Blacks helping blacks...a common trend in the Nigerian state..PLEASE READ BELOW
*Contribution to Education*
In 1938, the Ibibio State Union gave scholarship to 7 of its youths to study in different parts of the world. It was innovative and the newspaper The West African pilot editored by Zik praised the effort in its editorial describing the beneficiaries as "true merchants of light" . It was the first time a cultural or ethnic union could achieve such feat in west africa.
Some of the beneficiary of the scholarships were:
Dr Erbert Udo udoma who studied law in the UK and went on to become the chief justice of Uganda and acting governor general of that country and a justice of the Nigerian Supreme Court. He was the first african to obtain a phd in law from UK. His son senator udo udoma was a two term senator and a minister of budget during pmb first term.
Bassey udo Attah (the father of Victor Attah a quondam governor of Akwa ibom) studied agric in the US.
Ibanga Udo Akpabio studied education in USA. He was the uncle of governor Godswill obot Akpabio now the Minister of Niger Delta Ministry.
These were not government efforts but the effort of a sociocultural organization. Awo's free education policy in the West was foresighted and epochal and an emulation of this effort at the governmental level. I wish he had the opportunity to reproduce it at the natiinal level. And it's sad that no one could replicate Awo's effort at the regional level.
*Contribution to Education*
In 1938, the Ibibio State Union gave scholarship to 7 of its youths to study in different parts of the world. It was innovative and the newspaper The West African pilot editored by Zik praised the effort in its editorial describing the beneficiaries as "true merchants of light" . It was the first time a cultural or ethnic union could achieve such feat in west africa.
Some of the beneficiary of the scholarships were:
Dr Erbert Udo udoma who studied law in the UK and went on to become the chief justice of Uganda and acting governor general of that country and a justice of the Nigerian Supreme Court. He was the first african to obtain a phd in law from UK. His son senator udo udoma was a two term senator and a minister of budget during pmb first term.
Bassey udo Attah (the father of Victor Attah a quondam governor of Akwa ibom) studied agric in the US.
Ibanga Udo Akpabio studied education in USA. He was the uncle of governor Godswill obot Akpabio now the Minister of Niger Delta Ministry.
These were not government efforts but the effort of a sociocultural organization. Awo's free education policy in the West was foresighted and epochal and an emulation of this effort at the governmental level. I wish he had the opportunity to reproduce it at the natiinal level. And it's sad that no one could replicate Awo's effort at the regional level.
