by Nnamdi Ukasanya
I had to stay action this while, to avoid being viewed as a joy killer, even though there is nothing to celebrate, or an abuser-in-chief of the most important GEJ’s legacy which is still under threat – the Freedom Of Speech.
A Country filled with the proverbial milk and honey, endowed with enormous human and material resources, yet mediocrity remains our bane with lack of sincerity and the expected patriotism in dealing with issues of National concern.
Is Nigeria , our Nigeria, is it really Ours as in One-Nigeria?
Are we really all-inclusively independent? A Country, touted to be independent of any other, yet totally dependent on a few influences, within and outside, who dictates as self acclaimed gods they pretend to be.
Plus the brazen culture of unabating impunity, inherited from the colonial masters, where a few uneducated, unsound and rigid figures, remains in constant circulation as Leaders in the name of Born To Rule, even though they are kilometers away from being abreast with the jet age developmental features.
And when it miraculously happened – a Daniel coming to judgment in 2007, at the emergence of Yar Adua/ Jonathan leadership, the devil struck again, killing the former and leaving the later in the hands of the same wolves whose only target is to keep us in crises which happens to be their only avenue to confiscate and siphon our patrimony as they fought relentlessly to rewind the future back to the ancient.
Agreed, we have made some significant progress and improvement in some sectors, but politically, and in the area of bonding as a Nation, ours has been a contraption that is bastardized, and stunted by Religion, Ethnicity and Regionalism, wrapped in primordial sentiments that is wickedly occasioned by the greedy constant interference of men who should be enjoying their retirement as the constitution stipulates.
And in shame, I keep reading from majority of Nigerians, who takes a bliss in practical pretence; who out of hypocrisy and playing to the gallery, continues to make reference to the emergence of the present occupant of Aso Rock as parts and parcel of the expected progressiveness in the chequered history of the Country.
The youths were lucky to become the Leaders of tomorrow as far back as 1960, but, up until date, that tomorrow has miraculously refused to surface that one begins to wonder how Nigerian tomorrow became an elusive concept. The stunning fact is that leadership has been perpetually privatized in Nigeria by the same lots, irrespective of the fact that the young of today has a full technological grasp of the globalized world than they can do.
That they were Leaders in the past, yet achieved nothing to be proud of, does not strike a cord. What matters is that Aso Rock must be occupied as to fulfil all righteousness with a lot of funds going down the drain for lack of vision and the intellectual capacity.
This is the same gang that ruled Nigeria as dictators in 1983/84, and what has changed in them remains a public knowledge.
All we hear today in total conformity with their deceptive paper trail, is corruption corruption corruption, even when and where there is none. I happened to be of the school of thought, that corruption is just a by-product or a symptom of our problem as a Country and any prescription for its cure must holistically address same from the root.
It suffice to conclude that the corruption mantra of the present Administration is just as a hogwash, as it’s a passing word, which is most likely a tool for party consolidation, not even when the fight is so skewed to favour a set of individuals and party loyalists, at the detriment of others.
Destabilizing and chronic diseases like ethno-religious bigotry, tribal bias and born to rule mentality, which fuels mediocrity, remains the root cause of our stagnation and lack of oneness…
A Country where Leaders are selected, not by merit, but according to religion or regional background, with all trying to loot and confiscate enough to last them for centuries, after all it belongs to nobody and it belongs to everybody.
Why then curing corruption when the root cause of the evil is brazenly celebrated as it’s happening now where a man named Daura must man DSS while a Lady from the same locality must chair INEC and same goes to all sensitive positions in the land, after all, the much touted gender inequality has been addressed, using one stone to surrender two birds to the jubilation of a few ladies in need of female recognition.
To make a bad situation worse, all our bright stars, who have made their marks – home and abroad in many fields of human endeavor, are wickedly and continually witch-hunted, their career threatened and blackmailed just for working with a Government whose former head, fell short of an acceptable standard for being a none official member of the cabal.
So, at 55, Nigeria is ripe for restructuring. Methinks, all the resolutions made by eminent Nigerians during the last Constitutional Conference are ripe for the plucking. Jettisoning such a feet in the alter of politicking and Northern agenda may spell the type of doom that would require a much more sacrifice to ameliorate.
In the light of this, a Nation acceptable and owned by all Nigerians, must emerge. This should be a place where an Igboman can no longer be seen as an outcast in his fatherland; a Nation where a Fulani man does not see self as a first class citizen among equals; a Nation that must not be referred to as the Dogs and the Baboons; not a Nation where Suny-bobo will be sacked and the automatic replacement becomes a Sani- bobo. Not a Nation where the Niger Delta man is just a tool for milking, to be dumped after his landed properties have been forcefully confiscated, with a full blown degradation and pollution in the name of one Nigeria. A nation where equality, equity and fairness is the watchword; a place where meritocracy is supreme.
Not talking about the present abracadabra, where the popular WAZOBIA slogan has been confined to the dustbin of history-with the President, the Senate President and the Speaker of the House of Rep all of the same geographical/ geopolitical zone.
These and many more I think should be properly viewed and measures appropriately applied to kick start i our forward march to the dreams of our forefathers
Nigerians, this should be a brink of a new birth. Let’s reason together.
Nnamdi Ukasanya can be reached on Facebook here.
