In what appears to be Nigeria’s most dramatic “return on investment” complaint yet, a man on Thursday stormed the All Progressives Congress (APC) national secretariat in Abuja with a message as blunt as it was unsettling: reward me or kill me. The protest, captured in a now-viral video, shows the visibly distressed man holding a placard and demanding recognition for what he described as his personal sacrifices during the party’s 2023 campaign. According to him, loyalty was not just emotional, it was financial, physical, and, ultimately, total. In a country where political support often comes with expectations, some spoken, many implied the man’s outcry reads like a tragic audit of misplaced trust. His claim that he sold his house to fund campaign efforts has not been independently verified, but the symbolism is hard to ignore: a citizen liquidating stability in exchange for promised political dividends. Observers at the scene watched as the protester oscillated between anger and ...
The New Literacy is Autodidactism
By Abioye Tosin Lawrence | Oriontimes
There’s hardly any excuse left to blame poor educational background in today’s world. The problem isn’t lack of access, it’s misplaced attention. In Nigeria and beyond, many polytechnic and university graduates spend countless hours online consuming content that adds no value to their lives.
It’s heartbreaking to see how the digital space, which could be a tool for transformation, has become a theatre of triviality. Many young people, especially women, now chase visibility over virtue, flaunting their bodies on social media without restraint. Even those returning from church on Sunday often turn their phones toward their chests instead of their hearts.
In a world where someone can freely learn the same skills others pay thousands of dollars to study, ignorance has no valid defense. The new literacy is autodidactism, the art of self-learning. Yet, instead of mastering knowledge, too many are mastering nonsense, trending in all the wrong ways.
The fact that many people do not realize is that we live in an era where those responsible for employment are themselves giving excuses. It reminds me of a banter a lecturer once threw at his rude student: “Even if you graduate and leave with your result, do you know what to do with it?” he asked. Ironically, many who now occupy the labour market have been frustrated by a broken system that rewards noise over knowledge.
Most students on campus today, even corps members, are unaware of the struggles that await them until reality sets in. Whenever I see some public primary school pupils, what comes to mind is their innocence boys and girls whose fate rests on luck. Only a few will grow with the zeal to break through the barriers of hardship and rewrite their destiny.
Life is like that, because when a nation produces too many educated people without purpose, it becomes dangerous. Nigeria is gradually treading that path. The tragedy deepens when an educated person is denied every means to exhibit his potential; he turns that intelligence toward destruction. That’s why insecurity festers. That’s why everyone wants to “become something” overnight. That’s why about fifty candidates will want to run for presidency among the elite, because the queue to success is longer than the Mississippi.
It’s not poverty that holds us back; it’s poor focus, a collective misdirection of intellect and energy.
Abioye Tosin Lawrence is the publisher of Oriontimes Online, and author of Voices From the Fire: My Journey Through a Hollow Empire
تعليقات
إرسال تعليق
Join the conversation!
Have insights, corrections, or questions about this news story? Drop your comment below. We value civil, fact-based discussion.