Pegging Varsity Admission To 18 Years Policy Designed Against South, Middle Belt – Pan Yoruba Group

By Akinwale Kasali

Pan Yoruba Group under the aegis of Alliance for Yoruba Democratic Movement, AYDM, has frowned at the decision of the Federal Government to peg University and Polytechnic admission at 18 years. It  stressed that the policy is  driven by ethnic interests.

The Minister for Education, Mamman Tahir, had on Thursday, ordered all Tertiary Institutions to stick to the Federal Government’s Policy of offering admission to only candidates from age 18 and above.

But the AYDM insists it is a deliberate policy against the South and the Middle Belt Regions.

In a statement on Thursday by the Group’s Secretary General, Popoola Ajayi, the AYDM said the idea of having higher education admission pegged at 18 years will affect no fewer than 20 million Nigerian students with 99 percent of them from the South and the Middle Belt.

The group called on Southern and Middle Belt states to resist what it  called the “obnoxious policy”.

AYDM, a coalition of 130 Pan Yoruba and Itsekiri groups said the attempt of the policy was based on the strategic thinking of filling the current education gap skewed against the core North.

The Group said Nigeria is gradually moving towards greater and dangerous unitarianism where fundamental decisions that affect the livelihood of Nigerians will be taken by individuals.

It lamented that instead of the National Assembly presiding over fundamental issues on Education, the Minister has autocratically assigned the role of Alpha and Omega to himself.

AYDM queried the Minister to explain to Nigerians which research study or conference he organised where such a fundamental decision was arrived at.

He said, “The AYDM and the Yoruba Nation rejects this terrible assault on the knowledge industry. In Europe and in the US, the hub of Western education, there are University graduates that came out of school at 10 years.”

He said “the policy destroys creativity, talents and endowment given by God. It is obnoxious and savage to think that a 16 year old person cannot learn when such a child had performed wonderfully throughout his or her educational career in the secondary schools.”

The AYDM added that Children who are 16 Years can be allowed to beg on the streets but they are banned from University or Polytecnic Education.

“Children who are 16 Years can join Boko Haram and terrorists but they are banned from University Education.

“Students who are 16 Years can go into armed robbery but they are banned from University Education. 16 years old can marry and have children but they are banned from University Education” the AYDM said.

The group called on groups across the Middle Belt and the South to unite in the effort to thwart and destroy the primordial agenda of the Minister of Education.

The AYDM said in decent democracies, under aged children with talents are encouraged to actualize their potentials and not to destroy and take away from them the gifts of God.