A school nursery rhyme goes thus: “Some have food but cannot eat; some can eat but have no food. We have food and we can eat, glory be to thee, O, Lord”. My little kids recite this nursery rhyme as a meal ritual but beyond that, the message unfolds in various dimensions to the son of man.

A number of homes in Nigeria of today are stocked with assorted food items, others with money; the world renown legal tender which can feed the families of the “class of the chosen” from one generation to generation.

The affluent, Nigerians, those who’s “Chi” according to Chinua Achebe has helped to crack their nuts in benevolent manner have all to eat without an iota of ado or rigor. They sweat not and bother not about what to eat and drink.

On the other side of the divide are brigades of poor Nigerians whose days turn to nights and nights alternate with days on mere empty stomachs. Their stomachs are so empty of food no matter how little to such an extent their small and large intestines intertwine on agonizing level thus they curse the days of their birth.

We are all “Good people” in “Great Nigeria”.A few of us are, however, privileged to oscillate between the class of the chosen, the affluent and stinking rich and those that are so down trodden and could not boast of anything to eat. We know as Bob Marley once sang the reality of affluence and debilitating impact of poverty and hunger as he intoned, “Dem belly fool but we hungry. A hungry man is an angry man ………”

Similarly, Max Romeo while describing the plights of downtrodden children in the ghettos in comparison with those of the affluent homes delivered a rendition. “Up town babies don’t cry they don’t know not what hunger is like, they have mummies, nannies, lots of toys to play with, they have daddies, grannies, and lots of things to play with”

I remember as if it were yesterday, our childhood days at Offa, when life was based and spent merely on a subsistence level and there was no big difference between the affluent families and those that could be tagged relatively poor. Life was like that in many homes and Yoruba Communities of old.

Today; as Jimmy Cliff has rightly posited, “too many people are suffering, too many people are dieing. Too little people got everything and too many people got nothing. Remake the world, with love and happiness ………, ”

I have had the unique privilege of being invited to dine with Military Administrator’s family. At the dining hall was placed all sorts of what could be eaten by both the hungry and glutton. The waiters were there attending to every beck and call but my inquisitive mind betrayed my hunger. I was tempted to ask how life was, working and preparing food for such privileged Nigerians. It was gory tales of seeing, preparing but not partaking in the ritual of last respect to those delicacies lying in state at the government house dinning room.

The salary being paid to them was so meager to such an extent that most times their minds were being bugged by problems of children school fees, domestic commitments, family demands to such an extent they were over blinded to perform oversight function when the remains of the delicacies on table were to be interred. Just like them, I remembered that after devouring such sumptuous meal, I would have to resort to what my meager salary could provide for my family when I get back home.

I though held the golden cutleries but could not do justice to the food. With sorrowful mind, the rhyme reverberated “Some have food, but cannot eat, some can eat but have no food……, ”.

I also later realized the joy and affection I used to share with Adamu my beggar friend who before his untimely death used to share kola nut, groundnut and part of my coins with me before his demise under the stair case at General Post Office, Dugbe, Ibadan.

I remember I was the only so called “big man” that witnessed how Izal Antiseptic was poured on his remains before the old haggard staff of Oyo State Health Management Board carried his corpse for burial. It occurred to me that one day the son of man would die either in affluence or poverty like Adamu.

We are today witnessing a lot of sorrowful circumstances as tumultuous times are taking tolls on the lives of both the rich and poor. The rich though are getting richer and poor, poorer, our meals are so full of sorrow to such an extent we all bemoan our plights.

While the poor Nigerians yawn because of unending hunger, the rich are mindful of what and what not to eat because of the plaguing health problems associated with tucking the tummy with expensive junk foods. The selfish tendencies of the affluent to corner every resource Nigeria nation is blessed with for only themselves and their current dynasties, make the lives of the poor bleak and gloomy with attendant explosive and violent thoughts they daily nurture.

Collins Powell at a breakfast table at Transcorp Hilton, Abuja advised that political democracy must go along with economic democracy spiced with commercial code of law.

He relished the contributions of American statesmen such as Abraham Lincoln. Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin whose methods of political governance still sustain American ontology on truth. According to Powell on this evergreen golden truth is the statement of fact that “All men are created equal, we are all endowed by the Creator and that every being has right to life, liberty and free to pursue happiness”. To secure this right, government must be derived from just power which invariably must rest on the concern for the governed.

At each meal the generality of Nigerians take, we bemoan why in the midst of plenty many and very many are still hungry. We detest the lip services of the privileged few to building a virile nation without consideration for building our minds toward such noble ideals.

We are fed up reading how billons of dollars are stolen by the few, retrieved and recycled into personal pockets and accounts and yet, and many are left to suffer hunger and deprivation. “Money” according to Powell “is a coward; it only goes where it is sent”.

Would our money bags in politics and political economy of Nigeria please send their money to areas of noble purposes and ideals that would benefit us all Nigerians?

It is equally a truism that a citizen makes best choice for his country but the truth is self evident that our excellences and honourables by their actions and habits are not convincing average Nigerians to be good citizens when daily we eat bread of sorrow. Whatever be the case, crop of Nigerians and generations after us have no other place to call home, Nigeria belongs to us all and we must concur with Powell when he admonishes us on democracy at 10; “work, hard, sustain it, secure it and keep it”.

•Taiye Olaniyi

taiyelolu_2004 @yahoo.com