5 Errors That Are Still Taught In Nigerian Schools Today

Here are 5 lies out of so many, that are still dished out the world over even as you read this:


There are nine planets in the solar system: Astronomers are regularly discovering new planets all over the universe. However, the number of planets in our own solar system has been reduced from nine to eight. This is due to the declassification of Pluto as a planet. Pluto was officially downgraded by astronomers at the 26th General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union which was held in Prague, Czech Republic, in 2006. It is now a dwarf planet. Astronomers found out that it is merely a huge ball of ice and rock orbiting the Sun in an area known as the Kuiper Belt. The Kuiper Belt is located beyond the planet Neptune (which is now the farthest planet in the solar system) and it contains over 70,000 icy objects similar to Pluto. Pluto happens to be one of the biggest of these icy objects, but it’s not the biggest. The biggest is Eris. Eris, a dwarf planet, is the largest object in the Kuiper Belt. It’s about 25% more massive than Pluto.

Mount Everest is the highest place on earth: Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world quite alright, but it’s not the part of the world that is closest to outer space. Here how it works: the Earth does not have a perfectly round structure like the world globes you’ll find in most schools. Geographers call this anomaly an oblate spheroid, which means that the earth has a bulge towards the equator. As a result of this bulge, places close to the equator are “further out” from the centre of the Earth than places that are far away from it. Ethiopia, Kenya, Gabon, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo and other countries that straddle the equator are “further out” from the centre of the Earth and are closer to outer space than countries that lie towards the north and south poles, such as the Scandinavian countries, Russia, Canada, the United States and Greenland. Going by this phenomenon, the title of the highest spot on Earth belongs to a mountain in Ecuador that you may not have heard of. The rather unspectacular Mount Chimborazo in the Andes of South America has been identified as the highest point on earth and its closest part to outer space. The peak is in reality 1.5 miles “higher up” than Mount Everest because it sits atop the Earth’s bulge, though it only measures 20,564 ft from sea level, while Everest measures 29,029 ft. But for the sake of clarity, Everest is still the highest mountain in the world from sea level, but if two objects are descending from outer space from the same distance and at the same pace to the two mountains, the one coming down to Chimborazo will land before the one descending to Everest. Everest is actually the fifth furthest place from the centre of the Earth; Huascaran in Peru, Cotopaxi in Ecuador, Kilimanjaro in Tanzania and Chimborazo are all further.

Europeans brought Christianity to Africa and Christianity is a Western Religion: Christianity is the world’s largest religion and it originated from Asia in the geographical East. The movement that gave rise to Christianity was begun by Jesus Christ who was born over 2000 years ago in Bethlehem in present-day Palestine. The followers of the teachings of Christ were first called “Christians” in the town of Antioch which is now a historical site in present-day Turkey. Antioch lies on the eastern part of Turkey which is in Asia. It is not clear when Christianity was brought to either Europe or Africa. It is recorded in the Bible that Christ was taken to Egypt as an infant by Mary and Joseph who were fleeing from Herod the Great during the Massacre of the Innocents. However, Christ’s ministry began few years before He was crucified. It is not recorded if He went to Africa or Europe during His ministry. What is clear, though, is that one of His apostles, Mark, established the first church in Africa twelve years after the crucifixion, known as the Church of Alexandria. Some years before that, another apostle, Philip, was recorded in the Acts of the Apostles to have baptized an Ethiopian eunuch on the road leading to Gaza from Jerusalem. The Acts, however, did not tell us where the eunuch went afterwards or if he spread the message in Ethiopia. A church was established in Ethiopia some years after the Church of Alexandria in Egypt and it is still in existence today. Most present-day Ethiopians are Christians and their own form of Christianity is not linked to the ones spread by the Europeans.

Diabetes is caused by sugar: Sugar doesn’t directly cause diabetes, but if you consume too much sugar, you are likely going to get diabetes. What sugar does is that it increases the quantity of calories in the body. Too many calories in the body lead to weight gain which significantly increases a person’s likelihood to develop type 2 diabetes.

The Whites kidnapped Africans and sold them into slavery: This is not entirely true. Most slaves that were shipped into the Americas to work in plantations were actually captured by their own kinsmen and sold to the Europeans. When it all began, the Europeans were the ones doing the kidnapping. They organized abduction raids to capture slaves from different communities. But in no time, they realized that it was too dangerous a venture for them since they were not familiar with the inland terrains. What did they do? They subsequently found people that will do their dirty jobs. Then came the local chiefs and the greedy merchants. They were given this responsibility in exchange for money and other privileges. At the height of the slave trade, this practice became a lucrative business along Nigeria’s Atlantic coast.

- Sahara Reporters