Dr. Adeniyi Zafaran, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Vanguards Academy has warned Nigerian youths, especially Muslims, to resist moral decay.
He gave the charge while delivering the keynote address at the graduation ceremony of Class 2025/G91 held on Saturday, 9th August 2025 (14th Safar 1447 A.H.), at the school’s field in Odosengolu, Ijebu Ode, Ogun State. Full text below:
YOUTHS’ WORLD TODAY
My beloved students, the world is indeed at dawn…innal insaan lafi khusrin (verily, man is in a state of loss!). Our world has become our wars, instead of living in peace, we are living in tension. Evils are committed at unprecedented magnitude. The youths are wallowing in pools of immorality and wanton time wastage. They cluster at swimming pools in puddles of erotic and carnal scenes. They hang out at clubs and parties bubbling with shisha. Maddening addictions have become new lifestyles for the youths. Pornography has become a seasoned movie, masturbation has become a dinner, hard drugs have become sachet water, fornication has become a past time; burning data and time on Hollywood, Nollywood, Bollywood, etc has become unstoppable phenomenon.
They are mostly alive but dead in brain and souls. Their bodies shine with exotic creams but with filthy and mutinous souls. They are active materially but passive spiritually. Many youths have buried their parents alive. From drugs, they graduate to kidnapping. Only Allah (SWT) knows the quantum of money being spent by some parents on rehabs. There appears to be gradual minimising and liberalisation of Islam. Our children prefer the fleeting Duniya to the eternal Aakhirah. The real Hijaab/Jalboab is fast disappearing into the thin air. They are cool to please the people at the expense of their Lord. Trend of show-off is becoming a normal litestyle as agog on social media platforms. Young ladies recount body counts for sex as normalcy. Celebrities who should be taken to correctional centres are admired as models.
Where did we get it wrong? What has happened to us? Where are we heading? Both the driver and the passengers have fallen asleep while the car is on speedy motion! The ship of life has been filled with water while the captain does not even know where it is heading not to talk of what to do! Those on board that cannot swim keep shouting, crying, wailing, while some even jumped into the sea!
ROAD TO EMANCIPATION
As the evil ones believe they can perpetrate it, you too have the right to be different. You have right to change them too as they too try to bring you out of naturalness. It is a struggle between two parallel forces. Only the stronger will prevail. The strong may not always be the faithful in the physical realm. The ascendancy of evils today is because the perpetrators have free reins for their doom. They are leaving no stone unturned to change people’s way of life. It is only when you also contend with these forces that you will win and triumph. It is not about mere wishes. Faith is alien to passive attitude. You must be engaging people. You must live the life of the righteous struggling against all evils. It may take long, they may not even join you but your achievement will still be that, they will recognise your bloc and leave you alone or they could start doubting their own ways and eventually come to join you.
TO YOU ALL
The need to be blind to all evils affecting people today is a requirement of faith. If you do not close your eyes to indecent dressing pervading everywhere around you, you will be consumed by its temptations. If you do not close your eyes to materialism, you will lose your spirituality. If you do not close your eyes to bad friends, you will not be able to beat them, and then you will join them. If you do not close your eyes to pornography, you will become morally corrupt. You must, however, get it right; being blind to people’s evils or wrong enjoyment of life does not mean that you will not bother about what happens to them. You must see the evil they do and keep inviting them out of it.
This world is a deceptive and worthless enjoyment. What makes you happy is what makes others sad. Your son is graduating from the University, another’s son is dying after the National Youths Service Corps (NYSC)! Our sense of sight is today becoming our undoing, Instead of seeing to live for Allah (SWT), we look, see, watch and search to debase, desecrate and destroy our souls and the world.
Itis high time our walkways were free from soul distractions. What we shall tell our Lord should matter more to us than what we will tell people How we shall meet our Lord should grip our hearts more than how the fleeting world grids our hearts. What we shall see in the hereafter of enjoyment should commit us more to Allah (SWT) than this world. Our companions in al-jarmth should be more preferable to the misleading ones in this world. Our al-jannah qualifications, awards and rewards should be our targets, not those paper ones of this world. The mansions prepared by Allah (SWT) for the truly successful ones in al-jannah should be our dream place not any other place in this world.
Our human judgements make us underrate the value of Islaam. Our circles of friends make us become negligent of our duties. Our material quests take us away from our family. Our spiritual stagnation keeps us distant from our Creator.
THE EMANCIPATOR
We can never be despondent as Muslims. It is never in our ideology. There is always a remedy to every societal malady. You are the awaited Remedy.
You are Ertugul. You are the Kurulus Osman. You are the Sultaan Abdul Hameed. You are the Sultan Salahudeen al-Ayyubi. It is time for EMANCIPATION, and you are the EMANCIPATOR. Your predecessors have sailed on, set the pace, piloted, Navigated calibrated. It is time to emancipate. Do not become a victim. Do not be drowned in the messy flood. Do not wane or get distracted.
Clocks have different manufacturers but for the same purposes as it is with most items of use in life. You, my dear student, have a Maker and the purpose for which He made you. When a clock stops to tell time due to a fault, it has become useless. So it is if at any point in life you derail or deviate from serving your Lord, the reason for which you were brought into this world. Then, you become like that faulty clock. Make your life purposeful by always doing the Wish of your Lord. Distractions abound as instruments of Shaytaan, know your destination and dream place and do not be distracted. Give meaning to your life and future by giving attention to what matters. Make what matters your springboard. Inspire yourself to become who matters.
CHANCE TO CHANGE
Everything in life has a course for its cause. The only permanent path in life is change. Every change goes with a cost. It is your personal choice to decide which path you want to tread and how much you want to offer. You have the CHANCE today to make CHANGE happen. Your Parents brought you here, a chance most never had. They bore the costs ranging from different fees they paid, the risks they took on the roads bringing and returning you for six years, then expended so much on your personal effects, they bought uniforms, sandals, text books, notebooks, etc. They did all that for change to happen in your life!
At Vanguards, you started the change process with orientation programme, you were groomed for over 12,600 hours for academic classes and evaluations, you observed over 300,000 Salaats in congregation; you attended over 1800 classes for Arabic and Tahfees; you had windows for sports and skill acquisitions; you had over 150 classes of Shumuuliyyah, Fajr Breeze, post Salaat and assembly counselling talks were innumerable, you read six recommended Islamic literatures, you memorised six special quotes for motivation, you had weekly counselling sessions and special ones on sex education, you enjoyed post Exam Activities (PEA), etc. With all these and more, Fabi ayyi aalaai Rabikkuma tukaddiban…
Every stream has its course. It keeps flowing into the bigger water. It is not stagnant. It is self-purifying. Take a cue from that to flow in life, Flow with the right knowledge. Flow with faith and trust in Allah (SWT). Flow and follow only righteous friends. Flow not with trends but flee to your Lord in penitence. Flow in the spiritual realm to comprehend and dissect the meaning of life.
AND I WILL MISS YOU!
Oh my beloved students, I am going to miss you greatly but you must leave for good. Use all means at your disposal to promote the Deen. Become a high-class professional in your field of study and use it to salvage the world. The time has come to change the narratives. You have been chosen by Allah (SWT), won’t you be grateful by helping His Cause. Let your character be the most attractive thing for the Deen.
You have had a big chance to make positive change happen in your life. You have arrived. You have been long expected. Move on. Go on. Ride on. Fire on. You can no longer be passive, you are an active agent. You are not a spectator but an actor. You are not an antagonist but a protagonist. Let
your destination be clear as the current of a river is known, as time is told in clockwise manner and as rising of the sun follows a pattern.
AS YOU EMANCIPATE
My dear students, it is time to work the talk. The time has come to prove your mettle. You have been armed against the harms. Do always explore the world of the Qur’aan:
Remember Yuusuf while he was in the dark pit, he never lost hope in Allah (SWT). Different or tough situations might come your way, tum to your Lord, do not lose hope. Remember him while he was seduced by a woman, he was steadfast and never fell. Do not fall to the temptations of the opposite sex.
Remember Ashaabul-Kahf when they hid in the cave, have your own cave in righteous friends and milieu that will save you from corruptions;
Remember the Ghuraab that showed Qaabil how to bury his brother. Do never be like Qaabil. Eschew envy and do not start any evil.
Remember Hudhud which brought news to Prophet Sulayman to expand the frontiers for the work of Allah (SWT). Be ever there to ever support the Da twah of Islaam.
Once a Vangaurds; always a Vanguard
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