PETER MBAH’S FORGERY CASE: I WILL SOON BECOME A PROFESSOR IF……

By John Agbo (John Lead). 

Growing up, I had the ambition to be so many things in this life. What I wanted to become varied greatly with the particular stage of life I was at that point in time. For instance, when I was in secondary school, all that occupied my mind then was to become a radio or television broadcaster. This particular ambition was a direct product of my exposure to the only available mass media in the society then. Radio broadcasting was so popular and rampant that every home relied heavily on it for getting information on whatever was happening at that time. Remember that I belong to a generation that went to secondary school when nobody in the entire world could predict or forecast the emergence of social media in the near future. This ambition was equally being fertilized by my then penchant for using high sounding English words in communicating with everyone in the school. I can remember using an improvised megaphone to run football commentaries whenever my school was playing Match in the field. This was always done in obvious imitation of the then legendary Emeka Odikpo and Richard Asiegbu of the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN). This duo always run football commentaries for Radio Nigeria whenever the super eagles of Nigeria was playing any Match those days. Note that I was neither a footballer myself nor a football fan till date. My interest was solely on Radio and TV. Broadcasting and nothing more.

But towards the end of my secondary school, my ambition began to shift ground. Before I knew it I completely graduated from being a foremost art student to an ambitious science student. At this point I now wanted to become anything that relates to hospital and began to pursue the same with added vigour. I ended up getting admission into a highly rated medical course in the University. And you know what? Yours sincerely noticed that his ambition has moved from wanting to be just a medical practitioner to something more. In a  University community, the Professor is the most important person and he is almost always being worshiped by everyone. So your John lead now wants to become a professor and began to work towards it. I reasoned that having almost achieved becoming a medical professional, it will not be a big deal if I aspire to become a professor in addition. 

Fast forward to after graduation and the reality of Nigeria’s situation began to readjust everyone’s ambition automatically. I was never alone in this journey of oscillating ambition in life, every young person wants to be whatever that is highly cherished by the society. And for the men of my generation unlike those of today, all that we wanted to become revolved around going to school and its related activities. However today, so many of us have moved on with whatever that Nigeria state can offer us irrespective of what we wanted to be. Some people have become things they never contemplated in this life. Some have even abandoned all the certificates they acquired in the course of time and joined our counterparts in the trading or business world to the admiration of some of us who continue to cling onto our certificates like a new born baby clinging onto its mother.

But one ambition I have refused to let go is that of becoming a Professor. And the current happening in the forgery case of the INEC governor of Enugu State Peter Mbah, more than any other factor stands the chance of affording me my age long ambition. Yes since the INEC Gov. Mbah has the impetus to sue NYSC after forging its certificate and demanded payment of whooping 20 billion naira, and since he is using or intending to use the court to stop the NYSC from coming to court to prove  his forgery case, one can easily amass a bunch of hope that in the likely event that Mbah succeeds, (remember everything is possible in Nigeria) it will provide a leeway to those of us who have sustained our boyish ambitions towards achieving it through Peter Mbah’s approach. It will definitely not matter that I am currently just a medical scientist with the luxury of assessing my meal ticket from my practicing  license, nor will it matter that I am currently not enrolled as an academic staff of any University in Nigeria. All that will count is that I shall clone any document of any Professor I lay my hands on, and possibly like Mbah, approach any compromisable staff of the Nigeria Security Printing and Minting Company NSPMC, to print for me the National University Commission NUC, documents recognizing me as a Professor of any federal University of my choice. Or don’t you think that the NSPMC should equally be responsible for printing NUC certificate of Professorship? Thereafter I shall address a world press conference in Enugu, to announce the new appellation to my name to the hearing of humanity. I may not even wait for anyone to ask salient question that would include who is ‘Prof. John Agbo’? Where are his publications? Which University was he teaching?? In which year did he conclude his Ph.d, and in which area of study did he do it etc. I will be proactive in approaching any federal high court of my choice as soon as I am done with announcing my new achievement and procure an instant court order barring the NUC and the concerned federal University never to say pim whenever anyone asks any question concerning ‘Prof. John Agbo’. My own brand of the court order might even include a monetary fine against anyone that may ever ask such a question concerning my Professorship.

So if Peter Mbah succeeds in bribing everyone to have his way out of his self imposed troubles, if he succeeds in bullying NYSC into accepting his forged discharge certificate, I mean peradventure Barr. Mbah makes it into making the Electoral Tribunal rule that NYSC discharge certificate is not a criteria for contesting any election just as Mbah and his PDP supporters are fantasizing, and if by his perennial act of hobnobbing with anyone perceived to be a man of integrity in his endless attempt to blot out his repugnant antecedents, succeeds in making everyone look the other way to enable him  continue his illegal occupation of our highly cherished ‘Lion Building’, then he would have provided a collateral opportunity for me to attain the status of a University Professor whether anybody likes it or not.

I hereby call on all those who might have given up on their ambition to wake up. If you ever wanted to be a Senior Advocate of Nigeria SAN, and you have given up in the course of time, rise up now and embrace the new method which Peter Mbah may be about to  introduce to Nigerians soon. Even if you wanted to be a lawyer, a judge, an Engineer, Dr etc, all hope is not yet lost until Nigeria stops Peter Ndubuisi Mbah. Yes Nigeria needs to stop Barr. Mbah for sanity to return to our country. Allowing Mbah get away with this forgery will elicit a cascade of activities in the manner I have described above that will rubbish every institution in Nigeria. The Nigeria judiciary more than all other institutions combined have the onus of stopping Peter Mbah or risk bastardizing everything Nigeria stands for. Peter Mbah’s forgery case holds the potential of burying Nigeria’s educational system, institutional integrity, and even the legal system itself if mishandled. It is often said that to be ‘forewarned is to be forearmed’. And like my people often say, ‘a scheduled war never consumes the lame’. Peter Mbah is that scheduled battle that must not be allowed to consume any institution in Nigeria 

Agbo is a Freelance Journalist and a renowned political analyst in Enugu.