Prom. The beautiful event signifies graduation from High school or secondary school as we call it. If you’re familiar with American movies, you must have seen quite a several proms. The dates, the dance, the prom king and queen, the kiss, and the usual stuff you see in American movies.

What if I tell you, you can now see them in northern Nigeria?

Nowadays, schools in northern Nigeria also do proms. The dates, dances, prom kings, and queens. Everything else, minus the kissing (probably). From Kano to Katsina to Kaduna to Jos. And don’t even get started on Abuja, where the elitist schools are located.

For instance, Kaduna, where schools like Zamani college, Essence, Queen’s Field schools, Danbo International School, and NTIC have been having proms since the early 2010s.

The gate fee is usually between 5k to 10, and only corporate attire is allowed. 

In Katsina, the situation is not so different. While the practice only started recently in schools like Little Angels and Gobarau Academy, it isn’t any less fancy as DJs and MCs are hired.

The situation is the same for schools in Kano, like Lebanon school, Yandutse college, and Crescent Kano Capital school.

In Abuja, that has been the norm. for ages, The President’s granddaughter made headlines when she was seen at her prom dancing and jubilating with her hair open. Critics had a field day.

Like one social media user, Mahmood Salisu, said, “Prom dabi’ar yahudawa ne”, many people don’t agree with it.

Another popular analyst on Twitter, Galadiman Arewa, quipped ‘Arewa is lost’ “The confirmation is what secondary school kids are doing in the name of prom nights, graduation dinners, and parties. Ba banbanci da abunda arna sukeyi a US. It’s so sad,” he added.

The sentiment is mostly the same throughout northern Nigeria.

The most shocking thing is that Prom had been going on since the early 2010s but is only now receiving attention because of social media and the crazy TikTok culture.

Perhaps it might one day become normalized.