Fellow alumni of GSSA:

The phone call from Dr. Oliver Akamnonu, GSSAAA’s Projects Committee Chairman, three days ago (Thursday, May 7, 2009), was music to my ears. He called me “from the ground” at GSSA, the principal by his side. He gave me the wonderful news that work is now underway at GSSA to install a new borehole to improve and upgrade the water supply to the campus. Plans are afoot in the immediate future to install two more boreholes each with its own tank. This water project will cost GSSAAA a total of roughly 3.5 million naira. This project when completed, hopefully before the 2009 GSSAAA World Convention in Washington DC, will ensure that the school has a dependable source of clean water. We all are aware that the ready availability of clean water is one of the indispensable fundaments of a livable environment. And GSSA has to be livable to continue to fulfill her mission.

By these restorative efforts we, alumni of GSSA all, members of GSSAAA and the GSSAOBAs, together, are rising to the challenge posed by the unacceptable decline of our alma mater. By these efforts, we plant our feet firmly on the ground – on this revered ground – this beloved alma mater of ours – and we say: “No to decline. No to destruction. No to decay. No to neglect.”

Those who countenanced or sought the destruction of this magnificent place of learning, this nursery for doctors and engineers and architects and scientists and educators and pastors and accountants and lawyers and businessmen and entrepreneurs… and … and …You name it… Those who sought to destroy this jewel are little minded, unenlightened agents of darkness. No matter their pretensions, they cannot have meant any good. They shun the light and choose to live in darkness. And there they must remain. Their deed will live in infamy and ignominy.

We know better.

 

We have chosen NOT to stand by, wringing our hands and watching in silence, apoplectic and ….. and complicit in the destruction of a jewel, the continued desecration of a temple of learning and a citadel for the transmission of knowledge. Our task of rebuilding and restoration, begun by GSSAOBA and now joined by GSSAAA, must continue. The tempo must quicken. We must reclaim the school and hand it over to future generations the way we encountered it – the way we experienced it. That is the least we can do. That is the least we must aspire to do. Anything less is failure. And we must not fail!

 

Happy Mother’s Day to all our wives and mothers. And Happy Mother’s Day to our Alma Mater.

 

Long live GSSA! May God bless and preserve her for countless future generations.

 

Obi Nwasokwa, M.D., Ph.D., F.A.C.C.

Chairman, Board of Trustees, GSSAAA

School Captain, GSSA, 1967 – 1970