn the language. ABU is an institution without borders.
As a matter of fact, there are quite many non-Hausa/Fulani and non-Muslim lecturers holding positions of responsibility in the university. Even among students. The last active SUG president (Adoyi Omale) from 1994 to 1995 was a Christian, the person that won the election to succeed him before SUG was suspended in 1996 by the Sole Administrator, Gen Mamman Kontagora, was a Christian. Anslem Eragbe that became the first president when SUG was restored in 2002 was a Christian from the South. That is not very common in universities down south.
Meanwhile, I was supposed to go to a state in the South East for a conference last year and I refused to go because I don’t feel safe going there. Some colleagues from ABU attended the conference and came back alive. Not feeling safe going to some places may just be in one’s head. So, it’s very OK if anyone doesn’t feel safe staying with us in Zaria or the North. What is not OK is lying against an institution like the guy in the Punch Newspapers for sympathy or looking for evidence to seek asylum in Canada.
Hate it or like it, ABU is still the most accommodating university in Nigeria. It is still the only first-generation university that you apply to irrespective of your tribe and religion and gets admitted without knowing anyone. Our newspapers should stop promoting hate speech and giving the audience to idiots.
©Amoka
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