Photo credit: the Punch
It’s apparently a curse to be poor in a country like Nigeria. Being dispossessed of the good things of life is even ‘double wahala for dedi body’, respects to Fela Kuti.
Oh yeah, some of the people have been sentenced to a lifetime of authentic penury. And this has to happen in a land filled with the proverbial milk and honey.
Yes, Nigeria is a land of potentials. When the potentials will be actualized beats my imagination.
I hope we are all aware that the middle class has been relegated to a much lower level. The lower class too has in turn been long demoted to a sub human level.
That’s why the greatest musician to come out of Africa, Fela Kuti, sang that,
‘As time just dey go,
Things just dey bad.
Dey bad more and more…’
He sang in respect of Africa!
But one interesting thing is the fact that the people’s upliftment is nowhere else except in their own hands. The people have been so exasperated that we have stopped thinking positively.
Instead of thinking straight, we have allowed ourselves to be put in positions of self blame and transferred aggression.
That’s why the new bourgeois class have been able to penetrate our otherwise reasonable selves. The new bourgeois class consists of the politicians and the so called gods of men, sorry men of God!
We really do need to put our salvation, whether political, spiritual or material in our own hands. We shouldn’t allow anyone to be covering our faces with thick veils again.
The Yoruba will say, ‘Eni go lo n gbe Igunnu’. The Igunnuko is a masked masquerade. Its height would generally make it impossible for the masquerader to collect money from the appreciative crowd of people. The job is then left to its acolytes!
Who no wan better tin?
You see, the reason for my epistle is the fact that if our people should unite, there’s no doubting what Nigeria could turn into. But in a situation where we have a condemned view of our own self worth, then the politicians and pastors will continue oppressing us.
In the first instance, in our politics, could we do without, ‘Baba so’pe’. That is we should forget about any directive by whoever and vote according to our consciences.
The other one is the spiritual angle. This, by its very nature could be tricky. But I should think whenever a person is going to a particular church, for instance, they ought to know whether they are being fed spiritually and materially too!
If we aren’t careful, we’ll just be ‘shuffering and shmiling’, while the politico-religious leaders are ‘enjoying the lives of their heads’.
They would then have succeeded in finally getting us emasculated!!!
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