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Education,ASUU And The Globalist Agenda (I)

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4 years ago

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Professor Lukman Diso

 

L. I. Diso
BUK

When William Saint, the World Bank Education Consultant, came to Bayero University, Kano in 1999/2000, he hadn’t had the slightest idea that ASUU was ready for him. He was shocked by the level of mobilization and the ambush set to give him the terrifying welcome. The naive mindset people on such missions usually have about Africans being complacent, or having short memory and lacking a sense of history, was clearly visible in his mien. The apparent sudden realization that, contrary to his expectation, ASUU seemed to know the agenda they had been implementing in the last three decades (1970s, 1980s & 1990s), was, perhaps, what terrified him the more.

Let us take a short trip through these decades to see the picture that provides the logical context to this discussion. We shall return to Mr Saint to see who he was, what his mission in Nigeria was, how he planned to accomplish the mission, his encounter with ASUU at Bayero University, Kano, and part of his report recommendations to the World Bank.

All these may help to unravel the critical questions of why education has been systematically accorded diminishing national priority, and its role in Nigeria’s national development been consistently receding in the last 60 years. They would also help to deepen our insights into the trajectory that has shaped ASUU’s evolution and its struggles through the decades. Arising from all this may be the temptation to raise and tackle the following questions:
– Why has ASUU, of all the education stakeholders, decided to be the only consistent defender of education in Nigeria?
– Why do different Nigerian governments invariably respond to education crisis in the same pattern?
– What are the implications of government’s brazen hostility to education and the intermittent disruptions that follow as a consequence?
– What lessons could be learnt from ASUU’s consistent struggles for decades?

ASUU Strike And Posterity-Ameer Abdul Aziz

The 1960s, the decade of Nigeria’s independence, was afflicted with crippling political crisis, so turbulent that the new nation was shaken to its very roots. Whether it was an inevitable corollary of colonial vestiges that characterized such emerging nations, education, especially university education, seemed to remain relatively insulated, and as robust as it was anywhere in the world. The university teaching and learning environment, infrastructure and facilities were of high standard and comparably as good as anywhere in Europe and North America. Conditions of service were equally good and attractive. Staffing policy, in terms of staff-students ratio and staff mix, was based on best-practice standards, which produced a cosmopolitan environment and a vibrant academic culture necessary for university to thrive.
Therefore, the need for coming together as a body to represent the academics was not felt until 1965 when the Association for University Teachers (AUT) was formed. AUT was not political. It was formed to cater only for the welfare of the academics. Other variables that define university seemed to have been taken for granted.

However, in the decade of prosperity and consolidation, as the 1970s were referred to, Nigerian Universities began to slide gradually, at the beginning, as the military consolidated their firm grips on the country. Suddenly, though consciously, as if jinxed to a morgaged future, Nigeria decided to embrace a policy that marked the beginning of the cascading crisis that has bedevilled education, particularly university education, to this day, and likely, to a distant future. AUT protested to the extent of a strike to press for the Government to address the deteriorating conditions of education – teaching and learning, and welfare of staff and students.

However, the Gowon Military Government responded ruthlessly and crushed the strike. That experience served as an eye opener for the academics, and they moved to change the dynamics.

Despite the relative obscurity of the policy’s source and contents, it triggered a warning from concerned visionary and farsighted Nigerian citizens, scholars and the ASUU, which was formed in 1978 from the National Association of University Teachers (NAUT). They warned that the policy was clearly meant to serve the master and to rule over the target with all ruthlessness, to forcefully impose its contents, and ultimately emasculate the university system and education in general. However, as the decade was largely characterized by military culture, and the government, itself remotely manipulated by the same forces that had designed the policy, the warning was ignored. This explains why Obasanjo Military Regime witnessed a lot of crises in the education sector.

The NPN civilian government under Shagari (1979-1983) was a bit cautious towards university education, although there were largely unsuccessful attempts to violate university autonomy in order to implement the same surreptitious agenda. ASUU’s spirited resistance thwarted the implementation of the agenda. As the dogged struggle deepened, the first agreement that gave the academic staff the USS scale with 20% differential relative to civil service scale, was signed in 1982.

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The deepening contradictions in the Shagari Civilian administration provided the excuse that brought Buhari/Idiagbon military regime (Dec.1983- Aug. 1985) in a bloodless coup D’tat. Immediately they settled the military authoritarian culture began to manifest: the repressive policy mills were hastily deployed to launch a direct assault on the University and draconian decrees arbitrarily manufactured. Under this regime, the University was subjected to a torrent of attacks including:
– Termination of university cafetaria services
– Withdrawal of subsidies on accommodation in universities
– Workers retrenchment and wage freeze
– Transfer of university senate’s powers to NUC through Decree 16 of 1985
– Workers retrenchment and wage freeze
ASUU never relented in its strong resistence to these authoritarian policies despite all the harrassment and intimidation the union faced as a consequence.
The palace coup that toppled Buhari and brought Ibrahim Bodamasi Babangida (IBB) regime (1985 – 1993) was a continuation of the military and their repressive anti-intellectual culture. IBB regime never pretended that it was there to serve interests other than Nigerians’. Shortly after settling, the regime dropped the bombshell, unveiling a World Bank/IMF-packaged economic policy with fanatical determination to implement. While the regime initiated a national debate as to whether or not to take the IMF loan, it contemptuously ignored the process and silently took the loan with all the conditionalities before the public final verdict (a clearly overwhelming rejection). Nigerians were shocked by the regime’s stunning insensitivity in this reckless disregard for the far reaching and devastating socio-economic and political implications of this action.
ASUU became the intellectual light, in the forefront leading the resistance movement, providing an incisive critique of the regime’s economic policy and presenting simplefied but thorough analysis of the policy’s implications. The duo of ASUU and the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), the former being an affiliate of the latter, became the most consistent and vocal critics of the policy, vigorously mobilizing the nation with the dogged insistence, to force the government to reverse its decision. As the government intentensified the commitment to the ruthless implementation of this anti-people economic policy, ASUU, NLC, NANS and other pro-people organizations turned the situation into a season of revolutionary activities: intellectually scathing public lectures and production of mobilizational publications to galvanize public opinion against government’s submission to the oppressive policy.
Sensing the massive public support and reaction and the obvious likely consequences, the IBB Regime bared its fangs, unleashing all the repressive instruments at their disposal. Barely one year into IBB’s tenure, the Regime started the full implementation of the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) as a package of the IMF conditionalities. NLC, ASUU and NANS started to organize mass protest. NANS, using the Commemoration Day of “Ali-Must- GO”, staged a mass protest, in which many students were shot and killed in ABU, Zaria. The Government’s crackdown was widened and started in full swing:
– Arbitrary arrest of NLC leaders and “bombardment” of NLC offices started across Nigeria
– Plans to Weaken ASUU were hastily hatched and implemented
(1) ASUU was de-affiliated from the NLC by Decree 16 of 1986
(2) Payment of check off dues was made voluntary for ASUU and NANS
(3)The Abisoye Panel set up on ABU Crisis recommended sacking of lecturers for “…not teaching what they were paid to teach”
– A Year later (1987) UniBen VC, Prof. Grace Alele Williams, acting on the contrived report of visitation panel, announced the sack of ASUU President, Dr.Festus Iyayi, from the University. (ASUU Leadership Training Manual 2017).
By the time Dr Attahiru M Jega (Dr Iyayi’s Vice-President) was elected ASUU President in an early NDC in 1988, the IBB regime, following the World Bank Agenda, had added more to the list of its atrocities. In fact, a reign of terror was unleashed:
– Government’s plans to retrench lecturers and rationalize courses had already reached advanced stages
– Dr. Patrick Wilmot (ABU, Zaria), a Scholar and vocal critic of Western imperialism, and Ms. Firinne N.C. Adelugba (BUK) had been covertly abducted and deported from Nigeria
– Government was blatant in its refusal to implement the earlier negotiated EUSS (Elongated University Salary Structure)
– As fuel prices were hiked by the Regime, students protested and the Government responded with massive crackdown on their leadership and on other activists across the country
– NLC was summarily dissolved and sole administrator appointed. (ASUU Leadership Training Manual 2017)
These constituted Dr Jega’s immediate challenges as the new ASUU President, and his EXCO set out to confront them head on. They formed Joint Action Committee (JAC) with the Senior Staff Association of University Teaching Hospital, Research Institutes and Allied Institutions (SSAUTHRIAI) to present a united front. JAC submitted its demands to Government, which were expectedly shunned. Joint strike commenced nationwide on July 1, 1988. Curiously, only ASUU was immediately banned. The leadership of SSAUTHRIAI immediately capitulated, dissociated itself from the JAC and called off the strike. ASUU continued with the strike under University Lecturers’ Association (ULA). Government immediately launched a crackdown on national and local leadership of ASUU. Drs Jega, Iyayi, and other national officers were arrested and taken to unknown location (which was later learnt to be Lagos) for over a month. Many branch chairmen, secretaries and activists of the Union were arrested across the nation. Yet, the declared strike was kept alive by, more or less, leaderless members; it lingered for sometime, but finally fizzled out unofficially.
Signature campaigns for the release of all the arrested ASUU leaders and members were initiated nationwide. A legal action was instituted in Kano High Court for their freedom. A day to the verdict, Dr Jega was produced and presented to the court; and all others were released. Case closed, but ASUU remained officially banned (1988-1990). Despite this situation, academics never ceased to organize. They continued to network and organize under different names. It was remarkable, given the circumstances, to be able to stop the World Bank University Sector Loan Facility and consequential staff rationalization. The Loan Facility was carefully packaged to sow the seed for Nigerian University System Innovation Project (NUSIP), which popped up later as Obasanjo Administration’s initiative.
The occurrance of an interesting coincidence in 1990 helped to expose the desperation of the IBB regime to implement the IMF/World Bank policies. A day after the Association of University Teachers (AUT) – name adopted by the banned ASUU – had held a National Conference on the World Bank in OAU, Ile-Ife, the Orka Coup took place, April 22, 1990. In his coup speech, Major Gideon Orkar made apparently innocuous reference to the prevalent repressive tendencies of IBB and his Government. He adduced three reasons for the coup, part of which included:
“(d) The intent to cow the students by the promulgation of the draconian Decree Number 47.
(e) The cowing of the university teaching and non-teaching staff by an intended massive purge, using the 150 million dollar loan as the necessitating factor.”
Given the contemporary issues against which the ASUU, NLC and students were consistently united, and that which informed the core of their struggles against the government, it was easy for a sensitive government like IBB’s to perceive a connection between the coup and the conference. Hence, the conferene organizers, Prof. Omotoye Olorode and Dr. Idowu Awopetu (ASUU National Treasurer) were immediately arrested and detained as alledged coup suspects.They were subjected to military trials (Court Martial) but were found innocent and released. Yet, they were compulsorily retired “in public interest”. They were reinstated by the court when Prof. Aliu Babatunde Fafunwa became Education Minister.
After a long spell of unease between the Government and AUT (the former still defiant to address ASUU’s demands), September 1990 became a new dawn for ASUU as it was deproscribed. ASUU intensified its demand for collective bargaining – to negotiate the conditions of service and other work-related issues for its members. The IBB Gvernment remained adamant and invariably hostile whenever ASUU made attempt to push its demands, until May 1992, when Dr Jega was reelected President. After several failed efforts to get the Government to start negotiation, ASUU commenced the suspended strike. However, as if that was the Greenhouse conditions desperately needed, the Government readily submitted to start negotiation as the strike subsisted. What an irony! No sooner had the negotiation commenced than it was unilaterally suspended by the Government! ASUU had no option than to commence the strike.
On May 25, the strike commenced, but had to be suspended on May 30 as Industrial Arbitration Panel (IAP) stepped in. That marked the beginning of a series of crowded activities as ASUU responded to every Government move to arm-twist its way. ASUU continued to checkmate the Government’s unsavory litiny of absurdities until one by one they reached their climax and crumbled with a bang. Follow the labyrinth of tragicomedy of industrial relations as it unfolded:
– On June 1, the IAP found Dr Jega guilty of contempt of court, but the judge, apparently considering the weighty political implications, decided to waive it.
– On July 20, with Government irresponsibilty, ASUU had to commence the strike
– On July 22, ASUU was banned again, but the strike continued under Academic Staff of Nigerian Universities (ASNU)
– The situation remained until the Government was forced to negotiate through a committee it constituted
– On September 3, 1992, the two parties reached an agreement on Funding, Conditions of Service [with University Academic Salary Scale (UASS)], and Autonomy and Academic Freedom
– On September 4, the 4-month old strike was suspended and academic activities commenced.
Immediately the Agreement was signed, other university workers were instigated to ask for “parity”, insisting that whatever was given to ASUU must be given to them. Even some of their members reasoned and questioned the basis of their leaders’ claims to parity, pointing out that they had been part of JAC when the struggle had begun, but unilaterally decided to ditch the JAC, capitulated and called off the strike when the chips were down. With our union preserved and intact, and without any collectively bargained agreement, what justification do we have to claim parity? – these SSANU members rationally queried.
However, as implementation of the ASUU Agreement commenced SSANU intensified its parity demand, which led to another round of the “Theatre of the Absurd”. The new vicious cycle started with the appointment of Professor Ben Nwabueze as Secretary (Minister) of Education. He contrived a new concept of “the Agreement of Imperfect Obligation”, meaning that the FG/ASUU Agreement was not (legally) binding on the Government to implement. He therefore directed universities to stop implementing the UASS/USS. Without any provocation, Prof Nwabueze continued his vicious attacks on ASUU with systematic breaches of the Agreement. It was obvious that he was deployed to do the hatchet job, and he was certainly doing it with utmost efficiency. ASUU’s voice of protest was drowned in a wirlwind of blackmail and intimidation. Its persistent demand to stop the breaches of the Agreement came up against a brick wall. With most aspects of the Agreement rolled back and no sign of de-escalating the breaches, ASUU had no option other than to take action.
– ASUU resumed the strike on May 3, 1993, and all member universities joined
– Three days later, the Government announced the dismissal of all striking lecturers and salary stoppage
– A Decree making teaching essential service, retroactively prohibiting teachers from going on strike, was enacted
– All lecturers on strike were given sack letters
– In some campuses, lecturers were ejected from their houses, despite the argument that residency of campus quarters was governed by the rental law.
– A particular case of UniAbuja Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Isa Muhammed, was pathetic. He went to the extent of sending the estate staff to tear off the roofs of lecturers’ houses, and then the security personnel to eject them.
– Even after the reinstatement of all lecturers later, Prof. Isa Muhammed refused to reinstate the EXCO of UniAbuja.

(TO BE CONTINUED…..)

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Opinion

Between Sabotage and Scepticism: Why Nigeria’s Oil Dream Keeps Stalling

Published

2 days ago

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August 12, 2026

By

Halima Aminu

 

By Halima Aminu

Governments do not only govern, they communicate governance. And in Nigeria’s oil and gas sector, the distance between what the government says it is doing and what its strategies are actually delivering has become one of the most consequential communication failures in the country’s recent economic history. Evaluating the Nigerian government’s strategies to increase oil and gas production is therefore not merely a matter of counting barrels. It is a matter of examining how those strategies are framed, how credibly they are communicated to critical stakeholders, and whether the outward narrative is supported by institutional reality on the ground.

The government’s dominant communication frame around oil and gas recovery has been one of triumphant reversal. Official figures show that national crude output, which had collapsed to dangerously low levels around 960,000 barrels per day in 2022 among the worst in Nigeria’s recent production history has climbed back to an average of approximately 1.71 million barrels per day in 2025, with peaks approaching 1.84 million barrels per day. As a communication strategy, this frame is deliberately constructed to project momentum, competence, and institutional control three attributes any government managing a resource-dependent economy urgently needs its investors and citizens to associate with its leadership.

The problem with this framing is not that the numbers are fabricated. The problem is that production recovery, presented in isolation, is a selective narrative. It tells the audience what improved without adequately explaining what remains structurally broken. Strategic communication theory draws a clear distinction between impression management projecting a preferred image and genuine credibility-building, which demands alignment between message and demonstrable reality. Nigeria’s government is currently far more invested in the former than the latter, and sophisticated investors, who are the primary audience for this messaging, are professionally trained to detect that gap.

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The Petroleum Industry Act of 2021 represents the most structurally significant legislative intervention in Nigeria’s energy sector in decades, and its potential is genuine. Its gas fiscal incentives have begun attracting new production-sharing arrangements with international partners. Its Host Community Development Trust framework had channelled substantial funding into hundreds of community projects across the Niger Delta by late 2025 a structural attempt to address the root communication breakdown between oil-producing communities and the Nigerian state, rather than merely managing its symptoms.

Yet even here, the government’s communication strategy reveals a persistent weakness. Five years after the PIA’s enactment, the law has succeeded in restructuring institutional forms creating new regulatory bodies, new oversight frameworks, new corporate structures. What it has not yet succeeded in doing is restructuring institutional culture. Rules exist on paper that are not consistently enforced in practice. Transparency mechanisms are in place that are not routinely populated with verifiable data. Approval processes have been reformed structurally but remain administratively slow in execution.

Nigeria’s oil is real. Its gas reserves, among the largest in the world, are real. Its production recovery, partial and structurally fragile as it remains, is real. What is not yet real not convincingly, not sustainably is the institutional framework that would make those assets fully and rationally investable at the scale the country requires. And what is equally not yet real is a government communication strategy sophisticated enough to build the credibility that framework needs to be believed.

Until Nigeria’s government understands that the long-term persuasiveness of its oil and gas strategy depends as much on how it communicates as on what it does and that impression management is not a substitute for institutional accountability the oil dream will continue to do what it has always done: inspire at the announcement stage, disappoint at the delivery stage, and leave Nigeria perpetually situated between sabotage on the ground and scepticism in the boardrooms of the investors it cannot afford to keep losing.

Aminu Halima
Department of Development and Strategic Communication
200 Level

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Opinion

962 Forfeited Homes: Why Aliyu’s ICPC Is Beginning To Redefine What Asset Recovery Means

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3 days ago

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August 11, 2026

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By Mahmoud Ibrahim Kwari

WHEN corruption assets are recovered, the real question is not simply how much was seized, how many properties were forfeited or how many cases were filed. The more important question is what happens to those assets afterwards. In the Kaba District of Abuja, the answer is beginning to take a more meaningful shape: land linked to an alleged $65 million housing project, covering about 27.92 hectares, is now back in public hands with the prospect of delivering 962 housing units to Nigerian families.

The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), under its Chairman, Dr. Musa Adamu Aliyu, SAN, formally handed over the forfeited landed properties at Kaba District to the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN), following a final forfeiture order of the Federal High Court. Beyond the ceremony itself, the development offers an opportunity to examine a bigger question: what should integrity and progress look like in Nigeria’s anti-corruption campaign?

The answer, perhaps, lies in the transformation of recovered assets from symbols of corruption into instruments of public good.

The handover took place on Tuesday, the twenty first of July, 2026 at the site of the Goodluck Jonathan Estate in Kaba District, Abuja, with Dr. Aliyu leading the ICPC delegation and the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of FMBN, Mr. Shehu Usman Osidi, alongside senior officials of both institutions, witnessing the event.

For Dr. Aliyu, the occasion was more than an administrative transfer of land. It represented what asset recovery should ultimately accomplish in a country where the public has often watched recovered properties remain locked in legal, administrative or bureaucratic limbo.

The ICPC chairman made a particularly important point: asset recovery without proper management is incomplete.

That principle deserves attention.

For years, Nigeria’s anti-corruption conversation has largely revolved around arrests, investigations, prosecutions, convictions and forfeitures. Those are important components of accountability. But the public benefit of anti-corruption efforts becomes much more tangible when an asset recovered from an alleged unlawful activity is returned to productive use.

The Kaba project therefore provides an interesting test case.

The land was originally part of a housing project conceived by FMBN in 2012. The project was financed through a $65 million loan facility secured by Good Earth Power Nigeria Limited in partnership with an American firm and was intended to produce 962 housing units.

According to the ICPC, investigations established that the loan was completely diverted, with no housing units constructed, while some of the funds were allegedly routed through Bureaux de Change and taken outside the country.

That story is sadly familiar in Nigeria: a project is conceived for the public good, financing is secured, expectations are raised, but somewhere along the line, the purpose for which the money was provided disappears.

What makes the Kaba development different is the possibility that the story could now end differently.

Instead of the land remaining abandoned, the Federal High Court has directed that it be returned to FMBN, the institution identified as the victim of the alleged unlawful activity. More importantly, the court directed ICPC and FMBN to monitor and supervise the construction of the proposed 962 housing units to completion and ensure their allocation to the intended end users.

That is where the real significance of the development lies.

The court’s order, granted on December 11, 2025, by Justice M. G. Umar of the Federal High Court, Abuja Judicial Division, in Suit No. FHC/ABJ/CS/1124/2025, ordered the final forfeiture of two plots in Cadastral Zone D12, Kaba District.

One of the plots measures approximately 122,015.80 square metres, while the other measures about 157,198.30 square metres. Together, they constitute the land on which the housing project is expected to rise.

The court also directed the Federal Republic of Nigeria, through ICPC, to facilitate the handover of the properties to FMBN and mandated the two institutions to supervise the development of the housing estate.

A joint committee is expected to oversee the process, with ICPC’s Constituency and Executive Project Tracking Division representing the Commission.

This is where the leadership style of Dr. Aliyu becomes relevant.

His emphasis on the productive use of recovered assets reflects an understanding that Nigerians are increasingly interested in outcomes rather than headlines.

The public does not simply want to hear that billions of naira or valuable properties have been recovered. Nigerians want to know what those recoveries eventually mean for ordinary people.

A recovered house should become a house. Recovered land should become productive land. Recovered funds should return to the public through projects that improve lives.

In the case of Kaba, the proposed 962 housing units provide an unusually clear measure of success.

If the homes are completed, properly allocated and occupied by the intended beneficiaries, the project will demonstrate how anti-corruption enforcement can move beyond punishment and become an instrument of development.

It will also provide a powerful answer to those who sometimes question the practical value of asset recovery.

It is against this backdrop that the growing institutional recognition of Dr. Aliyu’s leadership at the ICPC becomes noteworthy.
The recent encounter with some police officers that mounted an illegal check point to extort money from motorists in Abuja, has attested to the integrity of the ICPC’s boss where he has shown practical example of what he preaches as the head of Anti-graft Agency.
The officers extorted N53,000 from him and he followed them very closely, and told someone to send the money to him upon the officers’ demand.
They took the ICPC Chair to a POS, where he paid the charges, while the officers withdrew the money and shared it among themselves, after which he reported them to the police authority.
At a press conference few days after the incidence, the FCT Commissioner of Police confirmed that the suspects carried out the act outside their duty post, and that they converged from various divisions and moved to the Banex Plaza area of Abuja City, where they mounted a checkpoint.
He said the four suspects perpetrated the act and ran away before they were declared wanted and arrested.
“We are going to make sure that they are severely punished, while those to be dismissed will definitely be dismissed. This I can assure you” said the police Commissioner.
This is a great test to personal integrity and commitment to fight corruption by Dr Aliyu, which was reflected and extended to institutional leadership by example.

Prior to this, the Chairman has received commendations from different quarters, including recognition attributed to the Senate Committee on Federal Character and Inter-Governmental Affairs for transparency, accountability and inclusiveness during National Assembly oversight engagements.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has also been associated with commendation of the Commission’s drive in asset recovery, efforts to close systemic loopholes and its attention to accountability at the grassroots and local-government levels.

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There have also been commendations surrounding ICPC’s collaboration with the Federal Road Safety Corps and efforts to introduce integrity-focused reforms and contactless systems in the transport sector, aimed at reducing opportunities for corrupt practices.

But perhaps the most striking feature of Aliyu’s tenure is not necessarily the commendations themselves. It is the apparent effort to connect anti-corruption enforcement with institutional reform.

That distinction matters.

An anti-corruption agency cannot arrest its way out of corruption. It cannot prosecute its way out of corruption either. Sustainable progress requires prevention, institutional strengthening, technology, transparency, accountability and consequences for wrongdoing.

This appears to be one of the areas where Aliyu has sought to leave an imprint.

The Commission has pursued technology-driven prevention mechanisms, including digital scorecards and AI-powered public reporting tools, while the chairman has advocated greater responsibility among judges, lawyers as well as tertiary institutions as moral gatekeepers and drivers of empirical research into illicit financial flows.

These initiatives may not always generate the drama associated with high-profile arrests, but they are potentially more important in the long run.

There is also another aspect of Aliyu’s leadership that deserves consideration.

During his inaugural press briefing in Abuja, the ICPC chairman made an unusual commitment. He said he would personally participate in the prosecution of major cases.

“I will lead by example,” he said, pledging to personally appear in ICPC cases in court.

He described the commitment as an effort to demonstrate that integrity, accountability and transparency must become part of the fabric of Nigerian society.

He subsequently fulfilled that pledge by personally appearing at a High Court in Kano in a case involving allegations of fund misappropriation by the Kano State Government through its 44 local government caretaker chairmen.

The significance of that decision was not simply that the chairman appeared in court. It was the message that the head of an anti-corruption institution was willing to put his professional reputation and legal expertise behind the cases being pursued by his organization.

That is what leading from the front means.

The case itself generated considerable legal controversy.

The defendants, including the state Commissioner for Local Government and Deputy Governor, had previously obtained an interim court order restraining ICPC from conducting further investigations, summoning or interrogating individuals involved in the matter.

Their lawyers also challenged the jurisdiction of the Commission and argued that multiple agencies investigating the same matter amounted to “forum shopping” and an “abuse of court process.”

They further alleged that ICPC had breached an earlier injunction by continuing its investigation.

Aliyu, however, challenged the legal standing of the caretaker chairmen, relying on a Supreme Court position concerning the legality of appointing caretaker chairmen in place of democratically elected local government officials.

The chairman’s argument was straightforward: those holding positions whose legality was itself under challenge could not, in his view, use the legal system as a shield against accountability.

The allegations remain subject to judicial determination, and the courts will ultimately decide the substantive issues.

Yet the episode demonstrated Aliyu’s willingness to personally engage with difficult institutional and legal questions rather than leave everything to subordinates.

This brings us back to Kaba.

The 962-unit housing project could become one of the clearest demonstrations of what successful asset recovery should look like.

The land, according to the ICPC, had remained unutilised after the original housing project failed to materialise. FMBN’s Managing Director, Shehu Osidi, acknowledged this when he thanked ICPC for recovering and handing over the property for its intended purpose.

He noted that the land had been abandoned and left unused for some time, describing the ICPC’s intervention as evidence of a commitment to protecting public assets and ensuring that forfeited properties are put to productive use for Nigerians.

That is a powerful endorsement because it speaks to the ultimate purpose of recovery.

The ICPC chairman’s position that the success of the Kaba intervention should be judged by the completion and fair allocation of the homes is therefore particularly important.

The project should not be allowed to become another abandoned estate.

The land has been recovered. The court has provided the legal framework. FMBN has taken possession for the intended purpose. ICPC has been mandated to monitor the process.

The next stage is delivery. And delivery is where integrity is ultimately tested.

There is a temptation in public life to measure leaders by the number of arrests they make, the value of properties they recover or the number of high-profile cases they announce.

Those figures matter, but they are not the whole story.

The deeper measure is whether institutions become stronger under their leadership and whether ordinary Nigerians can eventually feel the impact of their work.

For Aliyu, the Kaba project presents precisely such an opportunity.

If 962 families eventually move into homes built on land recovered through an anti-corruption process, the story will no longer be merely about forfeiture.

It will be about restitution.

It will be about taking something allegedly diverted from its original purpose and restoring it to the purpose for which it was intended.

It will also demonstrate that the fight against corruption does not have to end in a courtroom.

It can end in a school, a hospital, a road, a factory or, in this case, a home.

That is why the Kaba District development deserves to be followed closely.

The responsibility now falls on both ICPC and FMBN to ensure that the process remains transparent, properly supervised and insulated from the very abuses that necessitated the recovery in the first place.

The joint committee must do more than exist on paper. It must track progress, identify obstacles, ensure compliance and provide Nigerians with credible information about the development.

The intended beneficiaries must also remain at the centre of the process.

A housing estate recovered for the public must ultimately serve the public.

The broader lesson is that integrity in public office should not be defined merely by the absence of personal corruption.

Integrity should also mean doing the right thing with public power.

It should mean recovering what belongs to the people and ensuring that it is not lost again through bureaucratic neglect.

It should mean prosecuting cases fairly, strengthening institutions, closing loopholes, embracing technology and ensuring that recovered assets deliver measurable benefits.

This is why the Kaba handover represents more than another event in the calendar of the ICPC.

It offers a practical illustration of the intersection between integrity and progress.

Dr. Musa Adamu Aliyu’s leadership will ultimately be judged not by the rhetoric surrounding his tenure but by what remains after it.

If the 962 homes rise from the Kaba landscape, if they are completed to the required standards, if they reach the families for whom they were intended, and if the process remains transparent from beginning to end, then the ICPC would have achieved something more significant than recovering land.

It would have shown Nigerians what recovered public wealth can become.

And that may be one of the most persuasive forms of anti-corruption advocacy possible: not merely telling Nigerians that corruption has consequences, but showing them that accountability can produce progress.

For News Point Nigeria, that is the bigger story behind Kaba not simply the land that was forfeited, but the homes that could rise from it; not simply the alleged wrongdoing that led to the forfeiture, but the public good that should emerge from the recovery.

The true victory will be when Nigerians can look at the completed 962-unit estate and say: this is what recovered public assets are supposed to do.

Kwari, a journalist writes from Abuja.

 

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Opinion

The Weight of a School Bag Is Not the Weight of Knowledge

Published

3 days ago

on

August 11, 2026

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By IBRAHIM ONYINOYI SALIMAT

The final school bell rings, and twelve-year-old Tunde begins the long walk home with a school bag heavy enough to bend his shoulders. Inside are textbooks, notebooks, and a pile of assignments due the very next morning. After a full day of lessons, he hurriedly eats his meal and spends the rest of the evening racing against time, driven not by the joy of learning but by the fear of punishment for an incomplete assignment. By the time he is done, his mind is too exhausted to read ahead, explore ideas beyond the classroom, or simply enjoy the childhood every child deserves with friends and family. The next morning, he returns to school with neatly completed assignments, yet perhaps with little or no genuine understanding of what he is said to have learned.

If this routine has become our definition of academic success, then Nigeria must ask itself a difficult question: Are we raising critical thinkers and innovators, or are we merely producing children who complete tasks to avoid punishment, earn their teachers’ praise, and pass the next examination?

Behind the walls of many Nigerian classrooms lies a silent crisis that is often mistaken for academic excellence. The education system has gradually become more concerned with how much students can memorize than with how well they understand, analyze, and apply knowledge. Success is frequently measured by examination scores, completed assignments, and neatly copied notes rather than by problem-solving ability and intellectual curiosity.

Some educators argue that homework develops discipline and reinforces classroom learning. This is true when homework is purposeful and reasonably assigned. However, excessive academic workload often defeats its own purpose by leaving students with little time for rest, reflection, independent reading, or meaningful engagement with what they have learned. Instead of inspiring curiosity, it encourages students to work against the clock simply to avoid punishment or criticism.

This concern is supported by evidence. According to , millions of children continue to face learning challenges despite increased school attendance, demonstrating that time spent in school alone does not guarantee quality learning. Similarly, findings from the have consistently shown that effective education depends more on the quality of teaching and students’ understanding than on excessive academic workload.

Another challenge is that many classrooms still promote one-way communication, where the teacher speaks and the students listen. Learners are expected to accept information without questioning, exploring alternative ideas, or engaging in meaningful discussions. Over time, this weakens confidence, suppresses curiosity, and produces graduates who can recall information but struggle to think independently or solve practical problems.

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The consequences extend far beyond the classroom. Students gradually begin to associate education with stress rather than discovery, fear rather than confidence, and obedience rather than initiative. As these learners become graduates, many find it difficult to adapt their knowledge to real-life challenges, contribute fresh ideas, or compete effectively in an increasingly knowledge-driven global economy.

Ultimately, the quality of a nation’s education determines the quality of its workforce, leadership, and national development. When an education system produces individuals who are trained primarily to pass examinations rather than solve problems, society bears the consequences through reduced productivity, limited innovation, and slower progress. By contrast, an education system that encourages critical thinking, ethical values, creativity, and effective communication is more likely to produce responsible citizens, competent professionals, and accountable leaders.

Addressing these challenges requires more than minor adjustments; it demands a bold rethinking of what education should achieve in Nigeria. The goal should no longer be to produce students who merely excel in examinations but to nurture individuals who can think independently, communicate effectively, solve problems creatively, and contribute meaningfully to society.

The first step is to invest in continuous teacher development. Teachers should be equipped not only with subject knowledge but also with modern teaching methods that encourage discussion, collaboration, and active participation. Classrooms should become spaces where students feel confident to ask questions, express opinions, and learn from their mistakes without fear of humiliation or intimidation.

Equally important is the need to make classroom learning more engaging and practical while reducing excessive homework. If students spend most of their day in school, then the classroom should remain the primary environment for meaningful learning. Lessons should incorporate experiments, projects, debates, presentations, case studies, and problem-solving activities that help students understand concepts rather than memorize facts. Homework should reinforce classroom learning, not replace it.

Schools should also recognize that leisure is an essential part of education, not a distraction from it. Sports, reading, music, drama, debate, and other extracurricular activities help students develop confidence, leadership, teamwork, emotional resilience, and creativity qualities that are just as important as academic achievement in today’s world.

Furthermore, assessment methods should shift from rewarding rote memorization to evaluating students’ ability to analyze, apply knowledge, and develop practical solutions to real-world challenges. Such an approach will prepare learners not only for examinations but also for higher education, employment, and responsible citizenship.

Finally, sustainable educational reform depends on effective strategic communication. Government agencies, school administrators, teachers, parents, students, and communities must communicate openly and work together to ensure that educational policies are clearly understood and effectively implemented. When stakeholders share a common vision, reforms become more practical, transparent, and sustainable.

Nigeria’s future will not be determined solely by the number of schools it builds or the number of students who pass examinations. It will be shaped by the quality of minds nurtured within those schools. A nation that values curiosity over fear, understanding over memorization, and innovation over routine is preparing its young people not merely to earn certificates but to transform society.

The weight of a school bag should never be mistaken for the weight of knowledge. True education is measured not by how much students carry home, but by how much they understand, question, create, and contribute.

IBRAHIM ONYINOYI SALIMAT
200 LEVEL DEVELOPMENT AND STRATEGIC COMMUNICATION STUDENT, UNIVERSITY OF ABUJA.

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