Almajirai: The Shame Of Northern Elites

By David-Chyddy Eleke

Between yesterday and today, there has been news of the interception of almajirai, being transported in trucks in several states in southern Nigeria.

Almajirai. Photo credit: Premium Times Hausa

Before now, I only knew of Almajeri children, but the persons intercepted in Enugu, Anambra, Abia, and other states in the south were all full grown adults.

In one of the vehicles in which they were brought into Anambra, someone posited that to pay the fare for a comfortable Sienna bus from Kano to the east at this time would be at least N10,000. And one wonders if the Almajeri boys have that much and didn’t stay in their states?

A bus intercepted around Enugu and turned back confessed that each of them paid a bribe of N40,000 to be allowed into the state, and one again wonders if the Almajirai were that rich, yet we see pictures of them lined up in the homes of rich individuals in the north awaiting just a plate of food.

If they beg for food, which I know they do, the boys I saw in all the pictures of the interceptions at borders will most likely not be able to afford their own fare from far north to the east at normal times, not to talk of now that fares have skyrocketed.

Puting two and two together, it will not be wrong to conclude that the Almajeri boys are being deliberately sponsored to travel out of their states of origin, into the southern states.

But what could be the reason of such sponsorship at a dire time like this?

Save for Lagos, which is understandably cosmopolitan and very heavily populated, the state’s that have taken the centre stage in declaration of Covid-19 patients are states in the north.

Beyond that, more than half of the cases declared daily are all from the Almajerai. One may therefore not be wrong to say that the aim of sponsoring them out of their states of origin are either; to depopulate their states of the pandemic cases and or a deliberate attempt to ensure that the north does not bear the brunt of the rising cases alone, but to send the Almajerai out, so as to infect those in the south in large numbers.

To think that for the better part of the existence of the contraption called Nigeria, the North and her elite has largely ruled the country, both as military and civilian leaders leaves one with the thought of why despite the ample opportunities at their disposal, a large chunk of their youths have remained destitutes.

From being street beggars at a very tender age, they grow into urchins. No wonder there is a large cache of youths from where the Boko Haram sect are funded with human capital, despite killing of its armies year after year for over a decade now.

The governors of the South East can at this point meet and decide to protect their people if they still have their balls intact. You may not agree with the leadership style of Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State, but a little madness is good at times.

We must not let our ‘conquerors’ conquer us a second time, after struggling to rise from the bruises of the civil war. It is time for South East governors to show the Okonkwo spirit in every Igbo man by standing firm and condemning any attempt to compromise their territory.

Before I end, permit me to put the blame of the Almajeri culture in the north squarely on the doorsteps of the leaders of that region. If you have ever been or still is a councillor, LG boss, lawmaker (state and federal), commissioner, minister or a leader of thought of any kind, and you held this position in the north, the Almajeri culture is your shame, so, I say – shame on you all. Shame, shame, shame, SHAME!