Richfella:


However, it is not just the duty of the government to bring change. It is a collective responsibility. We should all do our 'little jobs' and responsibilities well. Martin Luther Jnr said: "If you've been called upon to be a street-sweeper, you should sweep the streets as Michael Angelo painted; as Beethoven composed music and as Shakespeare wrote poetry. You should sweep the streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause and say, here lived a great street-sweeper who did his job so well". Do we (you and I) feel such a sense of duty?

Finally, what is really most required of the government is the production of a 'conducive' environment for businesses to thrive; not direct intervention. Please can you remind us of the early inventions (without primary military applications) that the government financed? The atom bomb? My brother na market forces, a conducive business environment and You and I we suppose run the other package. Na our work be that


NB: The government had nothing to do with YouTube. Google purchased it from the founders and their initial financiers. Geddit?

@ Topic

It's interesting to note how most of us are missing the point. Mr Odumorun did not say the west doesn't have slums. He only argued that the depiction of Nigeria by the western media is disturbingly accurate or. . . in milder terms, not too far from the truth. Does it require rocket science to generate and distribute electricity across the country over a period of 50 years?

Well I agree with all your points except the one bolded. The depiction of Nigeria by the Western media is grossly inaccurate and lopsided. Futhermore it is riduculous to expect Nigeria at its present stage of development to have the same level of infrastructure and welfare programs as the West. This is where some diasporean elements here consistently miss the point.

We can't keep moaning all the time about the western media portraying us in a negative way. The truth is that the quality of life is poor in Nigeria caused by decades of bad leadership and a passive followership. Unfortunatley we keep living in denial and blame everyone else apart from ourselves. All we keep watching on NTA and AIT is an overcrowded music scene, parties thrown by politicians with our stolen money and lies from recycled politicians. Maybe our own media can do better by producing better quality programmes/documentary to show the positive aspects of our country which arguably are few and far between. As much as I cringed watching the documentary, it is a stark reminder of how bad things are if at all we needed any reminding.

^^What is a new trend here is that a lot of diasporans here do not even have the courage to state where they are posting from. Yet they keep on castigating the government and people without offering any constructive solutions.
Interestingly their impressions of Nigeria are derived mainly from the Western media.

sulad82i:

I dont think you read and fully understand what I wrote. Did you miss the part of companies and venture capitalist also investing in projects?

I'm not saying that the government have to do everything for the people, all I'm saying is that the country needs all the help it can get from all corners and the government is the biggest body that can provide most of what is needed.

I was not attacking the last part of your post. I simple expressed how ridiculous it would be for anyone to compare the lives of the poor in developed countries with those of those in Nigeria or other developing nations.

Chinda02:

And the UK and US are free of slums, abi?.In this life you cant seperate the fact that there will always be the rich and the poor.lets face facts,inasmuch,as we are a third world country we know our defects and we dont need the western media rubbing it in.

what you fail to realize is that in every society there is always bad as well as there is good. But the question is how much of the bad can you compare to the good? There is crime in the US as well as there is in Nigeria but can you call the police in Nigeria and be sure they will arive in 5 minutes to save you. In the US it is guaranteed. can you guarantee that you will have electricity 365 days in naija? In the US it is guaranteed. Get my point? I am tired of Nigerians using the same f.ucked up reasoning. If everybody is smoking hemp and your child decides to will you say "well at least everybody is doing it so what is the big deal?" Try to better yourselves towards the positive and stop this ridiculous reasoning.

@ Tensor77

My brother, I do agree with you that several of their portrayals are mildly exaggerated in maybe a bid to be sensational. In all sincerity, would you say that Nigeria has achieved 20% of it's present potential. 50 years is a long time to still be battling with the most basic of things. Power, water, food, education. . .

We are not asking for monumental palaces for the poor. Just basic needs for everyone. One financially OK person against maybe 10,000 people doesn't seem very OK to me. Is it OK by you?

bidemi12:

what you fail to realize is that in every society there is always bad as well as there is good. But the question is how much of the bad can you compare to the good? There is crime in the US as well as there is in Nigeria but can you call the police in Nigeria and be sure they will arive in 5 minutes to save you. In the US it is guaranteed. can you guarantee that you will have electricity 365 days in naija? In the US it is guaranteed. Get my point? I am tired of Nigerians using the same f.ucked up reasoning. If everybody is smoking hemp and your child decides to will you say "well at least everybody is doing it so what is the big deal?" Try to better yourselves towards the positive and stop this ridiculous reasoning.

Did you read the part where she acknowledged that Nigeria is still a developing country? You are the one coming up with baseless West v Nigeria comparisons

tensor777:

^^What is a new trend here is that a lot of diasporans here do not even have the courage to state where they are posting from.

I am posting from Maryland, U.S. Born and raised in the slums of Lagos. There's no point when some deluded Nigerians think things are okay when they never suffered or experienced what goes on in the minds of ghetto dwellers. Truth is so hard for some to digest, and the poster has highlighted what tends to be our Achilles Heel at present!

@ Tensor77

Did you really mean to say that 50 years is indeed inadequate for us to have a firm grip on our Power problems?

kashmo:

I am posting from Maryland, U.S. Born and raised in the slums of Lagos. There's no point when some deluded Nigerians think things are okay when they never suffered or experienced what goes on in the minds of ghetto dwellers. Truth is so hard for some to digest, and the poster has highlighted what tends to be our Achilles Heel at present!

Seems like there are lot of us from MD here on NL. I also reside in MD and currently attending UMD

sulad82i:

Seems like there are lot of us from MD here on NL. I also reside in MD and currently attending UMD

I go to College Park as well. It seems like Maryland is a Nigerian haven!

Nigeria does not really have a middle class. There is too much suffering in the country and the Federal Government is not doing much to set the country unto the path of development. Honestly, nothing much has changed in Nigeria over the past 15 years. Yeah, everybody has a phone now and the internet has come to stay , but the standard of living of the average Nigerian is still very low. Holding a job in Nigeria is unstable nowadays as employers cannot be trusted and changes in policies can lead to a sudden retrenchment exercise. Until our leaders start catering for the real social needs of the masses, the country will remain a third world country. What our leaders are not realizing is that if they invest in social infrastructure, they will be able to make the money invested back through taxes and charges. By modernising our Post Offices, the Government will create more jobs and also earn more revenue. Nigerian Post Offices can act as venues for the payment of taxes, water and electricity bills and as area job centres. We don't need to invent things for ourselves these days. Machines and their accessories have already been invented. We only need to use them to foster Nigeria's development.

The only thing standing against the development of Nigeria is the natural greed that lies in most of its citizens Greed and Corruption are deeply entrenched in the country's polity. We can keep coming to Nairaland to write about how Nigeria should be developed, but until we change our attitude towards money and material things, we won't transform the country. I can speak for myself but I cannot speak for other Nairalanders.  I don't blame the BBC for airing the documentary. It should make us and our leaders seat up and work towards genuinely taking Nigeria to greater heights. Cheers.


www.vibes-extra..com

EzeUche:

I go to College Park as well. It seems like Maryland is a Nigerian haven!

sulad82i:

Seems like there are lot of us from MD here on NL. I also reside in MD and currently attending UMD

I reside in Gaithersburg and White oak, transferring to college park this fall!

Nigeria is a developing country? Really? That's not the case according to some people on these forums.

I don't blame the BBC for airing the documentary. It should make us and our leaders seat up and work towards genuinely taking Nigeria to greater heights.

Things will suddenly change because the BBC aired a programme? Inferiority complex? Would you have that same belief if NTA had aired the programme?

kashmo:

I reside in Gaithersburg and White oak, transferring to college park this fall!

EzeUche:

I go to College Park as well. It seems like Maryland is a Nigerian haven!

Wow thats good guys. At least some of us Nigerian are not making nuisance of ourselves here. We are all getting educated at the same school. I will be graduating next month by the way, and I hope to go for my NYSC.

@tensor777

I absolutely support and see your point of view.

Unfortunately, it seems a lot of Nigerians right here are waiting for magic to happen overnight.

Anybody who denies that Nigeria has problems is deluded. Most of us even have ideas about how we can become better.

So, i don't see why i should support some documentary that portrays me in a bad light except if they are trying to get countries from all over the world to provide donations for us just like after the haiti earthquake.

ziga:

@tensor777

I absolutely support and see your point of view.

Unfortunately, it seems a lot of Nigerians right here are waiting for magic to happen overnight.

Anybody who denies that Nigeria has problems is deluded. Most of us even have ideas about how we can become better.

So, i don't see why i should support some documentary that portrays me in a bad light except if they are trying to get countries from all over the world to provide donations for us just like after the haiti earthquake.

I dont think Nigeria needs any handout of support. Everyone of us need to do our part to support the country. Small business is the backbone of America, they employ the most people in the country, that should also be true in Nigeria, _{I hope}. We should all do our part by supporting locally owned stores by buying what they sell and do more than we can all write on this post.

sulad82i:

I dont think Nigeria needs any handout of support. Everyone of us need to do our part to support the country. Small business is the backbone of America, they employ the most people in the country, the should be true in Nigeria, _{I hope}. We should all do our part by supporting locally owned stores by buying what they sell and do more than we can all write on this post.

@ sulad82i, what's your major in UMD? Sorry if i'm too forward, just curious

kashmo:

@ sulad82i, what's your major in UMD? Sorry if i'm too forward, just curious

I'm in the Smith School of business studying Accounting.

sulad82i:

I'm in the Smith School of business studying Accounting.

Cool! Coming in as an Economics major though. Good luck on your NYSC

The level of poverty in Nigeria is so embarrassing. Whenever one steps out and  decides to observe their surroundings critically, one cannot but see suffering and hardship all around. Is it the chaotic urban transportation system in a place like Lagos? So undignified with human beings crammed in rickety, old and unsafe buses like sardines in sweltering heat. Whenever I take a ride in these buses my heart bleeds for Nigeria.

This problem is the same in most african countries, the wealth is concentrated to some people and has become an heritage already,

kashmo:

Cool! Coming in as an Economics major though. Good luck on your NYSC

Thanks Kashmo, hope u enjoy the stress of college park when u get there too  

I won't call it hypocrisy as the word "hypocrisy" itself denotes something negative. The tendency of middle class Nigerians to repress memories of the slums and forget about poorer people itself is very much instinctive and perfectly human. This is because a middle class Nigerian himself is striving hard and working hard to feed himself and his family, to such a man, that state is poverty. He essentially - unintentionally - banishes any thoughts about poorer people and doesn't like to be reminded of them.

But this hypocrisy is not something positive either, it is rather something almost unavoidable at this stage of human existence. This is the age of materialism where the desire to make money trumps spirituality and, consequently, empathy in man.

Men are less likely to feel what others feel and to put themselves in other people's shoes. There's a business-like formalty about the whole thing. A man goes to a market and buys from a girl who's yet a teenager, he haggles with her like an adult, pays her, and departs. In a pre-materialistic society, things would have been different; he'll probably ask for her name, ask why she's not in school, and ask about her parents.

How on earth did you come about the middle class hypocrisy?

I have NEVER MET any middle class or even rich Nigerian that says the economy is good or the slums are not bad.

Because some people (including me) claim you can go past the terrible state to make a good living for yourself does not traslate to saying the country is in good shape.

You're the hypocritical one here.

tensor777:

Did you read the part where she acknowledged that Nigeria is still a developing country? You are the one coming up with baseless West v Nigeria comparisons

Like i said before; stop making up ridiculous excuses for our backwardness. developing country my foot. Ghana is a developing country but can you compare the mindset of the people there to Nigerians. With the cutthroat survive by all means attitude we exihibit on a daily basis. No wonder eldorado is like a myth to us. Change the mindset of the people and the nation will progress. Nigerians are surrounded by filth, bribery and corruption, insecurity, lack of amenities and so on and so forth, and to most this is normal and they see nothing wrong with it. To worsen the situation some try make logic of it by saying we are a developing county. Please.

Some of the points you made there are very true but I don't agree about that of shoes.

Some of the points you made there are very true but I don't agree about that of shoes.

bidemi12:

Like i said before; stop making up ridiculous excuses for our backwardness. developing country my foot. Ghana is a developing country but can you compare the mindset of the people there to Nigerians. With the cutthroat survive by all means attitude we exihibit on a daily basis. No wonder eldorado is like a myth to us. Change the mindset of the people and the nation will progress. Nigerians are surrounded by filth, bribery and corruption, insecurity, lack of amenities and so on and so forth, and to most this is normal and they see nothing wrong with it. To worsen the situation some try make logic of it by saying we are a developing county. Please.

As usual you are missing the point and going off on a tangent by ranting on other generic issues.
What we are concerned about is the Western media's almost pathological obsession with coming up with horror stories about Africa. These lopsided media reports give very false picture of Africa in the minds of Western viewers and even in the minds of some disgruntled elements of Nigerian extraction.

@odumorun you are 100% spot on in your analysis of the so called nigerian middle class, i would go further to add that they are a bunch of parasitical cowards who add nothing to the progress of nigeria as a whole, this so called educated class cannot and will not do anything about wresting the economic and political control of this country from the stranglehold of the criminal gang that has been running this country since independence, instead they bleat on about their so called educational and material successes, it was members  of the british ruling class - former prime minister lloyd george, winston churchill, lord beveridge and former prime minister clement atlee who created the british welfare state which has saved so many members of the british working class and underclass from ending up in the kind of grinding poverty as shown on this documentary.  

What we have in this country is a bunch of shameless, thugs and criminals masquerading as leaders egged on by  sycophantic cowards who would rather sell their mothers before they stand up for the truth.  Those fools who are angry that the bbc have exposed the abject poverty that 80% of the nigerian populace is condemned to live in are a disgrace, these are the same people who run away to europe and america to try and benefit from a system which was fought for by the same poor and disenfranchised people that they despise in their own country - they make me sick.

I have debated severally with some numbskulls on here who like to proclaim loudly about the so called acheivements of nigerian professionals abroad that individual success means nothing if 80% of your population lives in squalor and grinding poverty, this is somethign that the average nigerian cant seem to get in to their skulls.  

As you correctly stated scientists, mathematicians, inventors, academics in the west focus on the contributions they can make to their country in order to uplift their people as a COLLECTIVE GROUP but with a nigerian his vision is stunted and myopic - as the most populous black nation in the world, and with our academic achievements we should be leaders not followers, but as long as we focus on tribalism, materialism, religion,  individual success as opposed to collective success and other trivia,  we will remain where we are today - backward.

If we must be sincere with the prevailing economic situation and the great divide between the really rich and the fairly comfortable in Nigeria, we don't necessarily have a middle class. It's either one is poor or you are rich. The rich gets even richer while the poor languishes in his pool of sweat just to have bowl of an affordable staple food. The wealth is concentrated in few hands and the old rich crew are recycled back into the system they ran aground earlier. Think about TY Danjuma who made boast of not knowing what to do with an oil windfall of $500m becoming the chairman of the Presidential Advisory Committee. He's the league of the essentially rich. Using the same standards abroad to measure wealth here, we don't have a middle class. The last time I checked, the Human Development Index of Nigeria ranks us 158 in the world. You see? You are either poor or rich here. Period.