Is The Almajiri System Being Imported Into The South-West?

By Bola BOLAWOLE
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I witnessed the debate about who owns the home between the man and woman fortuitously last Monday as I found my way into the premises of the Lagos State Television and Radio Lagos, both owned by the Lagos State Government, along Agidingbi Road, directly opposite Coca-Cola premises. I was rushing in from Agege to catch an appointment within the LSTV/Radio Lagos premises when traffic snarl caught up with me just before I got to Cadbury.

At that time of the day, the traffic was unusual. The harsh economic situation, especially the unbelievable hike in fuel price, has driven many motorists off the road. So, traffic in Lagos is low these days and traffic flow is usually smooth and seamless. Getting ensnared in traffic that day and time got me thinking.

Was there an accident? Is any of those unmindful traffic agencies at it again, piling misery upon an already distraught citizenry? I consulted my wrist watch incessantly as the traffic grudgingly moved at slower than the proverbial snail’s speed. I am sure you know that in such a situation, every moment lost looks like an hour and one’s blood pressure must have begun to surge upward.

Gradually, we got to the epicentre of the traffic snarl. There was a sea of heads akin to what our people would describe as “oja meta”; that is, three full markets converging into one. Men and women, old and young; children as well all struggling to get into the LSTV/Radio Lagos premises. An interesting programme must be taking place there, I reckon. Usually, when these “elewe omo” or traditional medical doctors converge there to advertise their wares and prowess, the place witnesses a surge. That was then when things were still a million times better than what they are now.

So, imagine what it would be like now when many people no longer can afford Western medicine. Cost of drugs has shot through the roof. Doctors are scarce to find in the hospitals. For ailments that need urgent attention, people are given six months’ appointment to return to try their luck whether a doctor would be available to see them. Many die before the appointment date. For those with contacts who are able to get appointments fixed for them, that is how lucky they can get.

No one is sure of the quality of attention they get these days. A recent study gives medical errors as the third highest cause of death in the United States of America. If that can happen there, imagine the margin of error here – which is not only a developing country but one in which thousands of qualified, competent and experienced medical personnel have “japa” abroad. And the tide is yet to abate or recede.

I was wrong, however! The sea of heads were not in search of medical attention; they were in search of something more important – stomach infrastructure – made popular by a one-time governor of Ekiti state. A banner, which hung on the gate of the LSTV/Radio Lagos premises said food palliatives were being distributed there!

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The premises were filled. Getting an opportunity to drive in took minutes. A queue formed from the premises, stretching up to the nearby Ikeja Mall aka Shoprite. A horde of Police/LASTMA vehicles and officers were on hand to maintain order. The people were there to collect a handful of grains of rice and cups of garri. I saw people carrying all manner of sacks on their head. Some clutched polythene bags containing items I could not fathom. Others carried small kilograms of Semo on their head. Let us not bother to name those who said they were responsible for this show of shame. They must have thought they were doing something noble; don’t you think?

And I remembered what the governor I had earlier mentioned told me when, on one occasion as he distributed his own stomach infrastructure to the people – and I was there – he noticed that my countenance was sad (like that of Nehemiah before King Artaxerxes in Nehemiah 2: 1- 8). He said, “Sir, it is because you have food to eat: that is why you discountenance what we are doing here. Those who haven’t eaten for days and who do not know when and where their next meal will come from will appreciate our gesture and fall for it”

He was right! More so even now! Poverty has been weaponized to bring many of our people on their knees. Some think it is illiteracy that is responsible for the abject misery and servitude that the people are willing to subject themselves to. They may partially be right! Others argue that it is realism of the worst order. They, too, are right in a sense. The people have come to accept their powerlessness against their oppressors. If they refuse the tokenism they are offered, where do they go from there? What power do they have against their oppressors?

Some say the vote is the power of the electorate but our people are knowledgeable enough to know that their vote does not count. The historic vote they cast on June 12, 1993 that should have counted was annulled before their very eyes. They cried; they yelled, they struggled; they kicked; they fought; they marched in the streets; they laid down their life – yet, nothing came out of it. MKO Abiola refused to relinquish the mandate freely given unto him until death removed the shoes from his chicken’s legs, as they say. So, our people have come to realize that, head or tail, they lose!

Soviet leader, Josef Stalin, was quoted as saying that those who vote in an election determine nothing but those who count the votes determine everything. That was then – and in his own days and clime. These days in our own time and space, those who count and record the votes do not even determine anything – the judges who sit in judgment in election disputes determine everything! And the judges are not saints. The most ridiculous and putrid judgments have oozed out of their mouth. Tell me, where do we go from here?

So, the people accept their fate and move on. As I waited on a queue of cars that had formed, trying to meander my way into the LSTV/Radio Lagos premises, I listened to the argument of some woman trying to eject the men who had also joined the queue. What has this world become! Men were struggling with women to collect their own “Ounje Eko”! Lagos food, is that not what they say it is called? I read some days back that some university professors queued to collect a loan of N36,000 or thereabout to buy subsidized “Ounje Eko” and I marveled that things have got that bad! More than, someone quickly corrected me! But that is a topic for another day!

The women on the queue told the men: “Obirin l’o ni’le”; meaning that it is women that own/run the home. It was a ploy to eject the men who had also queued for the measly grains and items being dished out but the men fought back bravely! “Okunrin ni baale ile”, one of the men yelled, and another supported him: “Ati okunrin, ati obirin l’o ni’le”! What the first man said, for the benefit of those who do not understand the Yoruba language, is that men are the head of the family while his supporter said both men and women are joint owners/managers of the home! The philosophy of poverty!

I finally found my way in, conducted my business and drove out. The crowd kept enlarging and surging. The successful ones carried all manner of sacks on their head. Some held their own catch in one or both hands. As I drove in to Shoprite to pick a few items, the queue was still dangerously close to the shopping mall.

There at Shoprite another spectacle confronted me: A woman picked up choice items and waited at the cashier begging everyone to help her pay for them! Few weeks back I had also seen a man by the food stands in the same Shoprite telling everyone he was hungry and they should buy food for him! What are we turning into – or is it, what have we turned into?

And my mind went back to kilometre-long queues of almajiris that I saw weeks back on social media, of children and adults with bowls in their hands waiting for food from God-knows where, when and how in one city in the north of the country! Many social ills that we thought were exclusive to other climes and peoples have crept in on us here in the South-West. And you wonder why? Our people say a lamb that walks with dogs will eat feaces. The mind-boggling scenes that we witness around us here these days (that get us worried) are the usual sight in other places. What ails us here is their own way of life. There is no way the vortex wont suck us in.

The unfortunate thing is, they will be better able than us to cope with, and manage it because, for them, it is both cultural and religious imperatives. It has become, for them – and for years and decades – the social structure on which their entire society is built. Is that what our own present political leaders are trying to import into the South-west? Our best bet, if I may advise, is to quickly stem the tide before it is too late.

* Former Editor of PUNCH newspapers, Chairman of its Editorial Board and Deputy Editor-in-chief, BOLAWOLE was also the Managing Director/ Editor-in-chief of The WESTERNER newsmagazine. He writes the ON THE LORD’S DAY column in the Sunday TRIBUNE and TREASURES column in NEW TELEGRAPH newspaper on Wednesdays. He is also a public affairs analyst on radio and television.