A terrifying epidemic has descended on the society, resulting in the scarcity of single teenager girls. Oh! Forget your 14-year-old girl. She probably got married last night, while you slept. That’s the “authoritative” scare from the National Population Commission(NPC). 

Samu’ila Danko Makama, the NPC boss, says over 70,000 teenage girls get married daily. By a conservative  estimate, that’s 25.5 million marriages per year. Yet, nobody is celebrating. Well, media reports didn’t tell where Makama’s statistics came from. But it gave me an insight into why my 7-year-old niece keeps saying: “Uncle, I am a big girl, now.” Then, she brandishes her “wedding gown” –  the one she wore as “Flower girl” at my wedding, often.

I’ve really been wondering where all the teenage girls have gone. Look out the window, right this minute, you won’t find a single teenage girl. Except, the ones with a fixed leer at the street corner – on the billboards. At every road junction, bus terminus and school, you  either find little girls in diapers and eye-shadow. Or young “adults,” who struggled into baby’s blouses. Then talk like toys. None has a T-shirt with bold inscription usually associated with single teenagers: “Help! I’m young, single and  aging.”.It’s then easier to understand Makama’s  confusion. To him, teenagers are all grown and married – overnight. Except those still in nappies.

You probably would find girls in the 0 to 12 bracket; then 20 till death. But all those “lepa” claiming 17, 18 and 19 are ignorant. I suspect they aren’t  aware that they don’t only need NAFDAC number, they also need NPC certificate to stay single and young. 

Yes, every teenage girl is now married – to fashion, fast food and  phone sets. Materialism! So Makama isn’t entirely wrong. Except that he’s been talking out of turn, recently. As if the load of gibberish determines the money he gets for the census.  After labeling all of us ”ignorant,” he started counting our heads with insult. Those of us born before the Egyptians discovered Papyrus are not Nigerians. Why? No birth certificate!

Makama has decreed: Birth Certificate is the only thing that qualifies a child for equal opportunities in education, employment, health care, among other things – including access to all social amenities provided by the state.  Okay, one-by-each,  like Prof Ola Rotimi would say. I am not a “child,” so I do not count. But what about my relations in Bakassi forest, without access to hospitals or registration facilities?

STUDENT: Sir, how would birth certificate guarantee my education?

MAKAMA: What do you need another education for?  Education is all about certificate. And if you have birth certificate, you are already qualified for a job, having passed the ultimate test of survival in mummy’s womb.

JOB SEEKER: Sir, you mean birth certificate would ensure my employment?

MAKAMA: Yes. But first, you have to be a child. If you have no birth certificate, you are not a Nigerian. And, I don’t answer questions from foreigners. Birth Certificate is my own national cake. Didn’t some people get away with the National ID card thing? 

Now, how many of the graduates roaming the streets,  – with birth certificates – have jobs? And how many “social amenities” have been provided by the state? Never mind. Just cover up government’s  failures. 

Like all contemporary government appointees, Makama knows why we eat from the dustbin. He has solution to the rising cost of living, despair and hopelessness in the land. And answers are  all printed on a cardboard paper tagged: “Birth Certificate.” By his explanation, Obasanjo increased fuel prices every month because many children are not registered at birth. The police kill innocent citizens daily, including the recent Apo six, because many of us lack birth certificate. It doesn’t matter that the National ID Card project began and ended in a fiasco. Oh! Never mind that even those with birth certificate question God daily why they were “registered” from above into Nigeria. All Makama knows is that birth certificate is the beginning of paradise. He says a child not registered at birth “automatically loses Nigerian citizenship.” 

 Makama claims, “A child’s birth certificate protects him or her from abuses such as child trafficking, unlawful detention and imprisonment.” When you translate that into English, it means all those awaiting trial for upward of 14 years do not have birth certificates. And that ritual murderers and robbers  kill only those without birth certificate. If you have one, they leave you alone: ‘Go and show yourself to the priest of NPC, thank you.’ 

In fact, I heard Makama has ordered everybody – government officials, criminals, private citizens, etc, to behave in a particular way – once the other person has a birth certificate. If everything  goes as planned, even the so-called married teenage girls may lose their marriage certificates, unless they have birth certificates. It doesn’t matter if it’s from a haven of fakes in Lagos called Oluwale Street.

TRAFFICKER: I would have taken you to Italy for prostitution but that birth certificate on your forehead disqualifies you. Everybody might think you are a “born prostitute.”

JUDGE: The accused has been found guilty of murder, armed robbery and possession of illegal arms. But he is hereby set free because he has a birth certificate.  As you know, the court deals with evidence and the Counsel to NPC has proven beyond unreasonable doubt why the murderer should be set free. His birth certificate “protects” him against imprisonment. So, go and kill some more, you have the certificate.

SERGEANT: Sir, everywhere is calm. But  I shot six traders at Apo village. 

IGP: Did they have birth certificates?

SERGEANT: By the time I asked them, they were already dead. So, we decided that they must have been armed robbers – since we couldn’t find birth certificates on them.

DOCTOR: Unless you undergo operation in the next two hours, you would die. By the way, do you have birth certificate? Because if you don’t, I would  use hacksaw for the surgery; no pain reliever. 

TENANT: Oga landlord, you can’t evict me –o. I have immunity. Here is my birth certificate.

EL-RUFAI: Only those with birth certificates would have their illegal structures spared. Because birth certificate makes everything legitimate, even armed robbery.

CITIZEN: But, bulldozer, isn’t a certificate of occupancy enough?

Makama should concentrate on how he would be able to count the madmen without including me. NPC says the madmen would be counted at midnight, after they have gone to sleep under the bridges. My only fear is that  my chickens and the “area boys” might be counted among madmen. Since they sleep under the bridges like a number of other Nigerians – including some “uncertified” single teenager girls. 

• First published in Saturday Sun of  July 16, 2005