Protocols:
I salute you all especially the organizers of this great occasion. I want to particularly thank Professor B. C. Ozumba who I am sure nominated me for this great assignment. It is an indication of his special confidence in me. In a way too, for me, it is like coming home to an Institution that invested so much in me so that by this role which I am playing today, I am enjoying the privilege of being part of this University’s effort as it tries to establish this chair in honour of one of its greatest professors who has passed on to the great beyond.
Professor Kessandu Ogan was the founding Head of Department of Obstetrics and Gyneacology in this College of Medicine which has produced over six thousand (6000) Doctors since its inception. Pioneers often grapple with a myriad of problems. They assemble pioneer staff, procure first sets of equipment, handle accreditation matters and interpret approved curriculum as well as implement them so that over time they set standards which are supposed to compare with best practices locally and internationally. When the pioneer’s visions are clear and when he diligently sets out to lay enduring foundations he ends up crafting a system that stands firm no matter the intensity of tectonic forces that buffet the foundations the pioneer lays. Products from this medical school are creating waves all over the world in the practice of medicine, which to me, is an indication of the solidity or impregnability of the foundations on which the Medical School of our University of Nigeria was built by the pioneers who laid the foundations on which it stands today. One of those who took pain in establishing this College on sound, very sound foundations, is our elder brother Professor Kesandu Ogan who is being honoured today.
Since I was told to speak on any topic of my choice, I decided to look back in time, especially the time when Professor Kesandu Ogan laid the foundation which is still standing today. I have therefore gone even beyond this time, as far as my own experiences and indeed the recorded experiences of others. I have tried to identify other great authors of great foundations that have stood the time.
I have chosen the topic so as to remind us all who are beneficiaries of these standing foundations that we owe their authors some respect or gratitude. The foundations which these heroes laid for us were supposed to be there for us to stand on and launch this nation to another level of growth and accomplishment. It would then be for us to individually and collectively ask ourselves whether we have done well, given the foundations laid for us to operate from. It will be an opportunity for us to see whether we have advanced their worthy expectations of us or whether we have been woeful failures in the accomplishment of their plans for us. My discussion will apply generally to Nigeria but I will pay particular attention to the situation as it affects the South East of Nigeria. I know too that the situation is not particularly different in other geopolitical zones of Nigeria.
Professor Kesandu Ogan was a teacher and medical doctor who practised at the summit of these positions. I am also aware that he served in other capacities outside these two areas. For the purpose of our interaction today, I see him as a pioneer teacher who taught medicine and laid the foundation as a great teacher of medicine in this College of Medicine.
Some Of The Great Foundations And Their Authors:
1. TRANSPORT SECTOR: One of the thrills I had growing up was to travel by train. There were times I would, along with mates in 70s, board a train from Umuahia to Enugu and return to Umuahia. The Railway System afforded parents the means for moving their children unaccompanied from their stations of residence to their school stations. Northern bound students whose parents resided in the North would merely accompany their wards to railway stations and had no fears whatsoever about their safety. It was no wonder that some of the most known towns in Nigeria were located along the Railway lines – Markurdi, Oturkpo, Enugu, Afikpo, Ovim, Umuahia, Aba, Port Harcourt, Kafanchan, Zaria, Ibadan, Lagos etc. Those who laid the foundation for the Railway System in Nigeria had great plans. From the North, the Rails provided easy facilities for moving economic products to either the Port Harcourt ports or the Lagos ports. Cattle, palm produce, ground nuts, minerals especially solid minerals, were moved to their ports of export at very low cost and in great safety. I can remember very few accidents; the Langalanga disaster in particular. While travelling by train, you could move about from coach to coach, interact with co-passengers and make great friends. The foundation was well thought out and religiously implemented. It made the roads as a means of transport less congested and consequently long lasting.
What do we see today? Railway lines have become market places where all sorts of merchandise are sold. Some property of the Railway Corporation have been appropriated and sold by invisible but palpable Nigerians. Heavy trucks of all dimensions and make ply our roads. Night travels have become a way to reduce the congestions. Commuters travel at great risks to lives. Even with an efficient Federal Road Safety Corps, accidents of great dimensions and robberies are common features on our roads. Despite huge sums of monies invested in road construction yearly, the roads fail with constant rapidity and vexatious frequency. If our Government had built on the foundations of the colonial masters, we would have been somewhere else as a nation in the transportation of goods in this country. One would have expected that by now the Railways would have been extended to Calabar, Warri, Benin, Sokoto, Ogoja. Speed trains that facilitate movement of human beings in advanced economies and in reasonable comfort should long have been a feature of our transportation system. In place of the Railway we “invented transport by motorbikes” whose major contribution to the economy was the advancement of the practice of orthopaedic medicine and amputation of limbs with expert skills across the nations. Robbery by “these skilled motorbike transporters” has caused us to advance into another great improvement in the transport sector, the introduction of “keke Napep”.
I still remember that our Inland waterways were fully developed and functioned efficiently as a means for travelling. I enjoyed travelling by boat between Calabar and Oron in dignity and comfort as a young man. I do not know what happened to such companies as the Elder Dempster Lines. Greta foundations existed in the transport sector of our economy. Who uprooted those great foundations? Why have we not grown these institutions beyond where we met them some 30 years ago?
2. COMMERCE AND INDUSTRY: during our studies of Geography in those days, even a dull pupil could represent the Map of Nigeria, showing the location of industries then. Even now, as I speak, I can, in my miknd imagine the map of Nigeria and locate such great industries as Nkalagu Cement Factory, Michelin Factory in Port Harcourt, Leather Tanneries in Zaria not to talk of numerous others located in Lagos. In that map I can imagine the location of those great pyramids of groundnuts, those blooming oil plantations and mills in Calabar, Sapele and Benin from where the Malaysians picked a few trees to develop theirs to what it is today. I can imagine the sea ports in Nigeria and the activities of old UAC (not Mr. Biggs) SCOA, and similar other commercial establishments that gave employment to our parents. These companies also existed as responsible corporate citizens. In the East, I remember the great Ceramics Industry located very close to the Golden Breweries. Can I ever forget the radio jiggles on “Oyoyo Mmin”? What could have happened to the foundations laid by our earlier political leaders in Commerce and Industry? Does Nkalagu still exist as a town? Could it be that the limestone there got exhausted? Could we not have developed our cement industry to a level that we should now have been net exporters of cement? What happened to the foundations? What?
To be continued ...
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