‘I doesn’t like to dance’

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I am sure my readers would have thought the editors didn’t do their work by allowing such a grammatical error appear as a title of a published article in their paper. Kindly excuse the editors and indeed the writer of this article as this topic is crafted on the basis of a sentence from a foreign graduate who came to the NYSC for mobilisation for National Service. For the records, this particular candidate was among the ones who were blocked from participating in National Service on the basis of poor performance in the pre-screening test usually conducted by the NYSC to weed out fake graduates. I will come back to this later. Just recently, the outgoing Director-General of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, NCDC, Dr Chikwe Ihekweazu visited the NYSC Headquarters on a farewell and thank you visit, having been appointed as Assistant Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO). One of the remarkable things he said was that he was very lucky to have worked with the current NYSC Director-General and the NYSC Scheme as a whole in the fight against the spread of COVID-19. This, according to him, was as a result of the smoothness of the collaboration the two organizations have/had while he held sway as DG NCDC, especially in ensuring the safe return of orientation activities. He even said the NYSC DG couldn’t have come to the Scheme at a better time.

Dr. Ihekweazu was even frank in telling the audience that he has had to bear the pressure from those suggesting that the resumption of the orientation exercise would increase the risk of the spread of COVID-19. The man said that though he was unperturbed by the pressure, he was nonetheless disturbed that little did Nigerians know about the efforts and measures put in place by the Scheme not only aimed at ensuring the safe re-opening of the Orientation camps, but the fight against the pandemic in the Country. He said his success in the fight was attributable to the cooperation of partners like the NYSC. The outgoing NCDC Director-General also said himself and his organization have learnt a lot from the NYSC which has resulted in the recruitment of some serving and former Corps members as Public Health Champions. Considering the above testimony, how can the identification and isolation of Prospective Corps members with COVID-19 at the point of registration for NYSC suggest that the NYSC is responsible for the high rate of infection? Were these prospective Corps members admitted to the Camp? Was the NYSC not even being proactive by identifying those that returned positive, thereby mitigating the spread of the disease?

About a year ago, a certain professor attacked a representative of the NYSC at a meeting of the National Steering Committee (NSC) on Education convened by the Federal Ministry of Education. His major grouse was that the NYSC only succeeded in churning out corps members who lacked any iota of discipline and patriotism. The NYSC representative tried to ‘put it to him’ that the NYSC only distributed bread that had already been baked. He backed that by availing and, indeed, silencing the professor with sample tests conducted by the NYSC on foreign-trained graduates who claimed to have gone through the stages of education including a first degree. Those scripts looked unbelievable but they were actually very real. In fact, the ‘I doesn’t like to dance’ was one of those scripts. How, then, can this be a problem caused by the NYSC?

Sometime in 2015, the NYSC management was disturbed by the preponderance of fake medical reports presented to it. This prompted the scheme to carry out a verification exercise. The exercise revealed that 90 per cent of the medical reports presented by prospective corps members were actually fake. The findings also showed that while some of the reports genuinely emanated from the issuing hospitals, they were issued by unauthorised persons at the facilities. Some were even genuinely issued by certified medical doctors, but whether the sickness was genuine or not, is a subject for another day. Does this in any way, mean that the NYSC is the villain here? The NYSC has even documented all these flaws and presented same during a meeting with the relevant regulatory agencies with a view to drawing their attention to them and adopting collective approach.

During one of the meetings organised for Stakeholders by the NYSC on how to ensure seamless mobilization process, the scheme’s Director-General informed participants of infractions noticed by the scheme, particularly the inclusion (smuggling actually) of unqualified persons into the mobilization list by some unscrupulous officials in some corps producing institutions without the knowledge of the Institutions. As a way to mitigate this, it is now mandatory for all vice chancellors and registrars to indemnify every list coming from their Institutions so as to take full responsibility of any infraction. For the sake of God, is NYSC not working hard to make Nigeria good? Only recently, a portion of a book purported to be from the NYSC was widely circulated in the social media dragging the NYSC into another unwanted popularity. What is most interesting was the obvious fact that many Nigerians, including those who have no business with the well-being of the scheme and its corps members, were more interested in book cover and the portion that talked about insecurity, and not on whether it is true or not and the fact that the NYSC has come out to deny the production as coming from it.

This came at a time when the NYSC was trying to get out of yet another unwanted popularity. I know you know I am talking about Ezeiruaku Ifeyinwa Fidelia, a corps member who was dehumanized by a Female Soldier in Calabar, Cross River State. Of interest to me was the blind eye shown the statement issued by the Nigerian Army, not only condemning the act but also promising to investigate and mete out appropriate sanction(s) to the officer. The talk of the town was that a female corps member was dehumanised by the soldier and the NYSC must ensure that justice was served. I don’t know how else though. I don’t know whether we have all realised that the NYSC received more embarrassment than even the Nigerian Army on this matter. In all of this, my major worry is whether it is the love or hatred we have for the NYSC that is making some Nigerians to, as the proverbial saying goes, ‘treating ringworm while allowing leprosy to pester. If you know you know!