Last week I was in Enugu and decided to visit my alma mater, University of Nigeria Enugu Campus (UNEC). Right from the gate, the school was different as expected, from the one I left 17 years ago. The uncompleted gate house and bad road therein was not welcoming. On getting to my former hostel which was the raison d'etre I went to the school, I found out that Mariere Hall, the seat of power, had become a female hostel!! My heart sank. I could not imagine this happening when we were at UNEC. But I was in for a greater shock! On enquiry, it turns out only Kenneth Dike and Mbonu Ojike are male hostels and the rest are now female. I was told the hostel allocation is a reflection of the ratio of female to male students in the school now. According to the three students I spoke with, there are now more female students in the school.
What is happening to our Igbo young men? Can someone with access to data tell me the current numbers are not correct? The hue and cry in most developing nations is the education of the girl child. Should ours in Igbo land be the education of the male child? One of the students told me the males are at Onitsha, Aba and Alaba markets. The industry and business acumen of the Igbo man is an asset which if not properly managed can become a liability. It's time we told our children and relatives that education will make them better entrepreneurs and equip them with the basics to become better business men.
It was not all gloom and doom at UNEC as I saw the law faculty had new buildings, a few other constructions were on, including one on the site where Ugwum Odunze, Eberechukwu Perez Okonkwo, John Iwueke and I played football. I left the school feeling sad on the Igbo male enrollment issue and the decay in the road infrastructure in the school. I couldn't get to the front of Lady Ibiam as the road was really bad. For a school set out to restore the dignity of man, the dignity of the environment needs restoration first.
By the way, the business faculty students now wear "uniforms" like their law counterparts!!
Bishop Sam Chidoka
This reminds me of the statistic that I was presented with by the former VC of UNN, Prof. Ginigeme Mbanefo in 1998 that among the Igbos admitted in UNN that year, the ratio was 3:1 in favour of female students. This was when we were negotiating the transfer of Manuwa hall from a male hostel to a female hostel. That singular information swayed the negotiation in favour of the transfer. It seems the situation has remained same and may have got worse.
Sammy
ReplyDeleteFirst off, there are more females that males in the world - remember Biology and the X & Y chromosomes? I recall my surprise a few years back during the baptism of my last child. He was the only male out of 12 children baptised that day! I joked that he is "blessed among women".
If you want additional pointers, ask your kids the ratio of boys to girls in their class here in cosmopolitan Lagos. You will be surprised to find that not only are there more girls, but they are also doing better than the boys on the average.
So, it's not an Igbo thing. It's the new world order. A woman's world beckons.
First I am not sure there are more females than males for the age bracket in question. More males are still born today but males die younger because of our propensity to attempt the risky and downright incredulous compared to females. On Igbos, we now have more educated females than males. Our brothers are at Alaba, Onitsha bridge head, Aspanda etc.
DeleteThink about your extended family and kingsmen, mine suggests the men want to "do business" and the females more interested in going to school. UNEC went from five male and two female hostels to the reverse at the moment. The main culprits, Igbos, ratio of 7:3 in favour of the females among the Igbos. I don't have the statistics for the overall male to female ratio in UNEC but I can bet it's not as bad as that amongst the Igbos.