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Samuel A. Ogungbemi
Another year has come for another children’s day celebration. There is no doubt that the founders of this eventful day have done well by bringing the recognition of children worldwide to the awareness of all and sundry. On this note, I join all well wishers to congratulate the children all over the world.
All living creatures have continued to depend on their offspring for their continuity and sustenance. Little wonder an African adage says “When a rodent gets old, it feeds on the breast of its offspring”. God has plan for children when he said in the Holy Book, “Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth”. With this clear statement, God provides all that is necessary for children to come to the family where they can be nurtured and tutored to fulfil God’s purpose for their lives and for nation-building. When a child is likened to heat or power produced by fuel, it means that a child should be full of vigour, energy, power, enthusiasm and agility.
Children grow up to be youths. Youths are very vigorous to go out for battle to make exploits. They are not only strong physically, they are strong spiritually. They are not only agile to go to battle; they are also prepared to emerge victoriously. Youths are blessed with enough ideas, strength, ability and agility to move their nations forward if only they are encouraged, motivated and allowed to prove their good and lofty ideas. Victor Hugo, the great nineteenth- century French writer, once wrote, “There is nothing as powerful as idea whose time has come.” In other words, children as the fuel of a nation should always be given chance to prove themselves. This trait being present in the life of a child or youth makes them very active in carrying out any task successfully without wavering.
It is therefore not an overstatement that children are the heartbeat or big heart of a nation. Fuel is a by- product got from natural crude oil and when used in an engine, care must be taken so that the fuel is not al- lowed to dry up or exhausted; otherwise, such engine will stop working or may even knock down completely thereby causing loss of valuable time and resources to fix or replace it. In similar manner, children must not be allowed to go into adolescence beret of useful knowledge that will make them become enviable citizens in our society. There is no doubt that children and youths are the pillars of any nation. Their energy, inventiveness, creativity, ingenuity, prowess, preference and passion have direct relationship to the pace of national development. As the fuel of a nation, it is important to painstakingly look at families whose actions or inactions determine the fate of children in nation building.
The stakeholders in the training of children include parents (first hand stakeholder), religious leaders, teachers and government. These are largely in control of children’s development and consequently their fulfilment of God’s purpose for their lives. “Whatever a child achieves in life is dependent on the nature and nurture of that child”. What a child has inherited or imbibed from their stakeholders holds weight and matters a lot in moulding their lives. The nurture on the other hand has to do with the environment in which a child grows up. It is widely accepted by experts in children development, that the nurture or environmental circumstances play a more significant role in determining who and what a child be- comes in life. This is the singular reason why all and sun- dry should not fold their arms in training and nurturing our children for a better future and for nation-building.
The Holy Book puts it thus, “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it”. The exemplary life displayed by stakeholders at home, market, place of worship, school, work place among others is very crucial in the sociological, physiological and psychological development of a child.
The unbecoming attitudes of many of our politicians, policemen and all other law enforcement agents, market women with unjust measure, unscrupulous persons as quack doctors, unpatriotic customs officials, indolent lecturers, motorcycle riders, motor drivers, men of God who are not after soul winning but after wealth, abusive husbands, disrespectful mothers, to mention but a few, speak volumes of the type of role models we are passing over to the next generation. Children are very inquisitive, quick emulators and “copy cat”. Training and teach- ing children on good role models should be with passion and should start from home at a tender age or childhood.
For children to be effective, well shaped and well brought up. It should be the responsibility and duty of all and sundry in the society. It becomes imperative to be devoted to the physical, spiritual, psychological, sociological, educational and spiritual or religious needs of these children if they must be materials to build a virile nation in future. Parents must address the psychological needs of a child. This ensures a child is brought up to be self confident. Meeting the sociological need of children is the responsibility of the parents and the government. This is done by creating conducive environments for children to grow well, educating them to interact and develop their ingenuity, creativity and innovative- ness for nation building. Defilement and sexual abuse of innocent children, kidnapping, armed robbery, thuggery, cyber crimes, child trafficking are anti-social practices which can never give room for conducive environments for children to reach the height of their potentials. Inability to wipe out these vices from our society or to reduce them to the barest minimum to enable every person including children and youth to relax, think and maximise their potentials is a failure of any government in power. Deliberate efforts must be made to eliminate these vices from the society to avail children the opportunity to become effective nation builders.
With respect to educational needs, in addition to the role of parents, government should formulate sound and good policies that favour the provision of quality and quantitative education as fundamental human rights of every child without discrimination. Every child should have access to qualitative basic education. A child that has sound and solid training foundation from his/her parent, that grows up in a conducive political climate, that is nurtured in an egalitarian society, that is brought up in a disciplined society where fundamental human rights are observed, respected and protected, that is indoctrinated in every word of our National Anthem, that is taught the history of our past heroes in Nigeria, that is taught to know the norms and ethics of our society, that is religiously taught the fear of God and imbibes these virtues will be an asset to the nation. The quality of public governance in planning the future of children and youths should be improved. Realistic budget allocation should be made by all levels of government to enhance technical, formal and informal functional education.
Ogungbemi, a cleric, writes from Ibadan
