The story of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian teen who successfully beat security agents at the Amsterdam Airport but lost at the point of detonating explosive device hiden in his underwear while on board Northwest Airlines Flight 253, from Amsterdam, Netherlands, to Detroit, Michigan, United States, on Christmas Day, 2009, is one of such cases of how some African students even from decent family background are radicalised while studying in western academic institutions, reports BD SUNDAY.
Testimonies of some family members of Farouk shows that the lad who was age 23 at the time of the incident, was well behaved and had assisted other students in their academic work when he began his studies at the University College London in September 2005, where he studied Engineering and Business Finance, and earned a degree in Mechanical Engineering in June, 2008.
In October 2009, Farouk reportedly sent his father, Umaru Abdulmutallab, a respected Nigerian banker and former chairman, First Bank Nigeria plc, a text message that he was no longer interested in pursuing an MBA in Dubai, and wanted to study sharia and Arabic in a seven-year course in Yemen. When his father threatened to cut off his funding, Farouk said he was already getting everything for free. When his father asked who would sponsor him, Farouk replied: “That’s none of your business” and added that “I am no longer your child.”
Investigation by BD SUNDAY revealed that Farouk’s parents are just one example of several hundreds of elite African parents in general, and the Nigerian parents in particular, who confided in close relatives that they were secretly going through emotional and psychological torture, a consequence brought upon them by their children who studied or are studying in the West.
Only recently, one Izu Eze, a Nigerian graduate from the Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austral, was reportedly converted to Boko Haram extremist group while in Nigeria to participate in the compulsory Nigeria’s national programme otherwise referred to as National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) in Yobe State, northern Nigeria.
“Mum, I am only following you to church out of my respect for you. I don’t believe in God anymore. There is nothing like God of the universe. It is only those who are weak that try to hide in a God that does not exist. I am of age now and I know what is good for me. To be honest with you, I am an Atheist now,” a sad mother, whose two sons are currently studying in the West, quoted her first son in explicit confession to BD SUNDAY, and vehemently rejected the request to have her name in print.
The mother, who is a deaconess in the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), said she and the father were yet to recover from the sudden shock when their now apostate son made his new found faith known to the parents during his recent visit to Nigeria, and expressed fears that Joshua, not real name, who is in his third year abroad may not return to the country after the completion of his studies.
Gabriel Imodojemu, a Lagos-based journalist, told our correspondent how his uncle, a professor at University of Kent, Jamaica (name withheld), withdrew his son from a United Kingdom (UK) university following a sharp departure from a behavioural pattern the son had previously imbibed back in Nigeria before leaving for the UK.
He quoted the uncle as saying that African culture and tradition are seen as crude way of life compared to the new pattern of living as perceived by African children as soon as they secure admission in Western academic institutions.
“My uncle had to withdraw his child out of the school because he took to a behavioural pattern different from what he had as a foundation before he left; especially, inhaling of cocaine, getting whatever he wants without courtesy. My uncle’s decision to withdraw his son was born out of the fact that he had no more regard for the mother. The son said something that touched my uncle’s spine. He told his mother that women are meant to be seen and not to be heard. That statement depicts to my uncle that his son has joined a school of thought that has brainwashed him, hence he decided to bring him back to Africa so that his labour would not to be in vain,” he said.
He further explained that the bitter experience of his uncle, a professor, led him (the uncle) to conclude that African parents must wake to the reality of allowing their children to obtain a first degree within the African shore before crossing to the western world and that by then, they must have been grounded in African norms and core values.
It was gathered that education system was used in some form or another to recruit or radicalise young students; and in some cases, the terrorists, in target of potential recruits, involve in infiltration of teachers and student unions, and exerts total control over curricula and sponsor after-school activities, youth groups, and summer camps aimed at providing additional opportunities for indoctrination and training.
John Orhewere, a three-time head of department and currently, principal lecturer, Federal Polytechnic, Auchi, Edo State, told BD SUNDAY in an interview that tested core African family values have long been sacrificed on the altar of foreign academic institutions and that as a consequence, some African overseas students insist on marrying their cousins upon their return home.
He said: “The issue you are raising is quite touching because it affects many families, if not all families to some extent. Some African students who are blood related even get married to themselves. When they are already involved in love affairs, there is virtually nothing the parents can do even when they return home. This kind of behaviour is necessitated by the Western environment because our cultural background is quite different. What we fear they don’t fear it there. Some of these western countries don’t believe in incest; but the African family system is strongly against incest”.
He noted that some African students abroad have no respect for elders and that in extreme cases, some even dare address their parents by their first name, a behaviour he said is alien to Africa.
“When they come, the traditional respect and humility that is expected of them as they talk and greet those who are elders to them is one of those aspects that African family has lost to western institutions. Also, western approach to family issues is miles apart from that of Africa. Here, we get married to the whole family and everyone is carried along in wedding arrangements. But in the West, it is exclusivity. Some even get married before family members could hear of it,” he said.
He advised that since African parents cannot be stopped from taking their kids to overseas’ schools for fear of losing the children to negative western values at the expense of what they (children) could learn there for the benefit of the continent, African governments should work with the foreign schools to include African studies in their academic curriculums.
“The time is ripe for African governments to work assiduously towards protecting core African family values. With good understanding with these foreign schools, we can include African course in the curriculum of any foreign school where we have agreed percentage of African students. This is not too much to ask since African parents are paying heavily for their children to study in these schools. More importantly, lecturers that would teach the African course should be transported from Africa; because many African lecturers abroad have also lost touch with the term ‘African family value’. But the greater part of the issue still remains in the hands of the African parents. As far as it is good and desirable for us to have our children study abroad, from time to time mention should be made of those values that put the African family ahead of its Western counterpart,” he said.
But, Omoanghe Isikhuemhen, a professor in the department of Natural Resources & Environmental Design, North Carolina Agriculture & Technology State University, USA, told BD SUNDAY in a telephone interview from the US that it would be difficult for African governments to push for an African course in Western academic curriculums since the West already view African culture as primitive.
“I do not really see how this can be possible, because the system is different. Moreover, how do you expect the Western world to accept it when they see what you see as core values as primitive ways of life? In this past June, in Lagos, I saw many male youths with dropping pants much more than I will see in a city in the US. Though I could send away a student with dropping pants from my classroom (I assume many other teachers would do that too), it does not help since most of them I see on the street are wearing dropping pants. In the US for example, I have no business telling a student to pull up their pants, not to mention sending them out of my classroom,” he said.
He said Europe and North America where most elite African parents send their children to, the situation is like what the late Professor Chinua Achebe said in Things Fall Apart that “The white man has put a knife on the rope that holds us together, things have fallen apart,” and that once the core values are compromised, the relationships, manners of approach to family matters no longer mean the same for children who go there.
“I want to assume that divorce rate is higher among these children compared to their counterparts back home. On one hand, the males no longer believe in those core values and roles or a man in a marriage life. The female, see a liberated life and freedom, so much that marriage is no longer seen as ‘for better or worse’, but for ‘as long as it suits my condition’”, he said.
According to him, the primary reason some children with Christian background become atheists after studying in the West, is that most churches in Europe are more of a tourist attraction centres and not a place of worship where majority of these African children go for service on Sundays or other days for religious activities.
“So very easily, many will fine there is no space for church activities in their life. This is also the root cause of the loss of belief in those who turn atheist. However, many who were brought up in Christian or Muslim faith still hold to it and those who wandered away do return to their faith when they become older. The same goes for miniskirts and tights which I could describe as horrible. But I must say that the age at which a child goes abroad to study is a major factor. Those who go when they are 20 years old and above are less affected,” he said.
Christiana Yisua, clinical psychologist and relationship manager, First Bank Capital (FBC) Limited, Lagos, noted in an interview with BD SUNDAY that children’s experiences in the environment they live affect all aspects of their being, from the health of their bodies to the curiosity of their minds.
She said: “When children spend the major parts of their formative years around their parents and other care givers, they tend to be more rounded intellectually and morally; such that even when they find themselves, later in life, in a foreign and different culture, they are not likely to change their belief systems because these (their belief systems) have been caked. Arguably, the formative years of a child are its first few years, yet life lessons such as grooming a home or learning to be a successful spouse and parent are not taught in the classroom or taught to children. Kids learn these qualities as they observe their loving parents live out such qualities.”
According to her, parents, particularly mothers, go through emotional traumas as they watch their wards board the plane on a journey to a distant land where their eyes can’t keep watch on them.
“These children say from age fifteen or even less, go for studies abroad, after which most get job abroad or even marry abroad. Often times, these parents are not able to set their eyes on these children again, sometimes due to lack of cash to fund their regular visit to Africa. The ripple effects of this is that parents, especially mothers, do not have the opportunity forever again to teach their kids, especially the girls, basic principles of growing a successful home. Fathers, too, do not have the opportunity to physically mentor their boys into becoming successful husbands and fathers. Mothers weep privately in their closet when it runs through their minds all these losses, though in the public they appear to be happy,” she said passionately.
She went on to suggest that: “As a mother and psychologist, I will like to recommend that we (African parents and care givers) do not need to put ourselves through all these emotional crises all in the name of meeting up with certain social class; because there are still good academic institutions back here in Africa. Accumulated emotional traumas could lead to certain psychological disorders, such as mood disorders.”
NATHANIEL AKHIGBE
