Friends, brothers, sisters, a very frightening thing is occurring; perhaps the most alarming thing about this ‘epidemic’ is that the victims are largely unaware as to the danger that has befallen them. Much like a viral infection, the aggressor appears infinitesimally small compared to its victim, yet its potency works to completely destabilize its victim to the point where the victim is rendered completely non-functional. The victims in question are native to the vast, heavily endowed yet troubled continent of Africa. They are the younger generation of our century, comprising a greater fraction of the population than found in any other continent. We, the youth of Africa, as a collective group, stand the risk of being written down in history as one of the worst criminals of all time. The nature of this crime is of a very unique sort. This crime does not entail machinery in the form of guns or ammunition; in fact, it is one devoid of physical forms of aggression, yet its gravity inflicts wounds that work to further weaken the already fragile link that unites us as Africans.
In every war of aggression, there are the two parties that the history
books talk about at great length; the winners and the losers. However,
matters as complex as war are not to be seen only in black and white.
There is always an undefined gray area, which although in terms of area
take up but a fraction of the entire picture, in reality those operating
in this section are significant enough to influence who loses and who
wins. Historians will refer to this group as ‘bystanders’; a more
cynical historian would refer to them as ‘accomplices’. Members
of this group tend to shy away from the blood baths on the battlefield.
Their place is not behind the barrel of a gun nor are they accustomed
to the rigid rigmarole characteristic of the life of a soldier. Their
battlefield, although very much intangible, still effects the same purpose
of producing corpses with the use of their most prized weapon; silence.
What makes their war so unique is that it is often fought without their
knowledge; that is the perpetrators inflict damage unknowingly.
Most often when the name ‘Africa’ is spoken aloud, it subconsciously
elicits images of war, poverty, corpulent corrupt politicians, flailing
infrastructure and every other imaginable damage that can be possibly
imposed on a nation and its people. Its become a conditioned reflex,
very much akin to how the meeting of two Africans inadvertently ends
in a discussion of the ongoing crises that are crippling their individual
countries. These conversations most likely would trail off into a harangue
leveled against a certain tribe, government official or be attributed
to God’s anger against the nation. It will then end with the customary
head shaking from left to right accompanied by a disgruntled moan or
a defeated shrug. Upon personal self-reflection, one begins to realize,
as I did, that very rarely do these conversations ever end in decisive
action to actually resolve the situation at hand instead they tend to
belabor the issue rather than analyze it in search of possible solutions.
I was conversing with a friend of mine earlier this year and we too
were victims of this conditioned reflex; we fell into a discussion of
the moribund state of affairs in Nigeria. He had said to me “Do you
think Mandela would have been the hero that he was if he was born in
Nigeria”. His already prepared response to this was a resounding NO
as in his words ‘Nigeria was too diabolical’ to produce such a reputable
character as the Great Mandiba.
Decades of repeated government failure, wars, tribal warfare and series
of regimes that are inaugurated with promises of a better life and exit
with the state a step closer to complete wreckage. All this and many
more factors not only serve to impoverish individuals and add to the
endless list of conversational topics, they have worked to desensitize
the victims of this failure; Africans, so much so that we have become
so acclimated to a lifestyle of dysfunction and ineptitude that transcends
all the way from the government to us civilians. We’ve become somewhat
like robots, responding in a banal manner to the disorder around us,
yet refraining from engaging our intellect and any form of critical
thinking which would allow us as individuals to operate using a questioning
and analytical mindset which addresses rather than laments a problem.
One does not need to stray too far from home to find evidence of our
tendency to do away with intellect and rather embrace brutality. If
you have ever observed the numerous vehicle collisions that occur on
the subpar Nigerian roads, you would notice that on instinct, the two
drivers step out of their vehicles each loaded with all sorts of insults
they have prepared to throw at one another. Then slowly, we have the
bystanders who gradually begin to form a crowd around the collision,
each with an opinion of who was the victim and who the criminal, regardless
of whether or not this opinion giver witnessed the collision or not.
With the crowd fueling the brew with their own accusations, the drivers
engage in physical showdown. Worst case scenario, although sadly most
likely the case in these types of situations, one of the drivers is
killed. The bystanders return to their respective duty posts and the
car wreck is left at the site of collision for God knows whom to clear
up. Now, taking a closer look at this real-life scenario I just presented
we see that in a society not given to mental rigor, violence triumphs.
Closer analysis of the situation by either one of the drivers as well
as the bystanders would probably have laid the blame for the collision
at the Government who failed to invest in ridding the roads of potholes
and providing well-trained traffic wardens. The absence of this kind
of thinking leaves two drivers who cannot see beyond the accident itself
and therefore in either of their eyes each one is the cause of the collision
and therefore his anger must be channeled solely against the other driver.
Had this same anger been directed at government leading them to demand
their civilian rights perhaps such altercations would have been few
and far in between on Nigerian roads.
More important is what fosters this kind of thinking exhibited by
these two drivers; once again our dear friend ‘complacency’. Being
so well accustomed to the decrepit nature of our roads and entire infrastructure
as a whole, the drivers see nothing wrong coming into contact with such
a poorly maintained road network. It completely eludes them that the
role of their so-called government is to see that the roads are up to
par to avoid such collisions and in the absence of that, their roles
as civilians and true countrymen beckons them to see to it that the
Government is made to live up to their fundamental responsibilities.
We see here a byproduct of this kind of complacency; the birth of a
society whereby dysfunction is the norm and order becomes almost an
idyllic state that cant possibly be envisioned or actualized by human
minds and so therefore such order is not aspired for.
Applied in a broader sense, we see strands of this kind of complacency
in one of the greatest barriers to our progress as a continent; Ethnicity.
Perhaps the greatest atrocities committed against mankind have been
committed in wars driven by racial or ethnic ideologies, namely; the
Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide, Congo wars and the Nigerian Biafran
wars. Through these manmade catastrophes, history has pointed
out time and time and again that a society bent on emphasizing differences,
rather than nurturing unity, is destined for failure yet across our
continent we see that the major and most significant forms in which
we tend to mobilize ourselves, even more increasingly in times of unrest,
are around ethnic lines. Ethnicity, in turn helps to nurture tolerance
for mediocrity. The dictators of our continent have relied on sustenance
of patron networks consisting mainly of individuals from their places
of origin, to maintain their grips on power. By so doing they create
an atmosphere that condones incompetence for the mere sake of honoring
ancestral roots. We, as civilians are also implicated in this. Often
times when we head for the ballot boxes, our tendency is to vote for
the candidate that shares ancestral roots with us, disregarding whether
or not he or she possesses the ability to fully execute the responsibilities
of the position the candidate is vying for. During election campaigns,
we repeatedly fall prey to empty promises eschewed by these politicians
who offer them in a manner which seems as if they are doing us a benefit
and not the responsibilities they are obligated to fulfill, all in the
hope of winning over the masses. Borne out of our tendency to embrace
mediocrity is our failure to realize that the problems of our continent
has reached an emergency stage. Time, unfortunately is not on our side.
Our past leaders have lost the 20th century putting our nations
dangerously close to the edge of destruction. We can only start now
or never to regain ourselves now in the 21st century.
Earlier this year, a Nigerian senator was accused of marrying a 13-year-old
Egyptian girl. He finagled his way out of the accusations by an all
too popular escape route; invoking Islam‘ Mohammed did it so therefore
it is legal’. What really struck me when the news of the whole sordid
affair broke out was not so much the bestiality of this Senator and
his cohorts who backed the move, but the widespread silence of the Nigerian
population at large. In this case the Senator emerges as the winner
and the unfortunate teenage girl the loser. That leaves majority of
the Nigerian population as the bystanders. With our silence we encouraged
this Senator to be more brazen with his appetite for young girls. Later
on this year, news broke out that he divorced the young teen, whom he
had impregnated and took in another child bride. With our silence we
killed the dreams of two naive young girls; the former as a result of
her pregnancy and ties to the senator has been cast into a despondent
life, her prospects of a future marriage very slim and the other; well
only time would decide her unfortunate fate. We have become so desensitized
to the preponderance of injustice in our society that we have nurtured
an environment devoid of a moral compass. The fate of such a society
is left to the whims of what the diabolical minds ruling our society
can possibly conjure up.
Another route by which we tend to mobilize is through religion. Unfortunately
what is supposed to be a blessing has proven to be a hindrance to the
success of our nations as a result of wrong application. Perhaps one
of the greatest impediments to civilians of our continent rising up
against the tide of injustice is the unfounded belief held by many that
our success and change for the better will originate from the benevolence
of a greater divine being who will bestow success and development onto
our bosom without us getting our hands sullied. History has proven to
us through countless heroes such as the Great Mandiba that change is
enacted when individuals willing to defy the odds rise up to stand for
what they believe in. Upon attending the redeemed camp convention this
year, I was utterly dumbstruck by the masses that flocked to this venue.
The event greatly exceeded capacity; there were roughly about 6 million
people in attendance. I got to thinking that if we Nigerians could drop
whatever obligation, travel the distance on not very secure roads and
be present on time (a very challenging feat for us Africans) just to
hear the words of the highly revered Pastor E.A Adeboye, then why do
we find it so difficult to rally up and begin to demand answers from
our government. .
Perhaps, the worst of these crimes is committed by the well-educated
individuals, who have been privy to top institutions in the developed
world. They live a life well insulated from the plight of the millions
who are not as fortunate to afford a life sculpted by their own will
and wealth to back up that will. This educated class betrays the nation
by the mere awareness of the possibility of an alternative life to the
ones the millions in Africa live, a life replete with a functional public
transit system, responsive and accountable governments, reputable higher
institutions and the many more benefits that they enjoy in the developed
world. They are also well aware that these benefits did not originate
in the form of manna from a higher power but were the fruits of the
work of dedicated and visionary individuals who sacrificed personal
advancement for the bettering of the country as a whole. They are aware
of all this yet choose to fold their hands and watch from a distance
as their nations move closer and closer into disrepair. They, unlike
the millions suffering at the hands of corrupt and mismanaged Governments,
have not been accustomed to a life of disorder and know what it takes
to create a society that applauds merit and denounces incompetence,
they are aware that such a society requires the efforts of both Government
and civilian. Perhaps their indifference is due to their hearts having
long given up on the possibility of a strong, united and flourishing
Africa. Leaving the shores of Africa, they shed the responsibility they
owe to themselves, to their country and to humanity as a whole, using
their acquired skills to invest in already developed societies, robbing
the motherland the chance of a brighter tomorrow and debasing the sweat
and toil of our ancestors who liberated us from our colonial oppressors.
Friends, brothers, sisters, I implore you, let us reflect and objectively
analyze the ways we have directly or indirectly hurt our nation with
our silence and indifference. Our forefathers have relinquished the
reins of our nation from colonial hegemony. They have made their marks
in the history of our continent. Now, it is time for us to make our
own. We have delayed to the point where our situation is now extremely
critical. We cannot afford to be aloof and keep our shoulders and backs
turned, as we owe to the future generation, a continent free from ineptitude,
tribal warfare and social injustice
By Nchedolisa Anammah
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