Pebbles with Igbotako Nowinta.
Nigerian people today yearn genuinely for a drastic change. The present democratic dispensation has failed the nation abysmally; change is inevitable and it must come in Nigeria. The country is drifting towards a political, economic and social collapse, through insensitivity and ineptitude of an insane political class unwilling to change” – Quoted in WHERE WE ARE (Page 137).
On Monday November 10, 2014, a female suicide bomber sneaked into a school in Pokistum, Yobe State and succeeded in blasting herself to debris along with about 50 innocent, peaceful and law abiding school children.
As I pen this piece, the dreaded Boko Haram terrorists are brazenly in control of some Local Government Areas in the North-East of the country.
On Tuesday November 11, 2014, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan displayed a high sense of insensitivity to the gory slaughters that occurred in Pokistum a day earlier, by going ahead to declare his intention to contest the 2015 presidential election as the sole candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
And on Wednesday November 12, 2014, students, activists, comrades, lecturers, friends and well-wishers gathered at the main auditorium of the University of Benin for the first Prof. Festus Iyayi Memorial Lecture, tagged Neo-Liberal Siege against Nigeria.
In remembering and honoring one of its own the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) University of Benin Chapter, succeeded in bringing to the fore again, the issues that has catapulted Comrade Festus Iyayi into the avenue of immortality.
How time flies, a year ago, on November 12th, 2013, the deranged enemies of our country, who are satisfied with the mess they have turned our country into, staged a cruel conspiracy that manifested in the heartless murder of Prof. Festus Iyayi, along Abuja-Lokoja highway, at a place called Benda Village.
Thus, a ruling class intoxicated by violence and treachery, insatiably fed upon one of the most precious eggs (Iyayi) a year ago.
Because Festus Iyayi was a towering giant during the four months old ASUU strike that paralyzed the ivory towers in Nigeria that time; and also that he stood against the callous bestiality of the rich and powerful in his several cerebral postulations, he became a target for elimination.
But in killing Comrade Iyayi they have unknowingly made him a magnificent hero in death.
That was exactly what happened at the Akin Deko Auditorium on Wednesday November 12 2014, when Prof. Omotoye Olorode (a tireless activist of repute) delivered his memorial lecture.
As I was discussing with a guest at the venue of the 1st Festus I. O. Iyayi Memorial Lecture that day, the man said to me sarcastically that the struggle which comrade Festus Iyayi fought for regarding the repositioning of the universities in Nigeria (i.e. adequate funding, better infrastructural development etc.) is being reaped bountifully by some corrupt and wayward vice chancellors in the Universities, who went to dine and sleep when the battle was being fought.
But, I was quick to tell him that whatever the vice chancellors are savoring today is inconsequential to the prodigious energy, intellectual prowess and selfless service that comrade Iyayi rendered to our fatherland.
Prof. Omotoye Olorode in his lecture was brutally frank about the state of the nation when he averred: “The increased economic inequality between a very tiny, scandalously rich minority and the teeminig masses of the people in Nigeria has increased crime rate and insecurity and increased inter-community, Intra community, inter-community, inter ethnic and inter-faith violence and antipathies generated and manipulated by the owners of Nigeria.’’
Talking about the privatization of the educational sector, Prof. Olorode thundered out: “regarding looting, privatization and deregulation the sector that had perhaps suffered the greatest assault in the last decade is the education sector. By underfunding and deliberate neglect of the public funded education sector in the last decade. The sector had been forced into the private sector mode substantially. This is in spite of the generalized poor quality and inaccessibility (to most Nigerians) of the privatized sector of education.”
In describing Prof. Iyayi as “this illustrious son of Africa, a patriot, an optimist of almost no comparison and a revolutionary intellectual”, Comrade Olorode was simply echoing what countless individuals have said about the fallen Comrade, who displayed uncommon courage and stoicism in the struggle for a better Nigeria.
Comrade Iyayi’s widow, Mrs. Grace Iyayi said the following about him. “You were an exceptional husband to me and a wonderful father to our children. You gave, gave and gave all of what you had. And alas in the end you gave your life for the cause that you believed in.’’
Born in 1947, Comrade Iyayi conquered poverty with his exceptional brilliance. After elementary education, he bagged his Msc degree from the Institute of Economics, Kiev in the then Soviet Union and grabbed his Doctoral degree in Management from the University of Bradford. He began his lecturing job in 1981 and rose to become a professor.
As a writer, he wrote profusely and was President of the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights (CDHR) between 1995 and 1997, where I worked closely with him as chairman (CDHR) Edo State (1995 – 1997).
Comrade Iyayi epitomized a life of selfless service and in death took the sting out of the scorpion of the Nigerian jungle. Iyayi’s death challenges us all to drag our country from the morass of violence, impunity, corruption, bestiality and irresponsibility.
Nowinta wrote, WHERE WE ARE- A CALL FOR DEMOCRATIC REVOLUTION IN NIGERIA.
