“IT IS NOT OUR PORTION”, SAYS WHO?
All over the world Nigerians have being ascribed as a people with strong emotional attachments to religion. This affiliation is so glaring to the extent that we see nothing practically offensive to the way we outwardly profess our various faiths. No doubt, it is incontrovertible that religion plays a significant role in the lives of several people all over the world and as such, reinforces the understanding that it is a “programming tool” which helps to shape the way people behave in the society. The number of churches, mosques and spiritual homes in the country underscores how Nigerians align largely with religion. Indeed, in a recent survey conducted by British Broadcasting Cooperation (BBC); Nigeria topped other countries by having the highest percentage of people who believe in God yet, the country is rated as one of the most corrupt nation in the world. What a paradox!
In Nigeria, one cannot invalidate the influence of religion in the arrangements of our national lives. The most terrible person professes to be a strong adherent to their religion. It is no news that we have become so fond of misusing scriptural portions and statements to support our “religiosity”. For emphasis, we are in the habit of echoing “it is not our portion”, even to the very things that will eventually turn out to be our portion by reasons of our notorious behaviours, actions and neglect to issues of concerns. This product of hypocrisy is not limited to the citizens alone as national, state and local governments herald their events with prayers to hypocritically commit things into the hands of God but when actually in reality, the outcome of such occasion had been pre-determined by men whose intentions and purposes are far from being rated godly.
Ordinarily, it is not suppose to be an issue talking positive but of a truth, clear instances should reveal that you have laboured adequately to be rewarded with such conception. A situation where we sound out “ it is not our portion” without recourse to whether appropriate efforts were put in place are actually worrisome, incoherent with logic and completely unreasonable. It simply defaults common sense as it is not enough to talk positive; believing expectations will come to pass when in actual sense, the effort put in place is either limited or absent. This basically has to some extent undermined the nation’s advancement simply because each time we exhibit nonchalant to things that are of significance we get in return low standard in education, increase poverty, high rate in unemployment, insecurity and continuous romance with impunity.
The nation has suffered for so long undue setbacks as a result of this unconnected philosophy. In Nigeria today, it is very hard to command support or win elections without aligning with a religious group or faith. The idea is mostly that you will be perceived as a believer and hence should understand the peoples’ feelings (being a ‘religious’ person) and could possibly deliver adequately as against a person whose affiliation is not compatible to any known and recognised faith. Ironically, the cases have turned out to be that those who claim to be outwardly religious are unfortunately the ones exhibiting worst political, social and economic conducts. They have in no small ways raped our existence by manners of their various corruptive tendencies and successfully mortgaged our future.

Well Written bro!

Definitely not our portion to continue to wander in this wilderness

Apart from this insurgence in the north, Nigeria hasn't changed much. I was reading some old news magazines from the 80s and from comments, we still had these problems then.

I doubt our generation can solve Nigeria's problems that run deeper than our generation but we can try just so it becomes easier for subsequent generations.