Whenever someone dies, someone gives birth, someone is getting married and even if someone is warming their newly built house, my people, the Yoruba like marking such milestones with uniforms. This one is to show their solidarity with the celebrators. Meanwhile, those people celebrating would have factored their expenses on their incomes from the uniforms.
However, I have come to realise that not everyone that buys the uniform is actually happy with the celebrator. I used to work in a place where, as at the time I left the place, we had uniforms for practically everything. Yet, there was no love.
The foci of this write up are two incidents that occurred recently. Actually, I am praying that the second one should keep happening.
A medical doctor committed suicide on Third Mainland Bridge in Lagos. As if others had been waiting for it to happen, it created a band wagon effect. Some succeeded and others didn’t.
When interviewed, those that didn’t succeed had unfortunate tales to tell. They had lost one thing or the other, they were hopeless, they were afraid of tomorrow, etc
About a fortnight ago some millions of naira were found at Kaduna airport. Last week, about four hundred and ninety million naira was found somewhere in Lagos. As if that wasn’t enough, two days ago, two hundred and fifty million naira was found in the popular Balogun market in the same Lagos.
I believe there is a symbiotic relationship between both sets of events. That is, if all these monies that are being thrown away had been pumped into the economy, Nigeria might not have found itself in this sorry state. Those millions now being deliberately lost but found would have provided some jobs and basic amenities for the people.
Maybe the government should be thinking of giving an amnesty to all those keeping government money for us to publicly submit such money. They should be assured that if it is submitted within a stipulated time, they will not face any prosecution.
041217
