Nigeria’s Current Challenges Arise From Loss Of History, Says Aworawo

Dr Friday Aworawo, an expert on Nigerian History at the University of Lagos (UNILAG), Akoka, Lagos, spoke with TOBI AWODIPE about the importance of teaching history in schools.

IT has come to our attention that a good number of Nigerian children these days do not know Nigeria’s history, especially children in primary and secondary schools. Why is this so?

The sad reality is that most children of school going age do not have any sense of history because the larger society doesn’t have a sense of history either. So essentially, what we are witnessing is a reflection of the decadence of the Nigerian society and what we can deduce from the children’s inability to talk specifically on the history of their own country is a microcosm/extension of the myriad problems that has beset the Nigerian state. The kids are simply a representation of the sum total of the adults’ knowledge around them.

The Ministry of Education has removed history as a subject from schools’ curriculum. Why do you think they took this step and what are the likely consequences?
In my opinion, this was done out of ignorance, because there is absolutely no reason to remove one of the most critical aspects of human society, which is history itself. This just goes to show our level of ignorance right now, especially in the educational sector, because in advanced societies, this cannot happen. I put it to you, is there any country/group of people without a sense of history? In simple terms, history can be defined as the totality of the studies of the past activities of a people, with the view of improving future activities. In other words, salvation lies in the understanding of the past. If you don’t know where you are coming from, it would be difficult to know where you are going. If you go to a hospital for treatment, the doctor would request for your file, even if you visit them weekly. The doctor would want to review your medical history and re-visit past treatments. This is the same thing that happens in administration. The predecessor always prepares hand over notes for his successor, even if said successor might have been part and parcel of the outgoing administration. If this can be done for administration and health, why can’t same be done for our country and knowledge passed on to our children? Truthfully, a person without a sense of history is like a rudderless boat with no direction or like a river that forgets its source; after a while, it would surely dry up. Even if we want to look at it from a biblical perspective, the Bible we read and the events contained within are based on historical occurrences.

In advanced countries, most children can tell you about Abraham Lincoln, George Washington and so on and this is because their works, deeds and style of governance were all carefully documented and passed on to future generations. And so we keep hearing phrases like, “The foundation of the founding fathers”; why can we not have this here in Nigeria? Here in Nigeria, we just copied our system of governance from Britain and America, not realizing that the system was set up to suit the peculiarities of their environment.

Here, we just borrow and borrow, not even caring whether it is suitable for us or not. Even now, there are a lot of challenges we are currently facing as a country, running this system of government but because we have refused to sit down and discuss what works for us, we have been unable to move forward as a country.

Some people are presently claiming that Nigeria fared better when she was running a regional government and want us to return to that system since they have been able to juxtapose present events and situation and what obtains now with the former system of government.

Unfortunately, our society is sick and suffering from amnesia. We see people that have looted the treasury of a state and after they throw a few parties and ‘dash’ some people money, we forget what he/she has done. If we had a proper sense of history and realized that a few people are spending our children’s commonwealth, and ours as well, we would not celebrate such individuals.

Even if all the people in the ministry of education are engineers, is there not history for engineering? Apart from social studies presently being taught, history must be re-introduced as a separate subject. It has become obvious that we don’t even know ourselves and where we come from. Most people don’t know that there is a difference between a Delta person and someone from Imo state; we usually classify them all as Igbos which is not so.

A lot of young ones have no idea of the geography of Nigeria or its various cultures and languages. Those that clamoured for and got independence in 1960 were only able to do so because they understood the importance of history and with history, they were able to put things into perspective and show that Africa and Nigeria in particular could indeed master and pilot its affairs. I am pretty certain that the government has no idea that history is no longer being taught in primary and secondary schools, else it would have been looked into and reversed. This is the reason why a lot of students struggle with history learning at a higher level because by the time they want to start learning, the curriculum is over-bearing and they’re basically starting from scratch compared to someone who started right from the primary level.

Most of our children do not know Obafemi Awolowo, Nnamdi Azikwe or Tafawa Balewa or what they did for this country. Why are we praising Awolowo and our children have no idea who he is? HID Awolowo died recently and many youths have no idea who she was either. The pivotal focus of any and every student of history is to study and understand what happened in the past with the intention of improving upon it in the future. So many historians have done excellently well in administrative positions and I believe it is because of the background they originated from.

In your opinion, are there any pitfalls to this lack of history study especially among children and youths?
Definitely. It would affect them negatively and not just children but also adults. But the children can be partly pardoned because when they haven’t been taught, how then would they know? We should blame our teachers, parents and administrators that made this costly error by removing history from the curriculum.

Sadly, when our present crop of children go the Unites States of America or Canada for example, they are made to learn these countries’ history before they are awarded green card or citizenship. Charity begins at home, why can’t we do that here in Nigeria? It is sad and unfortunate that the children have become victims of this sad circumstance.

At the university level, Nigerian culture is being taught as General Studies, why then should we exempt the younger ones? Even if you are a first class student and you failed Nigerian culture in General Studies, no Nigerian University would clear you for graduation. That shows its great importance at the university level. We really need to re-introduce Nigerian history as a compulsory subject in both primary and secondary schools to awaken our national consciousness and restore a proper sense of identity. When we sing of our heroes past in the national anthem, do we really consider the past heroes or even know who they are? Going back to the basics will help us in no small way and starting early is very important.

Ask a Nigerian child to mention the national figures on our currency, which they spend daily, and you will discover that most have no idea. Until we realize that salvation lies in the understanding of the past, we would find it difficult to actually progress.

How do Historians such as yourself feel when you come across youths and children that do not know our national heroes and heroes of democracy?
To be sincere, it is sad and painful. Children that grew up/are growing up here in the Southwest don’t know Chief Obafemi Awolowo, how much more so children in the East, North, South-south or middle belt and other political zones in the country? This is a huge collective shame on us all.

Unbelievably, MKO Abiola and June 12 is strange for some youths and children. During the Xenophobia issue that happened in South Africa earlier this year, most Nigerians were angry that South Africans chose to forget what Nigerians did for them, financially and in other ways when they were struggling to get the apartheid yoke off their back and gain independence.

A lot of Nigerians argued that if the young South Africans bothered to read their history, they wouldn’t have treated Nigerians living there, with disdain. This is what a lack of history can do because those that strived, encouraged, promoted and supported at any point in time would be ignored. If we are annoyed at what the South Africans did, isn’t it worse what we are doing to ourselves? Is it not a thing of shame that we refuse to teach and educate our young ones about the country’s own history? The Lagos State government should take it upon itself to make history mandatory in schools and this would go a long way in solving this problem.