What is in a uniform? Ordinarily, a uniform is nothing but
clothing used by a particular group of people to identify them
and distinguish them from other groups in a particular area. The
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English (Third Edition, Year
2000) reinforces this view with its description of a uniform as “a
particular type of clothing worn by all members of a group or
organisation such as the police, the army etc.” Lately, the simple
affair of differentiation of members of a group by a uniform has
become an instrument of protest that has been hitting headlines
across the country.
For the NYSC, a corps member identified as Miss Damilola
Tolulope Ekundayo, a Zoology graduate of the Lagos State
University, hit the limelight in March when she stoutly resisted
wearing the trousers prescribed and provided by the National
Youth Service Corps for all graduates of tertiary institutions
undergoing orientation at orientation camps spread across the
country.
Apparently wanting to make a point on the impropriety of the
imposition of a uniform consisting of trousers and shirts on
NYSC members when some of them may not want to wear
trousers because of their religious faith, Ekundayo preferred to
be sent out of the orientation camp in Ogun State, to wearing the
NYSC trousers alongside the thousands of corps members
mobilized for Batch A of the 2013 service year. All efforts to make
her change her mind by camp officials failed, and she was
promptly sent out of the camp.
That batch of NYSC members have since concluded their
orientation and are now working in the various places they were
deployed. It is not clear what has happened to the decamped
Ekundayo since then, but it is unlikely that she will join her
colleagues in serving the country for as long as she maintains
her no-trousers policy.
In Osun State, where Governor Rauf Aregbesola has had a charge
of nursing a plan to Islamize the State hanging on his neck for
some months now, some Muslim residents and associations in
the state have also been in the news for insisting that female
Muslim students in the state should be allowed to wear hijab,
which is a type of veil used by Muslim women, on top of their
school uniforms. This demand of the Muslims, which has been in
the news since the time of the state’s former governor,
Olagunsoye Oyinlola, came to a head sometime ago when a
Muslim student in a public school, I think, Baptist Secondary
School in the state, came to the school in hijab and was
immediately sent home by a teacher.
Reports indicate that some aggrieved Muslims thereafter stormed
the school and beat up the teacher. Since then, the campaign for
Muslim students to be allowed to wear hijab to school has
increased, and the matter is now before a court as some Muslim
organisations in the state try to obtain a court declaration
supporting the move of Muslim organisations to make Muslim
children wear hijabs on their uniforms when going to public
schools.
For me, the wearing of trousers by NYSC members, and the use
of hijab on school uniforms by female Muslim students in Osun
State, should not be a matter for rancour and unnecessary
controversy. There are clearly much more serious issues, such as
the poor state of the education sector, unemployment,
dilapidated infrastructure and poor access to potable water and
health care that should be engaging the attention of well
meaning Nigerians.
The wearing or not wearing of trousers and the manner of
uniform worn by school pupils should not be a big issue in our
troubled country. Concerning Corps member Damilola Ekundayo,
her courage in standing firm on her resolve not to wear trousers
is admirable. It is good for anyone to be able to stand on his/her
convictions and be ready to pay a price for it. Moreover, it is
through such individual revolt to accepted norms that
fundamental and revolutionary changes have been effected in
society. But then, the decision of Ekundayo to refuse to wear the
NYSC trousers after signing an undertaking to abide by the dress
code prescribed for the scheme raises many questions. First,
there is the fact that the scheme is guided by a law which says all
participants must wear the prescribed uniform. Indeed, as the
NYSC Co-ordinator in Ogun State, Mrs Theresa Anosike
explained, Ekundayo’s refusal to wear the uniform contradicts
Section 3 subsection (h) of the scheme’s 2012 bylaws.
Her outright refusal to abide by the camp rule on the wearing of
the uniform was, therefore, also a threat to discipline in the
camp. While I respect this young lady’s resolve to rather leave the
camp than wear trousers, I think the NYSC is right to insist that
all corps members must wear the prescribed uniform. It will be
clearly inexpedient to allow any single corps member or group of
corps members to dictate a uniform to the NYSC. This is more so
as there are many religions in Nigeria and corps members of
each faith cannot be allowed to dictate their preferred uniform to
the NYSC. Instead of the “one-girl” approach to the demand for a
change in the NYSC uniform, groups of corps members or
religious institutions which have reservations about their female
members wearing trousers can petition the government and call
for a review of the current uniform, clearly outlining their case.
The change in the Corps uniform cannot be achieved through
civil disobedience by individual corps members. Although
trousers may appear best suited to the physical activities Corps
members engage in, the government may decide to allow use of
skirts, if the anti-trousers campaigners go through the right
channels. On the Osun State hijab on uniform controversy that
has been interpreted in some quarters to be a fallout of
Governor Rauf Aregbesola’s inclination towards “Islamization” of
the state, it is clearly inexpedient to allow this needless
controversy to jeopardize the peaceful relationship between
Christians and Muslims in the state.
Since Nigeria is said to be a secular country, there is really no
need for any person or group of persons to insist on wearing of
religious items to public schools, and the governor must avoid
any body language that encourages adherents of his religion to
start demanding special wears. The wisdom of maintaining
secularity in the matter of school uniforms can be deduced from
the problem that could arise when adherents of all religions in
the state start demanding all kinds of “spiritual” wears. What, for
instance, would the government do, if the adherents of Osun
religion begin demanding wearing of white uniforms only, with
white beads to school? Or, children of Sango worshippers, in
another instance, insist on wearing red caps to school, with
earrings in the ears of their boys?
What again, if Sango male worshippers insist on wearing braided
hair to school as we see depicted by Sango priests in some home
videos? If I were Governor Aregbesola, I will, while recognizing
the legitimacy of the demand for hijab, both publicly and
privately appeal to all religious leaders in the state to let us
maintain true uniformity of school uniforms, in the interest of
peace. This hijab on uniform controversy is a needless one. Let
school uniforms be just what they are – uniforms designed to
ensure uniformity in the appearance of school pupils. They
should not be used as instruments by anybody to divide the
hitherto peaceful state along religious lines. Let my good people
of the State of Osun place more emphasis on the things that
unite them as a state, and not the ones that divide them.
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