When will we have a Zuckerberg in Nigeria? 10 years, 20 years, 50 years? Never? What would his story sound like? Well, let me offer you his biography before he is even born:
He studied computer science in the Nigerian University of technology (school does not exist) and dropped out to start a career in Lagos. He moved to computer village to form alliances and understand the market need of the tech industry in Nigeria (and the world) only to end up in a roadside shop selling computer peripherals and pirated software.
He spent the next 5 years on that track but for the shop to fold and off he is again to school. This time he enrolled in a part time school and graduated to find a stable job in a small firm where he dashed all his tech ambitions for a stable monthly income. He is gone; we have to wait for another techie to re write the story.
As fictitious as the story above sounds, it is the plight that befalls many aspiring techies in Nigeria. They start with nothing but a little skill, strong passion and the Nigerian spirit – a priceless toughness in the midst of uncertainties which foreigners can sometime mistake for arrogance.
Ours is a story of drive, but a different kind of drive. Our drives are evoked by an insatiable quest to make a difference in our region (Africa), a drive which is often short lived as a result of constant opposition from the system we have around us. This drive – opposition battle is what accounts for the toughness Nigerians enjoy. But that is another story for another moonlight.
Nigeria gained her independent towards the tail end of the Industrial Age and was properly indoctrinated into the information age (which kicked off in the 1960s) through the British education system which coincidentally pioneered the age. One is left to ask where we went wrong.
How can a nation that started on a good foot in the techno- age loose grip so much as to import the simplest software to run the nation from outside.
The new techie Nigeria needs will not be born out of an American university or a British university or any foreign university per se. No country at this time will allow such a lad come back to Nigeria and besides, the lad himself after thinking about the prevailing circumstance in Nigeria might have to reconsider coming back.
The techie will have to grow in the streets of Lagos (or any street with the same degree of roughness) and will have to be baptized early into the nitty-gritty of SYSTEM ANALYSIS either through the class room or the street.
He will have to grow in a supportive environment, where ideas are nurtured by the system and given wings to fly.
He will also learn how not to sell out cheap at the first offer of a buy off deal, thinking about Mark Zuckerbergs refusal of a one Billion dollar ($1B) offer from yahoo.
He will need the support of the government, through access to growth resources (training, incubators, loans, patronage, etc)
This lad will need to be very indigenous and offer a Nigerian flavor of technology – anything Nigeria will sell well to the outside world if we so package it well and make its quality top notch.
He needs to be disciplined and most importantly, think global with a local content.
(To be continued)
Nice write up. Do Nigeria really need another Zuckerberg ? or we need the another UNKNOWN ?
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