'Your knowledge is not confined to introducing laws', A Student writes to Emir Sanusi

Dear Emir, 

I hope this letter meets you in good health. May the royal endure, sir. Before I go into the crux of this letter, let me assure you that I will do this with all due respect, and also assure you of many other things. Aside from knowing the honour of your social status, I am a Muslim and have a religious obligation to always show respect to constituted authority, not some unconstitutional “constituted authority”, though. And it is on this ground that I shall give you many more assurances.

ALI FAAGBA

Dear Sir, I assure you that I will not ask you about the price of your Rolls Royce neither will I tell you that the amount used to procure
that kind of car is enough to build scores of schools and hire some efficient teachers. You are a certified and world-class economic expert and therefore you know better. 

Dear Sir, I further assure you that it will not come to me to question your right to introduce a new legislation that will change the direction of things in our country, although in my entire life, I have never come across poor men introducing legislation on what choice rich men have in their lives. In fact, I appreciate your sense of generosity and patriotism, of course, and that you love your people so much that you are willing to share your expertise on how the ought to live. 

Sir Emir, the moment you made your intention known to the public, the whole media was awash with your praise. Too many intellectuals continue to gratify your valour and revolutionary mind. Indeed, a new era could be here after all. An era of supposed intelligence leads by sophisticated personalities such as your royal highness.

In all sincerity, I currently school in Sokoto and I am one of those who understand better the adverse effect of undesirable polygamy. You, as a man from ruling class, might not even understand this as much as I do, at least not in practice. I live in a house with no gate or security and I don’t have a car. I’m just a day-to-day person to this “Al-Majiris”. We meet everywhere I go. In the mosque, at my door, at the bus-stop and even in the lecture rooms. In short, wherever I may be, beggars have access to that place. As such, I can boast of having seen all sorts of Almajiris. 

I have seen old women who have no physical defect whatsoever carrying kids around the street in a bleakish chilling morning plying her beggary routes. They wear no cardigan because they can’t afford it. I have seen young kids of comparative young ages holding bowls in a sweltering sun as they go about singing “Kiaye, Kiaye” to the passer-by. I have seen promising boys on the dunghills searching for substances I cannot identify. Should I begin to reel off what I have seen of shaveling beggars, the list will be endless? Therefore, it is justifiable that I’m willing to partake in the decisions that will save them. I have often thought of what to do with no valid conclusion until you recently lend me a voice. To this I say a big thank you. 

Dear Sir, I can tell you without fear of contradiction that any Almajiri boy is a potential terrorist. With intellectuals sometimes losing their sense in the hand of theocracy, there is no doubt as to the enormity of damage that could be done to the hearts of young boys who had neither sound Islamic knowledge nor Western education. Sometimes, stone heart develops as a result of hardship. It is in this hardship that these young beggars were born and raised. What can’t hardship, too, do to the heart of man? It there for goes that aside from extreme poverty, another adverse effect which this long-lived trend can have is terrorism. It is the juncture at which all of us unite. When young people who have no idea why they are alive languish in penury, I feel we are all poor. When kids who has no idea how they were made are hired, doctored and turned to terrorists we all are in trouble. The bearing of this phenomenon is not limited to one caste without the other, although the degree with which we are affected may vary.

Given all these, your move is such a commendable one, once again. However, I have a few contributions to your move Sir, not objection. I dare not object a royal recommendation. In our countries and elsewhere in the world, MDAs and bureaucracies continue to grow. We continue to introduce legislations and policies over and over again. Any time one fails, we work out another to replace it, we even fight for local governments to have autonomy, yet it appears to me that the more we make these legislations, the more human beings lose their autonomy and self-determination. It is not an attack on legislations; it’s a call to caution on them. New policy is not always the answer. We must rein in the multiplication of policies. Why not, Sir Emir, suggest to the Federal Government to abolish some of these agencies and Bureaucracies and leave the incontrovertibly assisting ones? This will surely lower the financial burden on the government and money save therefrom might help us provide education for the ailing minds.

Another thing which I think you should look into, sir, concerns the money recovered by this administration from looters, Andrew Yakubu, Diezani and other lots of corruption. It has been rumoured that the Federal Government is willing to use the money to prosecute its infamous pupils-feeding-scheme. Among these pupils are young ones whose parent cannot feed properly at home or foot their transport fare. And there are some among these pupils whose parents have cars or enough money to pay for their transport fare. This simply means that the FG is feeding the poor and the rich equally; while the rich children over-eat the poor one may be having probably just one out of their scheduled two meals per day. What kind of inane scheme is this? That doesn’t multiply the nation’s wealth neither cutback the people's financial burden? Do the FG have any way of knowing whether these kids are underfed or fed with non-nutritional meals? Sir, you can also look into this. What if that money is used to facilitate free transport for children living afar from school premises? We heard that transport to school for secondary and primary pupils Ghana is free. This is not beyond the economy of the latest economy in Africa.
Dear Sir, I think educating the minds of this people will have far-reaching effect than making legislation on their behalf. With majority of those who these laws are made for being obtrusively ignorant, will they ever understand the meaning of this legislation? With majority of them thinking they are just following their religious teachings, will this not look, to them, as a fight against religion? I don’t think it’s right to get fanatics and bigots started on religious frenzy again in this country. I am saying this because the effect will get to me as a commoner before it gets to you. 

Dear Emir, your wealth of knowledge, experience, sophistication, fame and money is not confined to introducing laws. You can channel this wealth to another direction. Why not be a school builder and an employer of teachers of incontrovertible expertise to come and educate this minds in those schools? I heard of your stand against continuous building of mosques that increase religiosity but decrease Godliness. I learnt that you have thrown your wait behind building of education centers rather than building mosques. What a lover of the people you are! Nana Asmau, the daughter of the great Sokoto leader, Sheikh Unman dan Fodiyo did make her mark in assuring women education in the Sokoto caliphate during in course 19th century. Nobody can forget this. Women are no longer treated as chattel, thanks in large to Nana Asmau. 

Dear Emir, why not introduce a kind of legislation that will delegitimize beggary of kids and physically stable persons? This will make you look compassionate more than making you look lordly. I am surely not calling for beggars strike, but I believe if you do this we can totally stamp out kids Almajirism from existence in our shore once and for all. 

Dear Emir, why not let do it this way? I believe if people finally acquire knowledge and could discern what is wrong from what is right, they won’t have to be forced to do the right thing at most times. I believe that when people realize that what they deem right is not only acceptable in the mainstream but also abominable, shame will compel them to abandon it. I strongly believe that if we can facilitate education and hire more people into teaching jobs, many hearts will be reached and morale of hardworking and humanity will emerge. I implore you, sir, never to initiate a bill that will bear semblance to caste segregation. For the anger of ignorant minds who presume themselves religious beyond control can consume our land. Don’t start us on a war that will erode our national peace, we have had enough. I look forward to a day leaders like you will look beyond surface and make great sacrifice for the poor men in our midst. 

I finally I assure you I mean no disrespect with this letter of assurances to the Emir. 

Yours sincerely
Ali Faagba
Ali Faagba currently school in Usman Dan Fodio University, Sokoto.

He can be reached at opeyemi.hamed@yahoo.com