King Jakes

Over the years, Nigeria has grown to be a country where certificate can take you anywhere whether or not your content can corroborate. Our educational, occupational and whatever setup centre on one's certificate and not the person's content. It is no longer what you can do but what is in your hands. The degree in your hands is better than the technical know-how in your head.
All of a sudden we focus on one's class of degree rather than his level of technicality and this in turn gives rise to the different kinds of malpractice we now know. Students go extra length to get certificates they know nothing of just because they know it can secure them jobs where naturally their intelligence can't. The end result of focusing on certificate more than content is that students don't bother to study and know the content, even the few that study do so just to pass their terminal exams and forget all after that.
This cancerous habit is gradually killing the reading culture of this country giving rise to dull graduates with good results. Hard work and fervent study don't seem to pay and so most people engage in whatever means they can to get hold of the certificate cause to them and the society, it is all that matters.
The late Gani Fawehinme, the most successful Human Rights activist to have practiced in Nigeria would go on to prove the "certificate rituals" wrong. Gani Fawehinme graduated with a third class division and most of his mates made the second or first class divisions. By Nigeria's standards, the man is a failure, a dull student who got only an average of what he was taught in school and as a lawyer, his third class degree meant no government work for him.
Barrister Fawehinme proved all these wrong when he went into practice, winning cases upon cases. At a time he was sued by the Nigerian Bar Association but to the amazement of everyone he won that case too. He prove to everyone that certificate is not knowledge and as such can't determine one's technicality.
Last year a Corp member who served in the Nigeria Defence Academy, developed a drone using local implements. This drone could fly and work more perfectly than those purchased by the academy for their training purpose. After his service year he was let loose and when the management of the academy was confronted on why they had let a talent like that off, they said their standards forbid employing a third class holder.
This and other numerous cases are examples of the harm certification is causing and will continue to cause this country unless addressed.

Until we stop putting more emphasis on class of certificates, we can never get it right. We need to shift from class of certificate to content of the certificate holder. This is the only thing that can revive the dying intellectual nature of this country.

#RABTeam