YOUR PVC AND FUTURE OF NIGERIA

YOUR PVC AND FUTURE OF NIGERIA

Monday letter1

I have been critically observing the politicking going on in Nigeria since 2015. I have seen a lot of switching of sides and heard a lot of name-calling. Nigerians, especially most of us who are not completely poor in the real sense of poverty, and not rich in the real sense of wealth, argue, fight and even kill because of few individuals who don’t even know our names talk less of having our contacts saved on their phones. We can rubbish anyone who goes against those we support and praise anyone, not minding their character, as far as they appeal to our sentiments.

Well, since I don’t have the guts of Fela, to wax an album or two to tell us that we are all ”Suffering and Smiling” or call us ”Zombies”, and I am not a fearless lawyer with the audacity of Gani Fawehinmi to take some untouchable people to court or defend the defenseless, nor a writer with the dexterity of Ken Saro Wiwa who will write to convincingly question the irritating status quo – then, let me use this medium to say that we the masses of this country are the victims of our own doing.

For instance, out of tribalism, ethnicity, religion, social groups and titles, we are often quick to close our eyes to reality and embrace injustice and incompetence to the detriment of our today and our future. We hate the truth and we are always passionately working against it to butter our ego or to satisfy our sentiments. At the end of the day, we all meet at the table of lamentation or regret counting our losses.

We prefer to take the court to the street instead of taking the street to court and then we are left with the chaos in the Northeast, the blood stains in Jos, the tears in Benue, the sorrow in the creeks of the Niger Delta, and the bottled up anger in the hearts of people in all the parts of the country. In our ignorance, we have made the unworthy more worthy than necessary. In our carelessness, we have given dogs and pigs charge of our altars. In our littleness, we are being milked by the professional beneficiaries of the chaos we unconsciously or consciously create. We blame God, we blame every other person or thing but not ourselves when our sentimental and emotional decisions backfire.

 My countrymen, how long are we going to continue like this? The drawing board is gradually running out of space. We can’t keep doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. For how long are we going to allow our sentiments to make us overlook a possibility of a breath of fresh air and keep chasing the same old crowds that are always too busy engineering their social and political survival?

 If we don’t wake up now, in another four years from now, another Victor Ernest will have a reason to write something to challenge us to. I hope you or even the country will be alive in one piece to read it then. So, Who will you handover your future to for another four years? Make the right decision now that you have your PVC in your hand.

  • Victor Ernest, ernestv93@gmail.com

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