In many Nigerian ethnic cosmologies and sociolinguistics, there are words used to reject behaviours that are anathemas in a given society. Words like asaaruame, tufiakwa, olorunmaje, allah kiyaye, ýa fo, among others, symbolise actions and behaviours that are forbidden.
These snarl words illustrate the offences of the Nigerian State against the National Library of Nigeria (NLN). I am neither writing as an Information Science expert nor as someone who has worked as a librarian, but out of toxic nationalism or patriotism, if you like. It is also to call to attention how the nation is toying with its education; and in this particular case, the NLN which is symptomatic of the seriousness a country attaches to the education of her people.
That NLN has not been delivered many years after its conception can be equalled to a pregnant woman who after nine months of conception and no child is spewed out, calls for the skillful hands of a surgeon. The library and indeed, the NLN should be a better-built infrastructure than the building for the vice president that was reported to have gulped N21 billion.
Meanwhile, literature on the construction of NLN shows that TETFund had in 2022 budgeted N15 billion to complete the NLN in addition to yearly budgetary provisions for the completion of NLN since 2006. Today, the NLN, located in the Central Business District of Abuja is standing like an age-beaten gothic building in the ancient Roman Empire.
A peep into the history of libraries in the world and where its necessity was understood early enough have become the first worlds today. Records have it that the world’s oldest known library is believed to be the library of Ashurbanipal founded sometime in the 7th BC for the “royal contemplation” of the Assyrian ruler of Ashurbanipal. This spark of idea of a library by this distant ruler has made this man a trans-generational historical figure.
Significantly, the oldest library that is still in operation is the library of St. Catherine’s Monastery, located in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula at the front of Mount Sinai Jebel Musa. Probably to the disbelief of many living women today, Al-Qara-wiyyan Library, in Fez, Morocco was founded by a Muslim woman, Fatima El-Fihriyain 859 A.D. It is one of the oldest libraries in the world and the oldest in Africa. The Middle East will continue to be recorded as the rock bed of the ocean of civilisation but unfortunately plagued by wars booted by religious differences. This is a matter for another day.
The most famous library in the world today is the library of Alexandria. It is famous for its massive storage of classical antiquity. In this respect, use your tongue to count your teeth to imagine the huge foreigners that will visit that library each year and the foreign currencies that will come with it. Diversification of the economy goes beyond digging up minerals, exploiting oil and ploughing the field, but monumental institutions, as the library in Alexandria, make greater economic sense.
It is not for naught that France Macron would take it as a priority to rebuild the 1163 Notre Dame Cathedral built by Bishop Maurice de Sully. Take it or leave it, the investment is a money spinner in multi-billions for France. Once upon a time, I was in Singapore for a training workshop at the National University of Singapore. As far back as 2010, that university had planned to export academics across the world. During the visit, one of the side attractions was to necessarily visit the Raffles.
The Raffles was built in 1886 by four Persian-Amenian brothers called the Sarkies. My friends from the US/UK jokingly told me during our interactions, that upon their return to their countries, they would be asked whether they visited the Raffles. The essence of this story: monuments fetch money!
Nigeria does not have monuments. The National Stadium named after Chief MKO Abiola is taken over by crusaders and religious organisations. The football pitch, with many furrows, reminds me of my corrugated primary school field. I don’t know the status of the National Theatre. I do pray that it is not already traded off. The NLN would be a prodigious monumental piece, a pride to scholarship and the academia but today the uncompleted structure is looking like Miss Havisham in Great Expectations by Charles Dickens.
A wealthy spinster who was jilted at the altar, Miss Havisham, insisted on wearing her wedding dress for the rest of her life. Sitting in her ruined mansion in her caked wedding dress, Charles Dickens describes her as “the witch of the place”. The NLN is no better than Miss Havisham: a disappointed bride who has decided to wear her decayed, stinking, yellowish wedding gown until her last breath on earth. What we have as NLN in Abuja is what the architects would call a carcass.
A country like ours may not just show leadership by constructing a masterpiece of a library; individuals, institutions can as well add to the splendour of libraries in a country. The earliest records of institutional libraries as it is presently understood can be dated back to around 5,000 years ago in the southwest Asia regions of the world. This is the library found in present-day Syria in Ebla (circa 2,500BC).
Today, the Library of Congress is the largest library in the world with millions of items and variety of formats worth 175+ million catalogued size; British Library in the UK has 170-200 million catalogued size; Shanghai China has 57 million catalogued size; and the National Library of China, Beijing has 44 million; Royal Danish Library, Denmark; Copenhagen and Aarhus has 42.5 million physical items, excluding digital. In Germany, Leipzig, Frankfurt has 43.7 million.
The library has gone beyond the conventional package. Beyond what is traditionally known of a library, we have today beauty libraries such as the ones in Admont Abbey Library in Austria, Tianjin Binhai Library in Hebu Province in China; Bibliotheca Alexandra, Alexandria, Egypt and the Morgan Library and Museum, New York.
It will amaze you to know that some universities have richer collections than even our NLN.
The library is not just a place of books but also the conscience of a nation that loves education and knows the rich liquid values of education. Library is a tool for intellectual freedom and economic development. A library is the gateway to political, economic, and social happiness and survival according to Tochukwu 2019. Each time I drive past the Central Area of Abuja where the fossilised National Library building stands abandoned, my heart bleeds. I wish I could help. I wish I were the Dangotes, the Elumelus or the Otedolas to donate for the completion of NLN as the Federal Government of Nigeria has failed in that regard.
We may recall that this abandoned edifice was started in 2006 some handsome 18 years ago. The scope of the project is supposed to include the construction of a concrete structure consisting of 11 floors, two basement floors and eight upper floors for housing bookstore, locker rooms, bindery, printing press, restaurants, clinic, crèches, changing rooms, exhibition hall, auditorium, cataloguing, general reference areas and legal deposits, among others.
If the library is the conscience of the nation, Nigerians can now come to a conclusion that our conscience for education is totally dead and buried. Some of us readers usually feel insulted when we hear people say, “if you want to hide anything from Nigerians, and indeed Africans, put inside a book.” We ought not to be an illiterate nation, not with our early occidental experience. No wonder, 18 million potential boko haram insurgents, lukarawas and bandits are lurking on Nigerian streets in the name of scavengers. Time is ticking, it is chiming!
To enumerate the benefits of a library is not the trajectory of this article. However, it is imperative to note that access to information, knowledge, broadening of our minds, and many more, are the preserved culture of libraries across the world. Lifelong learning opportunities are offered by the library through the instrumentality of workshops and seminars, while new skills and personal growth are developed. In this digital age, resources are available on e-books, audiobooks, online data and these are obtained in real time.
Many appeals may have been made to the Federal Government of Nigeria; many budgetary provisions may have been made, yet the NLN stands as national shame and embarrassment. This article is to add to the huge layers of appeals. Now that the National Assembly is considering the 2025 budget, I pray them to consider the tears in this piece to approve a worthwhile amount and for the Executive Arm of Government to implement in order to save Nigeria from being termed a hater of education or knowledge.
– Maiyanga writes from Abuja.
