‘It’s unacceptable calling Nigerian language vernacular’

THE Head of School, T-Square Private School, Beckley Estate, Agbado-Ijaiye, Lagos, State Mrs Adebusuyi Abiodun, has urged parents and teachers to help promote indigenous culture by teaching their pupils and children Nigerian languages and cultures.

Mrs Abiodun, who spoke during her school’s African Cultural Day last Friday, said the task did not end at speaking Nigerian languages, but must also entail putting on traditional attire, eating native food, and learning the values, philosophies, history and worldviews of the different cultural groups.

She also urged parents and teachers to show example by being happy to identify with their cultures. She described as unacceptable a situation where Nigerian languages are called ‘vernacular’.

She said: “Our traditional ways of dressing are gradually going down. How many times do you put on your traditional attire in a week or in a month? When last did you speak your local language to your children?

“Today, most young people prefer English dresses to buba, sokoto with abetiaja cap, even when the occasion demands that they dress traditionally. What about the way we respect our elders? In those days, men prostrated while women knelt down to greet their elders.

“What happens these days in the name of civilisation? Sometimes you hear people, even parents, say ‘this is computer age’. What we eat these days are the foreign foods. What has happened to our local delicacies such as okro soup with pounded yam, edika ikong, ogbono, just to mention but a few?”

The chairman of the occasion, Mr. Fashion Adeola, described the event as laudable. He encouraged the children to show respect to elders and people in authorities; to embrace the tenets of hard work; to honour their parents; to be kind and hospitable to visitors; and to take part in community development and maintenance of law and order.

A parent, Mrs Angela Eze, said a part of the importance of the programme was the opportunity it provided the children to learn about other cultures and to learn to live in harmony with people from other cultural or religious backgrounds.