By Dele Sobowale “An excellent plumber is infinitely
more admirable than an
incompetent philosopher [PHD
holder]. A society which scorns
excellence in plumbing, because it
is humble activity, and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy, because
it is an exalted activity, will have
neither good plumbing nor good
philosophy. Neither its pipes nor
its theories will hold water.”
John Gardener, US Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare. I was living and studying, in the
USA, in the late 1960s when
Gardener rendered this piece of
good advice to graduating
students at Harvard University.
His aim was to warn the students not to think that their
degrees made them superior to
others who might not have
university education but who
were contributing greatly to
society. I also worked at Polaroid
Corporation, founded by Dr
(Honorary) Edwin Land, the
university drop-out who started
the revolution in photography by
inventing the first instant camera – which all professors of
Physics said could not be done.
Dr Land eventually employed
nothing less than 345 Ph.D
holders in various departments
of Polaroid Corporation. Some of those who came in with B.Sc
received doctorate degrees
based on experience and
research they conducted at
Polaroid. This is important because
Professor Wale Oladipo, National
Secretary of the People’s
Democratic Party had been
wasting everybody’s time
comparing Jonathan, a Ph.D holder with Buhari – who he
described as a semi-illiterate.
Oladipo, naturally, failed to define
semi-illiteracy in his bid to score
cheap political points. That is
standard practice for Nigerian professors once they enter the
murky waters of politics – they
invariably fail the minimum test
of scholarship which calls for the
definition of terms used in their
presentations. But, let me now take Oladipo up
on his own terms by
acknowledging that Jonathan
holds a doctorate in Zoology. To
begin with few, if any applicants
for admission to university apply for Botany or Zoology. Their first
preferences are often Medicine
or Pharmacy. It is when their
cut-off marks fall below the
requirements for those two
highly exalted professions that they are offered Zoology or
Botany as a condition for
admission to university. It would
be interesting to know if
Jonathan, ab initio, opted for
Zoology or was shunted into that course. More to the point, my questions
are: what had he done with it?
In what way had the Nigerian
society benefited from his work
as a Zoologist? How many papers
had he got published in reputable academic journals of
Zoology? In what ways had he
advanced knowledge in Zoology?
Those are the minimum
requirements for excellence in
academic work and not just the mere possession of a degree –
which is a personal thing. There
are millions of people all over the
world with doctorate degrees
who do nothing with them; they
are just contented to hold the certificates. Meanwhile, there
are technicians who have
invented millions of useful
equipment, household items,
medical and diagnostic materials
without the benefit of doctorate degrees. Professor Oladipo will
surely agree with me, if he is not
too far gone for redemption,
that a Bill Gates or Edwin Land,
both without Ph.Ds, had
benefited the world far more than a million Jonathans and
Oladipos who have nothing
comparative to their credit but
their certificates. CONTINUITY – FROM THOSE
WHO MADE YOUR CHRISTMAS
MISERABLE “Continuity” Jonathan’s
adverts lining Abuja Airport. Nigerians had the worst
Christmas since I was born. There
was no money. Even Federal
Government staff were not paid.
There was even black out for
several hours on the 25th. Lean pickings at dinning tables and
thread-bare clothes rounded up
the dreary occasion. Still PDP wants continuity. Among
other horrors and atrocities
implied in that request, consider
these — continuity of bleak
Yuletides; continuity of excuses
for not generating more than 4000MW of electricity in 16
years; continuity of frequent
ASUU strikes; continuity of mass
failure in WASC and, now, Law
School; continuity of Ministers
purchasing bullet-proof cars and spending billions chartering jets;
continuity of Ministry of Interior
and other services collecting
money from young job applicants
and killing some of them and
nobody got punished for it; continuity of pensioners dying on
queues; continuity of missing
Chibok Girls and kidnapped
women; continuity of 400,000
barrels of crude stolen everyday
in the Niger Delta; continuity of an unelected woman going about
disrupting the lives of people
everywhere she goes; continuity
of NNPC not accounting fully for
revenue generated; continuity of
depleting External Reserves; continuity of depleted Excess
Crude Oil….Need I continue? In short CONTINUITY at your own
peril. You will have a choice in
February – to decide if that is
what you want. POWER SECTOR VERSUS
NIGERIANS: WAR DECLARED. “A man [or group] cannot be too
careful in its choice of enemies.” Oscar Wilde, 1854-1900 I spent the whole of last year
persuading people in my
community that Power
Distributors were slow in
providing metres because they
didn’t have the funds. I pleaded they be given more time. After
that stupid N500m donation, I will
lead the attack on DISCOS from
now on. THANKS FOR STAYING WITH US
IN 2014. I received more Yuletide
greetings than I could possibly
acknowledge one by one. As
usual, I thank everyone – those
who agreed, and especially,
those who disagreed with me, even Aribisala, on anything
written last year. Have a
pleasant 2015. Those who
disagree and live, live to
disagree another day. We shall all
live. Amen.

FOOLS ALERT! Show me a
jonathan supporter and i will
show you a fool. Jonathan= fools
colony

We all are a witness to a lecturer at Unilag describing Mr. Jonathan as "a disgrace to PhD holders"

See these apc iddiotss o.


First tell old muhamadu to at least attend KG 1