Now, who in this country will write a tribute to celebrate you, Maiwada Danmallam? Let me be honest, this man--and no disrespect meant--is one of the most prolific writers I have ever come across. I cant even begin to mention the things I have learnt from him. Look, below is one of his as usuals, read, if you have never read him, and make your decision. His tribute to Nasir Yammama, our brother, is one thing even those who are so close to him, will not think of--and if they do, they will not; but Maiwada thought and did it! Read this literary freestyle at its best! ----------------------------------------------- Maiwada Dammallam NASIR YAMMAMA: TRIBUTE TO AN ALMAJIRI WHIZKID - They say success have a thousand fathers and so does it. Success attracts attention just as light to moths. This age old belief was manifestly clear in the manner many Nigerians are reacting to the phenomenal rise of a 24yr old Nasir Yammama, from Malumfashi Local Government of Katsina State in the heart of the North. Typical of Nigeria, rather than celebrate the success of this young man in a unified manner expected of a nation left lagging behind in global affairs, its the usual us vs them syndrome taking charge and determining how we savor this national success. Its not unexpected. Nigeria is so systematically polarized that success and failure are always judged on a scale of regionalism and religiosity rather than individuality. Of course, Im conscious of the effect a picture of an Almajiri rubbing shoulders with Virgin Atlantic Boss, Richard Bronson on the strength of his intellectualism could have on a politically polarized, socially confused and economically numb society like Nigeria. What I cannot fathom is the excessive expression of hatred towards the North by many brainwashed analysts. Yammama is not the first Northerner to expose the fallacy of an imposed idea of intellectual retardation, mental laziness and social backwardness against the Northern region and, neither will he be the last. Success in Nigeria is a Southern thing. Before him, Jelani Aliyu, the world acclaimed Sokoto State indigene automobile designer - the brain behind General Motors hybrid Chevvy Volt, a car that revolutionized the global automobile world was there. It took the Southern Press and their loyal and extremely gullible followers awfully long and, of course an unequivocal conviction that Jelani Aliyu is a phenomenon thats here to stay before they accorded him his respectable place in Nigeria. Call it an induced support if you like. It was obvious Jelani Aliyu could have been lost to history but for the unbiased support of his host country, the USA which is now reaping more benefits from his intellect for their investment and trust in his ability. Hot on the trail of Jelani Aliyu is Muhammad Abdulkarim. Not many might have read the uncelebrated story of Abdulkarim, the young Yobe State citizen who emerged winner of the best student award at the Advanced Topics in Artificial Intelligence Conference in Singapore few years ago. Abdulkarims story was enough to make Nigeria blow its largest trumpet but for his regional Almajiri bloodline. This Almajiri managed to beat the only other awardee in the contest who happened to be a Professor from Switzerland. The story of Abdulkarim was as pathetic as much as it was frustrating. He managed to escaped Nigerias madness after efforts to secure scholarship to pursue his dream were unsuccessful. A Phd student of Universiti Teknologi Petronas, Abdulkarim was the only African at the Conference which was attended by scientists from New York Institute of Technology, University of Tulsa, University of Surrey and many others. Before his sojourn to Malaysia, he was a junior lecturer with the University of Abuja in the department of Mathematics, Statistics and Computer Science. A research fellow in the Electro-Magnetic (EM) research group which was mainly into deep and shallow water technology and enhanced oil discovery. Although Abdulkarims research domain was electrical and electronic engineering, his specific area was data mining which deals with application of artificial neural network techniques for modeling seabed logging environment. Just like Yammamas revolutionary agronomy mobile app will undoubtedly revolutionize agriculture, Abdulkarims invention was the illusive answer to the obsolete system of detecting offshore presence of oil and gas reservoirs that could change oil exploration for good. How Nigeria, particularly the North failed to notice this genius is the greatest mystery of the century. By its antecedents, Nigeria could be said to have veered off the path of developmental progress and success by ignoring local talents through a funny process of selecting and developing its best brains. Where serious nations harness, support and build their best brains to achieve optimum potentials, Nigeria dont even know they exist; where it does they are subjected to the same primeval accreditation process where race and creed is favored over brain quality. Funny enough, rather than accept this national deformity and work towards reversing this trend, strenuous efforts is being wasted seemingly aimed at breaking these nerds for their regional background. Yammama is currently on the radar of Lagos/Ibada Press axis, as well many bigoted online publications for the simple offence of representing UK in the upcoming Microsoft sponsored Global Technology competition. One may ask, where was Nigeria when UK created for Yammama the conducive atmosphere to develop his potentials and went ahead to beat over 2000 contestants to emerge the winner of the British Council/Virgin Atlantic airlines’ Enterprise Challenge? Had Yammama relied on Nigeria and its faulty system to achieve his goal, he would have remained just one of the many unemployed/unemployable half baked army of graduates roaming Nigerian cities at the mercy of killer morons like the untouchable Minister of Interior, Abba Moro. Whats wrong with paying kindness with kindness. We keep missing the point. Loyalty, no matter how desperately you want to have it, is not a birthright. It is earned! By the way, most of the characters sharing these lies are people that spend half their lifetime sleeping in front of American and UK Embassies trying to play the comic Buhari era Andrew. In any case, Nasir Yammama have made his position clear about his UK representation and it was nothing near the Yammama-dumped-Nigeria-for-UK silly theory being propagated by the Press. His articulate interview in the current edition of the Weeklytrust was clear about his love for Nigeria and the circumstances behind his UK representation in the upcoming event. Most importantly, people close to the young man could attest to his supportive successful background and strong familial and royal privileges to even assume he could contemplate abandoning his roots to play second class citizen anywhere in the world. He came from one of the largest most successful families in Northern Nigeria whose penchant and uncompromising belief in building on the legacies of the family is well known in Nigeria and beyond. Take it or leave it, Nasir Yammama is a Nigerian and just like generations of his family before him will certainly remain a worthy ambassador of his family and his country. Better learn how to deal with it.
Posted on: Mon, 14 Jul 2014 02:56:48 +0000
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