by Dr. Perry Brimah
This letter is to the attention of ex-President Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida and two-time ex-President, Olusegun Obasanjo.
On behalf of Nigeria’s youth, I will like to inform you that the Youth are coming. We have risen. We have decided to be the leaders of today. Not tomorrow that never came; the leaders of Today. We the Youth are reclaiming our country. Our country, a country you do not own.
This message is to inform, or advise you of your next actions. The two of you got us here. You two created most of the mess we are in today. You two rendered this nation nonviable. You two held the reins of government in maniacal style, devoured the commonwealth and created holes in the system through which billions of US dollars could be looted. You two with your pals, rendered the nation helpless through hopeless transfers of power. You two ruined our systems, our judicial system, our security system and our political system. You two invented the almighty cabal and empowered them limitlessly, transferring the endowment of the nation into the hands of a few wicked, rapacious monsters. You started sharing oil wells to the dirty, still being shared today for election 2015. You two have continuously controlled the nations ‘political’ dispensation, juggling power and implanting yourselves, your brothers, friends and your godsons into office.
It is thanks to the both of you that we are a nation under siege today, ruled by crazy, inebriated ruthless plunderers. It is thanks to you that we are the bottom of the barrel, a laughing stock of the entire world, not even making headlines anymore, not even when we have the greatest flood of the year, or even when we have the largest looting scandals of human history. No headlines. The world has forgotten us, condemned the nation’s youth as hopeless and helpless mentally ruined slobber. But Lord knows we are not. We are a force. We are things you can never imagine. We can plan and organize in ways you will never dream was possible. We are the Nigerian Youth awakening.
And today, we have decided to give you a chance to make this revolution less bloody. We are giving you a chance for a little redemption, if such can exist after all the atrocities you have done. Our proposition is simple: Fix this mess and hand over to Youth. And then, take yourselves on exile from Nigeria, never to return for the rest of your lives.
You broke your pledge to Nigeria. You never loved Nigeria with all your strength; you only loved your pockets, and what a shame that was. Like the Solomon story, you chose for the baby to be split in half and killed; you rather possess half a dead baby than see it alive if won’t be yours. But now, you and your ilk must leave our nation, or you will never see sunlight again in it when we are soon through. Corruption is robbery and elite robbers will go to jail. It will be a new day.
We can and will do this with you or without you. We are determined. You are seeing the force of change, the natural tendency of things, as Ghandi said, after a while all tyrant leadership eventually falls. Every wicked tyranny in history eventually falls. You are witnessing a transition period in Nigeria that no one could ever expect or predict. You are seeing a cohesive force of Youth ready to die to make change. Youth media, youth activists, and everyday youth moving as a force majeure. Rising up all around you.
The choice is yours, for it is within your power to do something good. We know you; we know the conspiracies you have plotted that got us here. Now, the people of Nigeria, the millions of destitute, the millions of sick, wounded, hopeless and grieving, represented by a Youth who have decide to take charge, direct you to fix the mess you created and be granted safe leave, or you wait it out in your mansions in Minna and Ota, watch a lengthier, severe but by God, successful, intellectual and moral revolution, and be taken to the gallows. Yes, for all of us and our friends and families that have lived in suffering and poverty and died painful deaths in the hands of your governments, we will be brutal to the corrupt. We will take no prisoners.
Fellow Youth. We implore you set your differences aside just for now, at least. We can resume the animosity later, but right now we have a common task. In Ghana, the Hausa and Ga do not quarrel and kill each other. It is these wicked ‘elders’ and elite that have kept us this way; pitted the Hausa against the Igbo to distract us while they loot us silly. We can work together again as we did to elect Abiola. Why quarrel and fight each other over budgetary dispensation of $30 billion, when together we can fight and for once in our history, recover$100s of billions from looters and re-establish a full yearly income of three times as much for our nation?
Perhaps when we bring in our total oil earning, the true figure of which Nigeria has never known, and which more than half of has always been set for looting since the Babangida regime, perhaps we would have such surpluses and a quality, sane life, we won’t even need fight each other anymore. Once we get rid of these jagajaga, greedy, sick and morally deficient looters, we will have a true SNC. We will decide if we want regions or nations, all in the best interest of life and the pursuit of happiness with peace and security. If the time is not now, then when is it? Who will avenge the deaths of the innocent students slaughtered in Yobe… in Borno, in Bayelsa, in Benue? Who will ensure our police are fairly paid and equipped from the nation’s wealth, so they secure the nation properly rather than focus on street bribe? Who will avenge the pain and suffering of millions of Nigerians today and in the past? If not us and if not now, when will we be the leaders of the day? Who will retrieve the 60% looted annual endowment and give it to its rightful owners, so Nigeria will no longer have 112 million poor and over 100 million destitute, living under a dollar-a-day, while a few senseless, greedy cows can have hundreds of billions of dollars to lose to foreign banks; or can privatize and make phony companies in Nigeria to bill us triple global averages and extort us further?
Imagine you were the one laying there in Yobe, knife on your neck about to be slaughtered. How will you fight? What will you want, for security, for change? And as you lay dying, how will you want your death to be avenged of those who allowed the nation slip into such a state? This is how I feel, this is how we must feel. Let this be the knife-on-our-neck revolution.
To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace. (Bible)
It is our time. The Youth Will Lead Today! We will peacefully, boldly fight this war! And we will win!
May God continue to be on the side of the oppressed. May God give us the power for this battle.
About the Author
Dr. Peregrino Brimah
https://ENDS.ng/ [Every Nigerian Do Something]
Email: [email protected] Twitter: @EveryNigerian
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
