Sometime back, my friends and I saw a woman with a baby on her
back, and a little boy beside her. She still had three 20-liter gallons of palm
oil to carry across the street. It was a disheartening sight. In that entire
situation, she still managed a smile, we could not believe it. Why should any
Nigerian have to suffer this? It was a sentiment shared by all in the car.
We
told the driver to make a U-turn and we headed back to the scene, before we got
there, another Nigerian was already helping her. We came down in our suits,
stopped a cab, carried her load in, and paid the driver to take her to her
destination.
It felt good.
Mangs, Heriju, Chekube, anonymous man, and myself did our small
bit to ensure that suffering ended, yet we are not unique because there a
various forms of this act happening every day; that’s who we truly are as
Nigerians.
Nigeria can and will be great when we begin to see ourselves as
one, first as Nigerians before our molecular deconstructs into tribes and
languages, which is smaller and weaker than our collective identity as
Nigerians.
Just imagine if we all believed in our country, in ourselves,
protecting and nurturing each other, the structures, following through with
what needs and has to be done, and many other correlates of ensuring a thriving
society, who is to say that we will not claim our rightful positive place?
No organized society abandons its existence and its management to
those in power alone. It is the collective responsibility of leaders and
followers to ensure that we get out of our corporate existence that which will
not only keep us together but do so happily, fulfilling our needs and wants in
the relationship.
Majority of the disharmony in the country today, stems from the
feeling of alienation felt by certain people, and the inability of this union
to meet their actual/perceived needs and or wants. If the country belongs to us
all, then it is our responsibility, each and every sane one of us to make it
work.
The problem is not if we can, it is if we want to. When we decide
to, there is nothing under the sun that can, that will stop us.
God bless Nigeria.
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