Academic Genocide of the OROKO

Each time I happen to calculate the amount of money invested on education by Oroko parents and the return obtained from these investments which are brought in by those who were educated, my heart sinks. I have thought about this for a longtime and each time, like many Oroko kids, I weep and sometimes shed warm tears of pain because the system has victimized us all. This academic genocide, has lasted for too long and it is time for the Oroko, to wake-up and reflect on their academic path, learning curve and professional career.

What most Oroko people do not understand is that, most students should be retained to study in Technical Schools or professionalize their skills, educate and develop their hands-at work knowledge. Those that go to study in general education or grammar schools should be the handful who failed to be bright and intelligent. On the contrary, these grammar people, are the ones the Oroko have been and are producing in the name of intellectuals; I hold a degree in this, in that or am studying that and that, only to come back after wasting all their youthful exuberance either studying, looking for “salaried jobs or writing “concours”

What really worries me most is that, this seems to be endemic for each Oroko village I try to assess from the little that is generated in that village. Most often than not, after a series of years, there is practically no return from what their hardworking parents invested on them. Maybe their parents wrongfully educated them or maybe due to the illusion sold to them by boisterous salaried workers from government-run professional schools in the City on Four Hills.

The burning truth is that, instead of training Oroko children in technical skills that permits them solve our everlasting problems, parents prefer the bureaucratic and certificate amassing system. This system which strives to instill hope in obtaining certificates with the pretext that, the more certificates the child obtains; the more his or her way is paved towards a highly paid job. Here, it matters not if you possess the skills necessary to build a house, mold blocks, wire a house, paint a house, multiply a plantain sucker or convert waste into renewable energy. In most of these villages especially in the Balue, Bakundu and Mbonge, what is taken into account, is the number of degrees you obtain; your certificate reflects your social status or portrays how much you will someday end as salary.

We, the Oroko, lack entrepreneurs, engineers, agronomists, foresters, plant breeders, geneticists yet, we cry everyday of lack of industrial development within Oroko land. This is academic genocide, mental redundancy and cultural servitude engulfing the Oroko land which has consequently reduced us to powerless noise-makers, complainers and materially poor in the midst of wealth. Furthermore, the Oroko are yet to contextualize and aspire breaking-out of the poverty trap through the education-development nexus, for over 49 years, we remain in a poverty trap. What is the necessity for all these certificates when we can’t use them to construct pipe borne water or teach modern farming and improve crop varieties that adapt to the changing climate in Oroko land? What added value do these certificates create or have created around Oroko villages? The indoctrination of children and sale of an illusionary paradise obtained from certificates, has not protected us from perpetual enslavement.

Over 49 years ago, we naively made a tragic error accepting a system of education that has repeatedly invaded Oroko land, looted its people and spiritually enslaved us. We can never refute the fact that, this system of education is some form of mental slavery. Why is this system not producing individuals capable of creating jobs, engines, banks, designs and Oroko companies? Honestly, this system solely produces employees not employers with generations upon generations of families enslaved towards salaried work. Oroko parents spend huge sums of money year in year out for an educational system where their children are taught how to manage banks but not how to create one; how to wear suits and jackets but not how to make one for themselves and how to become a doctor but not how to build a hospital or produce the drugs needed to run the hospital.

The Oroko have been kept at the bottom of the social ladder for too long, we need to stand up against this system and embrace one that serves our interest, one that creates wealth, excellent captains of industry armed with intelligence to play a leading rule in the key domain of wealth creation.  Most people will say that, the government is not doing enough to help the Oroko create its industries and become self-dependent. I don’t think that’s true because, we cannot study to the level of obtaining a university degree if it is valuable, and still talk like mentally dependent uncultivated people. On the other hand, our degree holders should stop complaining and accept the fact that, it is only through their initiative that they will break free from this poverty trap. Morso, free your minds from the notion that, everything must be free and that it is the responsibility of the state to take care for you.

Let the Oroko harmonize their efforts and stand on the foundation of social capital, creating internal cohesiveness and generating riches necessary for our collective advancement. Education does not mean learning to depend on government, becoming a liability but acquiring instruments necessary to go from nothing to something, create riches and become self-dependent. No Oroko man can do remarkably well while working for others because the main function of their existence rotates around creating wealth for others. This is because salaried workers from one generation simply pass-over poverty to the next generation. Their children will remain as servants to the children of the person who owns the company they work for. This is how total subordination is created and transmitted for generations.

The Oroko situation will be radically different if, one generation decides to break or walk-free from this tragic vicious cycle of poverty programmed in advance. If one generation accepts to crack their minds, coordinate effort, work intelligently, create and manage their own company and free themselves from perpetual slavery working for others. Therefore, the future generations, will grow up seeing their parents generating wealth for the family through their own initiative.

Oroko land is in dire need of potential job creators, able to take control of our youths, industrial wizards endowed with knowledge of the fact that, if they are poor materially today, it is because they have not done what they are supposed to do to become rich. The Oroko man must take total responsibility of his failure and understand that, we are not poor because of our government but because we don’t want to get mentally mature enough to outgrow the cage of mental dependence that permits us to act like owners of ourselves.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2016

Long Live OROKO!

I will be back!