12/07/2022
Nineteen eighty eight,
Yes 1988, that year,JAMB sent my
university admission letter,
not online,as they were wont to do years later
But through the post office, NIPOST,
the preferred choice for moving mails then
from the villages to the cities and from the Hamlets to the coast
The bicycle riding Postman delivered it at my doorstep promptly
The same day we began planning my trip to Abuja,
everything was overestimated by my dotting mother...joyfully
So on the day we travelled,it was in an air conditioned Peugeot 504 which even Governors rode in then,it didn't cost 150 Naira as expected,but N50(fifty naira) from Benin to the Federal Capital Territory
It was a calm and peaceful journey,no washed off sections on the highway,no terrorists,no killer herdsmen,no robbers,no rampaging youths,no multiplicity of road blocks by Policemen,Soldiers,EFCC,NDLEA, Civil Defense Corps or Vigilante...no banditory
I read a newspaper on the journey which I bought back in the motor park for ten Naira
Before boarding the taxi which was itself assembled in Kaduna, and which was selling then for around twenty one thousand Naira
It was a five hour journey, the short stopover for a sumptous lunch at Lokoja inclusive
Lunch cost around five Naira,the now out-of-ciculation note that has long since become scorned, condemned to bank vaults and currency collectors,wasted,exiled,exclusive
We arrived Abuja around 2pm,boarded another cab and still got safely to Minna before dusk
My country was a safe Haven then,we just didn't know it at that time,it was the prayer that mattered, not whether it was said in the Church or the Mosque
In 1988,my accompanying Mum worried for nothing over my far away university, as she would have realized if she had lived to see 2021 and 2022 as they would later play out
Finally,we arrived the Campus where I commenced my freshman registration the next day, I paid ninety Naira, yes N90, and for that I was given access to every facility including a modern hostel without a generator,but which hardly ever had any blackout.
To be continued...
*JAMB:Nigeria's Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board responsible for undergraduate entry examinations
*NIPOST: Nigerian Postal Service
*Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
*National Drug Law Enforcement Agency
