There is such a word as HONOR. Unfortunately I doubt if it exists in the Nigerian lexicon.
We have successfully taken every good thing handed us and redefine them in a manner that suit us, and it is usually not in a good way.
We took oil look what we turned it into. We took politics and turned it into a do-or-die affair. We handled democracy and managed to repaint it bigotry. Political office is no longer earned by what you can deliver but where you are from. Political appointments are determined by whose boot you lick. We took the virtue of honor and rubbished it, totally incinerated it. It does not exist again, no not in the Nigerian reality.
When Neville Chamberlain with his pacifist methods couldn’t handle Hitler’s overrunning of Europe, he stepped down for someone else with a different ideology and approach to the issue. Winston Churchill with the help of United States finally quelled the devils quest for territory.
In 2006 the Prime Minister Balkenende of Netherlands handed over his resignation to the Dutch royalty. Why? He was unable to reconcile dissenting factions of the house in good time and he was out of ideas. Rather than let the disarray continue and grind the nation to a halt, he gladly handed over to allow someone who might know a better way to resolving the crises. The most striking thing about this particular case was that the disarray in the house was partly as a result of allowing Hirsi Ali a smallish black Somali lady who only a few years before in 1992 had been granted asylum retain her Dutch citizenship and seat in parliament.
It isn’t about ego, it isn’t about pride, it isn’t about national cake. It is about getting things done, delivering on the mandate of office and the promise for which you were elected. It is not about south-south or north-south it is about human lives.
There are no perfect individuals, and there never can be a perfect country. We only need a human country. Human as human can be. Some will take to vices; some will chose to be outlawed but for those of us who have entrusted our commonwealth in a government must find the government worthy of us. We must be made to think that our lives, health security safety and feelings mean something because it does.
We don’t need being told to ‘go to hell’. We can understand that our leaders are not gods and may not have the answers and solutions at the snap of a finger but that we mean something to them at least. How does a leader go gallivanting and politicking when it should be mourning its citizens that die in unceremonial ways by no fault of theirs.
We must feel that we are human and equal. The live of a man who dies in an SUV is not ‘more equal’ than that of people who died at a bus stop bomb explosion. When a FEC meeting is cancelled on the death of one person and there is not even a tear shed for the souls of many other, one begin to wonder; what a nation.
Nigerians don’t ask for a perfect country, we only ask a human nation; where we are dignified and secure enough to pursue our dreams. If you cannot guarantee this please stay out of the kitchen!
Stepping down is not anything to be ashamed about, in fact, it is a sign of strength not weakness. You need to know that the nation is greater than any individual and his ambition. We need to bring back the virtue of HONOR
#OurGirlsAreStillMissing
#BringBackOurGirl
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