It is sometimes necessary to name and shame persons who behave badly .But whether for mere innovations or the desire to impress there has been a syndrome of name changing especially by the state that is sometimes meaningless.
What in a name? It is obviously a means of identity .One cannot imagine nameless human beings because even animals like dogs have names to which they respond. Aside from mere identity names could be given in remembrance of parents, relatives or even religious and other characters that they wish the name to resemble in character.
Turning to state affairs there are many historical instances of country and city names for reasons outlined above. While the name of the state of China remains ,the name of the capital formerly Peking has been changed Beijing .The name of Gold Coast has been changed to Ghana whilst Bathurst was changed to Banjul to name only a few. Former President Dr. Siaka P. Stevens attempted to change the name of Sierra Leone to something else because ,he said ,it smelt Portuguese .But the project was abandoned due to its expense unavailable by corruption caused the proponent himself.
The needles name changing affects state institutions in such a way that it sometimes causes dismay. Take the case of the Ministry of Education for instance where they are so bookish that they have ironically run out of naming ideas. When there was sanity in the Ministry there used to be a Director of Education, Deputy Director ,Principal Education Officer ,Senior Education Officer and Education Officer etc. Came highly Educated Officers who felt one way to salvage cascading standards was to resort to nomenclature changing. It has not worked . Now we have a Chief Education Officer as Professional head of the Ministry with Deputy Directors all over the place when there is no Director.
The Police too have not been outdone in this matter of unnecessary name changing. Since the advent of the British Keith Biddle the names of most ranks have been changed from the top down save for the fact that the name ‘’constable was saved from extinction. The Commissioner of Police became Inspector General next Deputy etc. The well knows Chief Police Officer has become Local Unit Commander.
Euphemisms in this exercise have had a field day with no positive results. Think of the change of name of the Sierra Leone Road Transport Authority (SLRTA) to Sierra Leone Road Safety Authority (SLRSA) as if safety was not considered when the name of the Authority was Road Transport Authority .Statistics since the change of name have not denoted an improvement in accidents and road conditions as well as the attitude of drivers.
The most ambitious of the name euphemism is the changing of the name PRISONS to CORRECTIONAL CENTRE .In passing let it be noted that Britain our mother country still uses the name PRISONS. It will be found an examination that crimes have not abated because of the change of name .Why have we been trying to show that we know more English than the English man?
What our idle name –Changers did not realize is that we are in a country of about 70 percent illiteracy and so we have been confusing them the more by our useless change of names .They have been naming and failing