Monthly Archives: August 2022

Nigerians are unique in every sense but if we pretend that we operate a normal society, then the truth is not in us. Nigeria was great and can be great again, only that the long journey to greatness would require some internal cleansing by all of us. The first time I began to query the ‘Nigerianness’ in Nigerians was way back in 2007. I was on a return journey from Dallas, USA to Lagos after the summer holidays with my family. The journey was enroute London and the transit from Dallas to London was peaceful and orderly. The journey from London to Lagos was different. All hell was let loose when it was time to board, as passengers scrambled for space from the lounge to the aircraft. In awe, my younger son who was barely three years old then asked me why the rush, after all we all had our seats already allocated to us.

I recall the excitement that greeted the 6-3-3-4 policy as pronounced by the Late Professor Aliu Babatunde Fafunwa when he was education minister under the self-styled Military President Ibrahim Babangida. How did we fare with that policy? How far did it go beyond the promises on paper?

Tobi Amusan probably doesn’t know that she is the face of the new Nigeria that Nigerians desire. She is winning medals, she is packing laurels, she is breaking records, she is setting records, she is scoring firsts, she is flying high but I doubt if Tobi knows that she is the new symbol of hope for the Nigeria dream. The son of man can stay without food for hours. He may not even know where the next meal is going to come from. He may be in tattered clothes without having a shelter over his head. Man can cope with all these and life will still be going on but when hope is lost, everything is lost. If only Tobi knows that she represents that hope for millions of Nigerians today that Nigeria can be great again. Tobi has scored many firsts in a row. The firsts are too numerous to count and they are everywhere on the internet but it is remarkable that she is not just breaking existing records, she is consistently beating her own records and she is marching on. This is the best way to compete. If you consistently aim to outperform your best, you will see yourself flying above the altitude of your competitors.

It started like a joke. We touched on it casually if it became a matter of public discourse. Soon it was beginning to look like a movie. What looked like mere hazard metamorphosed to imminent risk. Now, it is looking like ours is a country under siege. The days we dreaded are here with us like an unwanted visitor. To say we did not know how we got here will amount to hiding the truth under our tongue. We muddled politics with governance and carried on as if we had the joker. There was so much we could do if we saw ourselves as a people, whose destinies are joined irrespective of our individual beliefs. Only that the vision is blinded when the love of power overpowers the power of love. The journey to the brink was not an overnight journey. It was a systematic journey we nurtured thinking it would fizzle away the way it came. Now, road travel is dreaded and the rail lines are so endangered. Like play, like joke, the schools are beginning to close. How else to know that we are succumbing to the wish of these intruders? Who have always maintained that western education is evil.