Nigeria—with qualifications

ON ONE SIDE of the road there is a giant new university, sprouting dozens of new buildings, new lecture theatres, even a jumbo‐sized new library. It is fringed by rows of neat little boxes, housing the Polish and Pakistani PhDs who will teach here until their students take over. The campus of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Northern Nigeria, has the brash, modern, unfinished atmosphere of new campuses all over the world. Then you notice the little groups of men in loose black or blue garments who sit around the campus, their faces hidden by black headcloths. They carry swords; they are the Touaregs, the legendary nomads of the desert. Destitute, they have come south to escape the drought and do the only job modern society can offer nomadic herdsmen whose animals have died of thirst: they guard the university at night.