BY AGNES NWORIE, ABAKALIKI
The Nnaji of Nkaleke Echara autonomous community in Ebonyi State, Eze Pius Akam Aloh, has urged the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board to include the mastery of any of the three major Nigerian languages as parts of the criteria for students’ admission into the nation’s higher institutions in a bid to save the local languages from extinction.
The traditional ruler made the recommendation while speaking on the need to promote the good aspects of the diverse Nigerian languages, cultures and traditions, during an exclusive interview with The Point.
The monarch, who stressed the need for learners to have good mastery of the local languages, frowned on the growing extinction of the Nigerian languages.
He expressed worries that the Igbo language, particularly, was fast going into extinction as many now indulge in speaking English language.
According to him, the inclusion of good mastery of, at least, one of the three major local languages as a criterion for admission into tertiary institutions in Nigeria by JAMB would encourage proficiency in the languages.
This, he said, would invariably help in promoting the local cultures.
Stressing the need for parents and caregivers to place high premium on the local languages to the children, he said that doing so would aid their learning processes as evident in the China experience.
“Languages are one aspect of the culture that needed to be given good attention. If we allow the local languages to die, it means that our culture is gone. Remember that languages are the marks of our identities. The neglect of the mother tongues does more harm than good to us as a nation. The Igbo man especially is fast losing his identity because of that.
“In Yoruba land, you will find a professor being very fluent in the local language because they value and protect it. It is the same for the Hausa in the north, but in the East it is a different ball game,” he lamented.
