THE UNFORTUNATE FAITH OF NIGERIA

The ship of Nigeria state is sailing in very troubled waters. Waters troubled by very many crises. Crises of unemployment, crises of insecurity, crises of malcontent of discontent by the population of the country. Crises like corruption and stealing in public places. The ship is not about to sink but is in a dangerous position in the high sea. That is how I describe the current ship of Nigeria state.


The ship is the result of forceful amalgamation, well, the amalgamation was not done by Nigeria, not by the people who today see themselves as Nigeria. It was done by the British colonial rulers; who ruled the country in those days. They effected the amalgamation for their own convenience and not for the convenience of the people of Nigeria that they ruled. The main motive of the amalgamation was because the British colonial government in Nigeria could not run the government of the North economically. It was not viable, the government could not pay it way through revenue and produce of Southern Nigeria.

So they wanted to bring the two together so that they could use the wealth of the south to cushion up the loss or the shortages experienced in the north and secondly, to ease their administration. So, they didn’t effect them to favour Nigerians. But, for their own convenience, for the purpose of the achievement of their aim in Nigeria to rule, dominate and exploit the country. Be moved together in a hundred years should be able to plan how to stay together. All over the world now you see that there are advantages in greatness of nations.

Nigeria is a big country in Africa both in perception of governance and in economic development. But unfortunately, the incursion of the military in the governance in Nigeria, introduced a very serious setback to the Nigeria progress. It introduced stealing, corruption, looting and division into the polity. And so the country has not progressed as it should have.

Of course; I said it loudly. I say that with great historical facts behind those who founded this country, those who fought for the independence of the country and those went in the first government of the country and we were running a country, a country that at that time did not have the advantage of oil wealth, depended only on agricultural produce; groundnut from the north, cocoa from the west and palm produce from the east. These were the main sources of revenue of the country. They were able to manage the economy and to establish industries, they ran a railway corporation for cheap transport across the country from the South to North they ran a Nigerian Airways, an Airway that linked Nigeria to the whole world, then they set up industries, these industries were growing and then they set up universities.

Britain left Nigeria without a university. She left only a college of London university that is the University of Ibadan today. It was not a university at the time of independence, it was at independence that they made it a full-fledged university. They founded the University of Nigeria Nsukka, founded the Ahmed Bello University Zaria and founded the University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University, in the west. Because they needed man-power for the development of the country.

Unfortunately, only six years into government, an unpatriotic group of people stepped into the government and used the weapons which they issued to them for the defence of the country and used the weapons on the nationalists that set up the military, and killed the prime minister, two premiers and many other people, and in their madness, the military took the country into 33 months genocide civil war that cost more than two million lives.

The military remained in power for 38 years, doing what they knew best how to do, doing what they were trained to do. The military all over the world are trained to defend, to fight, to defeat the enemy. They also trained to crush the enemy, loot the enemy, devastate the enemy and vandalise the enemy. That is what the military is trained to do, they are not trained to build, to administer, except administering themselves. So they introduced corruption and stealing in the government, the military destroyed the foundation which they laid. If the nationalists that fought for independence had been left to continue, they would have trained successors to follow their footsteps with them as nationalist, they would have lead through a tutelage of patriotism and nationalism and that would have given Nigeria a development and a growth.

The military came and introduced stealing in governance for 38 years. That’s is what destroyed the country. It is easy to destroy and difficult to build, so I pity the people who are in government now or who have been in government or who want to be in government. Because, what took 38 years to destroy cannot be rebuilt in a day. It is easier to destroy than to build. That is the fate: unfortunate faith for Nigeria.