Only the best is good enough for us.
~ Bishop Samuel Adjai (Ajayi) Crowther (c. 1807 – December 31, 1891)

I doubt if you and I would have been here if Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther had not been kidnapped by Muslim Fulani Slave hunters at the age of 12 in 1821. If Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther had not been exchanged for a horse in a slave trade by barter and later sold to the Portuguese slave traders, Providence would not have rescued him from the Portuguese slave ship, the Esperanza Felix, through the British anti-slavery warships, the Myrmidon and Iphigenia. Bishop Samuel Jayi Crowther would not have been the translator of the Holy Bible into the Yoruba language and compiled a Yoruba dictionary with a grammar book between 1843 and 1850.
Most Igbos are ignorant of the historical fact that the first book in Igbo, Isoama-Ibo, a primer, was written in 1857 by Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther. Then, Bishop Ajayi Crowther wrote a primer in the Nupe language in 1860, and a full grammar book with vocabulary of the Nupe in 1864.
Nigeria has not appreciated the great legacy of Bishop Ajayi Crowther in the history of modern civilization and the nation building of Nigeria.

The legacy of knowledge is the greatest heritage to bequeathe to every age.
The ignorance of the lessons of history is often responsible for the prevalence of decadence in the society, because we have failed to learn the lessons of life from the tragic mistakes of the past.

How do we learn from the lessons of history when most of us are non-literates or intellectual illiterates and intellectual hypocrites?

Those who cannot read and write are over 76 million in Nigeria and those who can read and write, but fail to learn the vital lessons of life from reading and writing have worsened the calamity of the Nigerian society by being bad examples for the illiterate majority. The so called Nigerian elites are the intellectual illiterates and intellectual hypocrites. They are mostly graduates of the tertiary schools, but they behave like primitive natives. Like a bank manager whose unhygenic manners are so repulsive that you wonder if he ever saw the four walls of a university. Many of them have very dirty toilets that you cannot feel comfortable whenever you visit them. Others cannot converse in English without making you question their knowledge of the language.

I know one man who is 25 years old and a student in one of the Nigerian polytechnics, but he could not read the essay I wrote when I was only 13.
The appalling state of Nigeria is caused by the prevalence of academic decadence, intellectual ignorance or what I prefer to call intellectual illiteracy.

Nigeria today is a nation of intellectual illiterates and intellectual hypocrites.

How do we define intellectual illiteracy?
As described by Christopher Lasch in The New Illiteracy,
“Mass education, which began as a promising attempt to democratize the higher culture of the privileged classes, has ended by stupefying the privileged themselves. Modern society has achieved unprecedented rates of formal literacy, but at the same time it has produced new forms of illiteracy.”

Christopher Lasch was addressing a similar problem in America.
He noted that the standards of academic education have been deteriorating even at the Ivy League universities. He made references to falling standards in Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Columbia, while the undergraduates and graduates of these highly esteemed universities are still posing and posturing as status symbols of privilege and prestige in the hypocritical American society and the less privileged are being fooled by their conceit and deceit, because they cannot tell the difference. An illiterate or semi-literate cannot tell the difference between the literati and dilettanti.
Mr. Lasch mentioned said a faculty committee at Harvard reported:
"The Harvard faculty does not care about teaching”. According to a study of general education at Columbia, teachers have lost "their common sense of what kind of ignorance is unacceptable”. As a result, "Students reading Rabelais's description of civil disturbances ascribe them to the French Revolution. A class of twenty-five had never heard of the Oedipus complex --or of Oedipus. Only one student in a class of fifteen could date the Russian Revolution within a decade.”"
~ Christoher Lasch / The New Illiteracy

The situation in Nigeria is worse.
The terrible state of Nigerian universities can be traced to the ignorance of previous leaders who misappropriated the revenue allocations meant for the sustainable development of higher institutions in Nigeria and neglected the welfare of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the students.
Nigerian universities have been relegated to the bottom of the accredited universities in the world. No Nigerian university is even rated among the best 1, 000 universities in the world and only one Nigerian university ranked among the top 50 universities in Africa at the 44th position.

Nigerian administrators neglected Nigerian universities, sent their children to the best colleges and universities in America and the UK, and then misappropriated revenue allocations to establish their own private universities. But none of their private universities even made the list of the best universities in the world in the latest global rankings. One of the best private universities in Nigeria, the Christian Covenant University is at the bottom of the rungs in Africa at the 98th Position,

Establishing private colleges and universities is not the solution to the falling standards of education in Nigeria, but making sure that the public colleges and universities are well equipped with the basic facilities and utilities, such as modern classes, laboratories, hostels with clean toilets and qualified academic staff. Most of the teachers and lecturers in Nigerian secondary schools, colleges and universities are not certified teachers. Having a degree is not enough qualification to teach. The teachers must be certified like the graduates of accountancy who must be certifed by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN) before they can become competent professional accountants.

When the academic faculty is already faulty, then the quality of education will not be up to the required global standards. Poor teachers will produce poor students.

Before anyone can teach, you must have a bachelor's degree from an accredited college or university. You must have completed teacher training through an approved program and you must have successfully completed the appropriate teacher certification tests for the subject and grade level you wish to teach

Investigations have shown that many of the teachers in Nigeria cheated to pass their exams and dubbed projects to earn their diplomas and degrees. When they fail to get the dream jobs in banks or oil companies, they turn to the private schools, colleges and universities springing up daily and they are often employed by these insitutions that are in desperate need for tutors to teach the thousands of boys and girls already given admission. These private institutions have already charged exorbitant school fees in thousands of naira like the so called elitist schools charging over a million naira per session for a single pupil in Nigeria!

The private schools are all over the place, competing with the churches for every available space in the towns and cities in Nigeria. To know how phony they are, you can hardly find them in the rural areas where education is needed most. They are all after the money.

Opening private schools and churches are the fastest get-rich quick schemes in Nigeria today.

To find out the truth, cross check the academic qualifications of the teaching staff and compare them with the standard criteria for teachers in America and the UK. Many of them will fail the common examination for the certification of teachers.

Dr. Suleiman Kano, ASUU President, in a news report by the Nigerian Tribune on June 17, 2007, said:
“I think we should ask ourselves this pertinent question. Do we want to produce graduates for the sake of doing so or we want to produce quality graduates? In the latest ranking of world universities, no Nigerian university made the list of the first 1,000 in the world. This is because of the rot in the system. The government should address the issue and rid the system of the rot. Proscribing ASUU will not solve the problem.”

“This is a country where the government itself says we need 47,000 university lecturers, now we have 16,000. What are we doing about getting the balance? Good students do not want to join academic staff, they prefer to work elsewhere. Many medical students do not get to see, let alone use, the equipment they will need when they start practice. What kind of graduates are we producing?”

The rot in Nigerian education did not start yesterday, but decades ago. The falling standards can be traced to the late 1970s as chronicled by Professor Vincent Chukwuemeka Ike in his novel, Expo’ 77 published in 1981.
I am afraid that the same Nigerian secondary school pupils who engaged in the scandalous examination malpractices of the late 1970s and were never prosecuted are now the masterminds of electoral malpractices and perpetrators of other horrible and terrible crimes of corruption, the plague of the nation.

As Jesus Christ said, by their fruits you shall know them.
Millions of Nigerians have been studying and graduating from Nigerian colleges and universities and yet most of them are still intellectual illiterates and intellectual hypocrites, because most of them have been going to school for the wrong reasons. The first reason is for the mere acquisition of paper qualification for the sole purpose of social class struggle in their pursuit of titular status symbols of the social class hierarchy. To secure a dream job, earn a seven-digit salary, acquire a dream house, a dream car and to crown it all, acquire a dream wife or simply marry a woman to bear children who will bear their name and survive them when then die. Finis. Most of them are not thinking of how the acquisition of modern academic or professional education can be the best application for the advancement of modern civilization and as a vital tool for the nation building of a New Nigeria in the leadership of Africa among the comity of nations in the world.

We have over 20 million graduates of Nigerian colleges and universities who can boast of having first and second degrees and that they have written excellent papers, but they cannot boast of other practical achievements we can actually use as indices of sustainable human development in Nigeria. Most of them leave no other legacies than their domestic liabilities.

The majority of Nigerian contributing more to the GDP and GNP are those without any academic qualification. The Nigerian farmers, traders and artisans and not the Nigerian bankers, lawyers, engineers and their fellow so-called educated elites.

The majority of these so-called educated elites are also the leading intellectual illiterates and intellectual hypocrites posing and posturing with false airs and graces, because most of them cannot tell the difference between Chris Abani and Helon Habila or even tell us what makes Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie different from Sefi Atta in contemporary Nigerian literature. Do not waste your time asking them why nobody won the last Nigeria LNG Prize for Science, because they will disappoint you. Yet, they can tell you the names of all the players in the first team of Arsenal Football Club or Manchester United Football Club of England. They can also tell you the full details of bizarre pornographic scenarios of the last Big Brother Africa on cable TV and their fellow intellectual illiterates aping American Pop Idols on Sound City and Channel O and corrupting the ignorant and naïve Nigerian teenage boys and girls with their psychedelic and pornographic songs and musical videos.

The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) has failed to regulate what to broadcast and what should not even be authorized on any radio or television in Nigeria.

The Nigerian lawmakers are busy fighting and slumping over contracts on how to embezzle the revenue allocations and other public funds, so they are still confused about how to address the problems of governance in Nigeria.

The same intellectual illiterates and intellectual hypocrites are in the Nigerian banks, oil companies, insurance companies, and other corporations, so they cannot address the decadence in Nigerian education and social infrastructures. In fact, they are exploiting the situation like the capitalists fishing in the troubled waters in the Niger Delta.

The banks employ the prettiest female graduates to be trained and used as marketing executives and sent on the mission to hook millionaires to deposit their millions of naira and dollars in their banks. They do not care if the monies were stolen or not. One of these hot legs employed by one of the banks at the zenith of Nigerian banking met me in the office of a young millionaire and was shocked at first sight. Why was she shocked? I knew her as the first daughter of strict Christian parents and here she was soliciting for the favour of a young millionaire who was happily married. She was already willing to date and mate with him. He confided in me that she was sexually harassing him and guess what? She was already engaged to be married to a man who thought he was lucky to have found such a young woman as his fiancée. What an unforeseen romantic tragedy.

The so-called Nigerian elites are the most selfish citizens in Nigeria. Their foolish pride is awesome. As Professor Pat Utomi noted in an interview on the Centre for Values in Leadership (CVL) published in The Guardian on Sunday of February 3, 2008, that we cannot make a sustained progress, because of the following problems:
§ The Average Nigerian Has Entitlement Mentality
§ We Have No Respect For Dignity Of Human Person
§ We Neglect Culture As A Critical Factor To Progress
§ We Have No Work Ethic and
§ We Mouth Rule of Law, but Operate “Bigmanism”

The last problem, “Bigmanism”, is in fact the worst, because it is the rat race for “Bigmanism” that makes Nigerians to become corrupt, from the Ivory Towers to the Corridors of Power and from the street to the pulpit. The lust for perishable social status symbols drives most Nigerians to exploit all means possible to acquire their dream cars, dream houses, dream wives and other highly coveted trophies of vain glory at all costs, without respect for the rule of law and without scruples.

From the social anomie of intellectual illiteracy and intellectual hypocrisy, let us address the spiritual anomie of spiritual hypocrisy as demonstrated and exhibited in the Christian churches and Muslim mosques.

Hypocrisy is simply fooling yourself while thinking you are fooling others.
The spiritual hypocrites use religion as the camouflage of their dubious lives. They pay lip service and eye service to God, but are incorrigible cheats, liars, crooks, rogues, prostitutes, and other evil fringe elements.

How would you describe the politicians who claim to be Christians and Muslims, but engage in rigging elections and the misappropriations of revenue allocations?
How would you describe a woman who claimed to be a Christian and swore in her oath of office to abide by the Federal Constitution of Nigeria, but within 100 days in office, she was already engaged in corrupt practices?

Are these Nigerians cursed to do evil?
How can anyone who claims to be a Christian or Muslim pay an adult employee N7, 000 (seven thousand naira) only monthly in the present harsh economic realities in Nigeria?
N7, 000 is less than N300 per day.
Can any adult live on N300 per day in Nigeria?
For feeding, housing, clothing, transportation, health care and water supply?

The same so called Christian or Muslim employer will later go to the church or mosque to thank God with a N500, 000 (five hundred thousand naira) donation to the pastor or Imam.

Some are even reluctant to pay their poor workers the monthly salaries, but they are praised in churches or mosques as generous and pious members?

How can a Christian or Muslim maltreat the employees and underpay them, so that they would remain poor and underpaid and cannot even improve their living standards?
A true Christian and Muslim will treat the employees as God commanded us to love our neighbours as we love ourselves.

I cannot send my children to one of the best schools and deprive my employee of the means to do the same for his or her children.
A true God fearing wealthy employer will sponsor the children of the poor employee and treat them, as you would want your children to be treated and not treating them like sub humans or even like those Frantz Fanon called The Wretched of the Earth.

What the spiritual hypocrites call class struggle or the rat race is nothing more than intellectual arrogance and ignorance.

I have seen the parade of ignorance
In the masquerade of arrogance.

Look at the life of Jesus Christ and emulate him or stop pretending to be a Christian when God knows that you are not.

Ninety-nine percent of those who claim to be “Christians” in Nigeria live unchristian lives shamelessly. There is nothing Christ-like about them, they have contravened every command Jesus Christ gave those who believe in him, and how they should live their lives after him.

I have seen childish and foolish mannerisms among those who claim to be educated Christians in their daily lives.
They do not even respect their elders and cannot even pick up the broom to sweep their surroundings clean, but when they go to church, they are genuflecting and prostrating before the pastor and rushing to clean the pews all in their childish and foolish conceit and deceit. What they would not do in their foolish pride at home, they pretend to do in the office or church to curry favour or to impress those they think will never know or see their true colours.

I have traveled and stayed in four regions of Nigeria and I have been active in Christian evangelism since my childhood. I have worked for both Christian employers and Muslim employers for years. I see little or no differences in the characters of these so-called Christians and pagans in Nigeria. The only difference I have seen is the different places of their religious worship, but as the so-called Christians leave their church and the pagans leave their shrine, they end up in the same company of partners in crime in the public sector and private sector. In fact, the pagans fear their juju more than the so-called Christians fear the Almighty God.
Pagans who swear on their juju hardly break their vows, but the so-called Christians break their vows even before the sunset.

Who is fooling whom?
The fools who think they are fooling others.

Personally, I would be pleased to make a public display of such spiritual hypocrites as Jesus Christ did. but by their fruits, you shall know them.

Christianity is not by force.
The churches and mosques are more interested in the members who can give them more offerings and tithes and other donations.

The fact is, most Nigerians judge themselves by the amount of money or status symbols they have been able to acquire or steal.
The moneybags of the rat race and the title chasers are often eulogized and honoured with chieftaincy titles and other awards, while in most cases they have contributed little or nothing to the development of the Nigerian society, besides the donations they made to the church or mosque.
How many Nigerian Christian or Muslim millionaires or billionaires have built free homes for the poor and needy Nigerians who need comfortable accommodation? But the same Nigerians gape and mope at wealthy Americans building and giving free homes and vehicles to their poor and needy Americans in the Extreme Makeover, Home Edition on ABC TV. But how many of them are emulating such good charities? What are they copying? They are busy aping Big Brother House where a young Nigerian woman shamelessly exhibited her naked body to the whole universe in her desperation to win $100, 000 (one hundred thousand dollars) only, but did not win in the end. Tomorrow, a man would be proud to marry her?
Or the Nigerians aping the epileptic dancers on American musical videos, but do not know how to emulate the young Americans inventing technological wonders online and offline.

Is it not a great shame that Nigerians know how to copy all the bad things in America, but fail to copy the good ones?

Now the Nigerian apes are calling every occasion red carpet event, without any clue of the history of laying red carpet for dignitaries. Dummies are walking on the red carpet in Nigeria.

What awards have we given the most brilliant graduates from Nigerian colleges and universities?
What is wrong in giving $100, 000 (one hundred thousand dollars) only, to the most outstanding Nigerian student every year?
Must they strip and bathe naked on TV before we can call them stars and reward them?
Must they ape American musicians and singers and lip-sync to computerized music before we can applaud them and give them awards?

We prefer to celebrate Reality TV prostitutes, gigolos, musical illiterates, and other fringe elements than celebrate Nigerian geniuses in colleges and universities and the unsung geniuses on the streets.

The list of the agonies of the ironies of the anomie plaguing Nigeria is longer, but the solution is quite simple and short.

We must celebrate our geniuses, not intellectual illiterates, and intellectual hypocrites.

We must celebrate meritocracy and not mediocrity.

We must stop wasting over $70 million daily on recharge cards for the GSM phones in useless and unproductive conversations and imagine what would happen to Nigeria if we spend only half of $70 million on buying the works of remarkable Nigerian writers, composers and inventors monthly.

The best way we can appreciate God is by the appreciation of the wonders of His creation in humans.

The developed countries are rich, because they have been appreciating themselves more than the underdeveloped countries.
What you sow is what you are going to reap eventually.

Our banks and other corporations must stop wasting millions of naira on the sponsorships of immoral and non-intellectual TV shows and other extravagant events and spend the money on seed grants for Nigerians who can start cottage industries to boost the Nigerian economy.

Dr. Pat Utomi has many success stories of how charity transformed the lives of many poor widows in Lagos and helped them to educate and train their children to overcome their poverty and become living testimonies of prosperity through wealth creation projects.

We must be honest, transparent, and stop paying eye service and lip service to the best practices of work ethics, values, and virtues of a better Nigerian society.

Leadership is best by example.
We must not compromise with bad people or bad leaders.
We must reject bad people and bad leaders.

God said as written in the Holy Bible, that we must not accept the persons of the wicked.But ironically, wicked people have become the best friends and business partners of most of the so-called Christians and Muslims in Nigeria.

We all know the truth, so let us stop all these nonsense in Nigeria and do the right thing always and do that which is best for Nigeria and Nigerians, because as Bishop Ajayi Crowther said, only the best is good enough for us, so we should not settle for less.

God bless Nigeria.


N.B: From the collection of my articles and essays.

Hi Orikinla,
Nice post, very thought-provoking.
Also equally thought-provoking is the fact that nobody seems to have read your article, or even commented on it. I guess it must really hit close to home to a lot of us, else we are just mentally dead to our collective folly and ignorance,
My dad always used to say there are two myths about Nigerians:
1. They are very intelligent.
2. They are very hardworking and principled.
Over the years I have come to agree with his position, which has always been that both of those postulations are, in fact, huge fallacies. We just dey 'overwhelm' the rest of Africa, indeed the Negro world, with our sheer size and population. Else we for don learn!
Cheers

@Orikinla
The veracity of your post is self-evident, the accuracy surgical, the potency unimaginable.
We desperately need a complete overhaul of our value system.
We need a resurrection of our individual and collective sense of purpose and direction.
We need a rebirth as a nation.


GOD bless Nigeria.

@Orikinla,

I just don't know what to say to this post cos most of the points you pointed out shamed me; yes as I just realized the vanity of some, if not most of the the things I held very dear.

We, yes, you and I have really messed this country up. Really.

Thank you for saying it as it is.

God!! i did not know there was this amount of intelligence on Nairaland.
This is simply mind blowing.
the Nigerian situation is perplexing. the more you look, the more you see.
our problem is hydra headed and very complex.
Like Reuben Abati quoted a book recently that said that Nigeria is a failed state that works.
the matter serious o!
on every front, economic, educational,spiritual and moral.
anyway that moral one na universal problem.

Orikinla, May the place where all those words originate from not dry up. AMIN! I'm not surprised that there are just a hand full of responses. the NLers i know don't have the patience to read through the whole write up. and if they read through it would make a smart comment, illiterate wannabe intellectuals. i might come by here more often now that i know there are people like u that start up threads that would add to my being and not some thread about ManU and Arsenal or the dreadful, "i need a girl to marry" threads.


Damn, 72 people have viewed this and only 5 commented, i guess its because u r not seeking to know how many ways to bone a fine girl.

Orikinla,

My brother, I appreciate the article indeed. Very well organized, direct and thought provoking.
I certainly agree with all your argument.

Until we place high priority in recognizing and motivating hard workers, reward good success accordingly to encourage more minds to be better, and discourage the short cut totally; things will never improve. We (me and you) as a nation have a job to do. The hardest part is the awareness, which will eventually lead to success.

Other people have stolen the words from my mouth. Excellent write up.

However,

Orikinla:

The majority of these so-called educated elites are also the leading intellectual illiterates and intellectual hypocrites posing and posturing with false airs and graces, because most of them cannot tell the difference between Chris Abani and Helon Habila or even tell us what makes Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie different from Sefi Atta in contemporary Nigerian literature. Do not waste your time asking them why nobody won the last Nigeria LNG Prize for Science, because they will disappoint you. Yet, they can tell you the names of all the players in the first team of Arsenal Football Club or Manchester United Football Club of England. They can also tell you the full details of bizarre pornographic scenarios of the last Big Brother Africa on cable TV and their fellow intellectual illiterates aping American Pop Idols on Sound City and Channel O and corrupting the ignorant and naïve Nigerian teenage boys and girls with their psychedelic and pornographic songs and musical videos.

This section is completely unneccessary. You might as well opine that Enrico Fermi or Werner von Braun could only be considered intelligent by yourself if they could launch into a lengthy discourse of Tolstoy' works, or write narratives on Lord Byron's poems.
People choose their own diversion and hobbies. Some of the truly intelligent NIgerians i've met do some of their best reasoning while listening to rap music

All in all, nice piece. Please consider publication in a national newspaper!

@Post.
Very thought provoking.

the value of a holistic education cannot be undermined.

The DSTV thingy is also not helping the development of kids l8ly. Its like Kids 8-13 are no longer into all them adventure novels, or any form of reading etc etc.
Now its Xbox this, PS3 that and what happened in the l8est music video on MTV base.

Lord Deliver Us

Good post. We do need an overhaul, in our value system, and in our thinking, and yeah I feel you on the arsenal thingie

Actually this is my second time viewing this thread, first time I was such in a hurry and failed to settle down and read this beautiful piece.

Lovely write up. I think the moderator of this forum should create another forum, and name it Nairaland2 or something. This one should be for sensible posts only and write ups like this that will provoke our very best thoughts. Hence, No romance, jokes, arsenal, or other sections that just clog the forum and make us miss stuff like this.

im curious to see how long it would take for this post to clear its first page. seun abeg add this thread to the main page.

Seun abeg do as the last comment said add this thread to the main page.

Thanks

THE WAY TO SELF-RUIN

I wake up every morning with the thoughts and prayers of the potential greatness of my beloved in my heart.  The thoughts ran in my heart through the day hoping that the decadence in my beloved will be uprooted with systematic equanimity. How did I allow my beloved to get so enmeshed in the evil of national prostitution laden with evil vice that were uncommon among her founding fathers. These were the thoughts from a caring and yearning heart.

Just 3 days ago I read that Merrill Lynch ranked Nigeria as the World's Safest Economy.  Although this did not come as a surprise to me given the sustained improvement in the Nigeria's fiscal management for the past 3-4 years. The statistical calculation in Merrill Lynch's results does not however take into account other factors (or economic variables as others may refer to it) such as social unrest, prevailing poverty level, infrastruture, GDP, etc. (Source 1: http://www.thedeal.com/dealscape/2008/11/nigeria_the_safest_place_to_in.php), (Source 2:. http://www.thisdayonline.com/nview.php?id=128275).  I so much proud my self in the self-belief that that singular report coming from one of the world's leading financial management and advisory companies has boosted Nigeria's image positively in no smal terms.  It's no small means that Nigeria's horn in financial revolution- Prof. Soludo, along with other world renowned economists and financial analysts was recently appointed to a United Nation's high-level task force reform global financial system.

"Safest Economy" declaration is a huge image laundering for Nigeria, and rightly so given the "brutal revolution" (albeit with a positive mindset and positive results) of the banking sector introduced by the CBN management headed by Prof. Chukwuemeka Soludo. We must not rest on our oars but must extend this "brutal revolution" to all sphere of the economy.  Need I reiterate that the political terrain in the country still leaves a lot to be desired although with signs of improvement given the latest democratic proceedings as in the case of the new Edo State Government elect-Comrade Oshiomole.   My assertion is based on realistic facts emanating from the EFCC that the management has suspended its Director of National Finance Intelligence Unit (NFIU) over "alleged" complicity in illegal transfers of millions of illegal funds from Nigeria's coffers with his full knowledge (Source 1: http://www.efccnigeria.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=475&Itemid=34), (Source 2: http://allafrica.com/stories/200811200872.html).  What on earth is going on? Can't we get our acts together and do the right thing as a nation?  I was ruminating so hard on this thoughts when I stumbled on a piece of article "Only The Best Is Good Enough For Us" on nairaland (Source: https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-195700.0.html ) then I mumbled under my breath (Oro pesi je)?

That article touched my bone marrow to say the least and I retorted "if only we have ears and the minds of a wilful change as a people". But come to think of it what is stopping my bride to dig deep into her conscience to rejuvinate those cultural and morale values taught in the early days.  The morale values of my beloved bride have gone to the dogs and we now celebrate superfluous mediocrity in the name of celebrity and overnight get-rich affluence.  I am quick to say here that I am not a cynic but a realist and I am one of those to stand up and offer foreigners explanation of the true situation in Nigeria and of most Nigerians in the face of the fact that most foreigners have been fed with news that all Nigerians are "potential" (in the strongest of terms) scammers.  I have had to provide non-professional explanation and advice via e-mails and phone to foreigners (mostly Europeans) after posting an article http://www.saharareporters.com/www/letters/detail/?id=349 and    another comment on http://www.africanloft.com/can-the-nigerian-mobile-phone-companies-handle-the-46-million-subscribers/

I recall an ensuing discussion with a young Belgian chap after reading one of my articles on scamming and had supposedly been "hypnotised" into thinking he's got a cute Nigerian lady online he intends to marry within months. The lady by the name Stella Gibson (allegedly a "guy" claims to be a Nigerian-American raised in Ashebury in North Caolina and had come to Nigeria to take care of her ill mum. I have had to ping pong e-mail and telephone conversation with the Belgian by arranging a private investigation on the identity, address and location of Stella Gibson. She (allegedly) provided the Belgian with her home address somewhere on Opebi Road Ikeja and I called for a search party of friends and family members in Lagos to verify the identity of this suspect.  It will be a disservice to Jean (the Belgian) to outline results of the investigation here in this context. However the taking from these is that there a large number of Nigerians (especially young Nigerians) who engage in nefarious activities in a get-rich quick scam such that there activites tarnish the image of Nigerians at home and abroad. 

The yahoo yahoo business has so much grown in the belly of my beloved country and unfortunately among teenagers - the fruit and future of her womb.  I am sick to my stomach to see young boys and girls of tender age who can't even make a complete statement in their indigenous language let alone in English spending time in cyber cafes to send scam e-mails. And Oh "yahoo yahoo don pay oo" that is the sort of response you get from these confused teenagers bred by the societal norms they found themselves.  If you take time to discuss with any one of them (at least i have on numerous occasion), the general belief among these young chaps is, to put it in their own words, "the are trying to get back all the money the white man has stolen from Africa" (sic). It baffles my imagination that sycophants in the name of popular musicians are now glorifying such nefarious activities in Nigeria as though its a thing of joy. Else how can one explain songs like "yahoozee" by Olu Maintain and "maga don pay" by Kelly Handsome.  (Source 1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQ1YLL9mvBU ), (Source 2:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7iJzgxoFiM )

Basking in the euphoria of my seeming success with a few of those I have advised on the issue of scam, I took a trip to Paris to meet with a friend (I wouldn't want to use the word 'client' as I do not do it for profit) to whom I have been introduced few months back and was subjected to ridicule at the UK airport on the return leg of my trip. My offense (I should have known better) is I carry a green passport. I must quickly add here that I wasn't referring to the "American Green passport" but an official Nigerian passport.  I was subjected to "special guest" treatment to put it positively while other passengers walked past giving a deep thorough gaze towards me as if asking rhetorically "what have you done?"   To say the least, I was filled with bile but I took the under control, asking another Immigration Officer pertinent questions as to how enjoyable she finds her job (as if I was "toasting" her in my Nigerian parlance), while her colleagues carry out thorough primary and secondary searches on my hand luggage.  I played the cool as though I was in the dark as to the motive of the search. 

A few days later I read through some Nigerian and International online newspapers as usual to learn of how a renowned Nigerian Pastor was subjected to outright ridicule at an airport abroad (Source:  http://www.sunnewsonline.com/webpages/news/national/2008/oct/15/national-15-10-2008-003.htm).  Going by the revelation I just had to rest my case that if a man of his status could be suspected a fraudster (until proven otherwise) who am I to complain of my harrowing experience in the hands of those O' level holding Immigration Officers. 

Is my bride on the way to creating a healthy and wealthy nation or she is head-rolling down the hill to self ruin, I wonder.  Nigeria can be and will be great, my heart resounds, but the question that beats my guts out is WHEN?  We have all collectively in one way or the other seek untenable alibi as a nation in letting our beloved nation stoop so low into a state of despondency.  Someone once retorted, "Starve the people of information and you'll be able to take them captive" I stand to be corrected on my next statement and unapologetically so (at least at the time of writing this article from a hurtful heart); the Nigerian system has systematically withdrew valuable information from its citizens in order to impoverish her 150 million population. Nigerians have been starved of quality education and the void has been replaced with the belief that one can only get rich by cheating the system. 

Few years back, I learnt among other things the famous Karl Marx's statement that "religion is the opium of the masses". Having been born and bred in Nigeria before striving hard to top my education with a Masters studies in the UK, I began to carry out societal and cultural comparison between Nigeria and other countries.  The religious clout on the psyche of Nigerians is so powerful that we all (annoyingly so) attribute our collective failures to the will of God.  While engaging in a discussion with a friend recently, I mentioned that wouldn't it be good for Nigeria to assess the level of poverty vis-a-vis the population and promulgate a law to limit the number of birth per family to, say x-number of children. True to my pessimism in asking the question, I got varied answers, a lot of which has religious intonnation from both christians and muslims alike. I began to question my sanity at that moment - Do I think differently from these chaps and if in the affirmative, WHY? Why can't we look at facts and figures of the population vis-avis the poverty level and take a positive approach (although may seem radical) to stem the skyrocketing population growth, which should benefit every Nigerian in the next 20 - 50 years, for example. We are so enmeshed in our religious clout and fail to take hard-decisions as a nation to better future generations. We (both christians and muslims) are culprits in this crime - Do we continue to quote religious verses in support of "staying glued to old norms,  bearing children like guinea pigs without adequate plan for those children?"

I sometimes laugh my head off when Nigerians (in our show of undeserved pride) refer to ourselves as the giant of Africa.  I would gladly support the notion that we are potentially a great African nation but not the empty, undeserved and unsubstantiated claim of being the supposedly "Power House of Africa".  Are we a happy nation? Yes. Do we have a military power house to be reckoned with in Africa and the world? Yes of course, we do and I pay my respect to the men and women in the Forces who put their lives on the line for the good course of stabilising other nation in Africa. Oh the Nigerian military? No, no, no, that is a monstrous national cult and a law unto itself. I will leave the Nigerian military to another article premise. I must not however fail to give a hint of some nefarious activities of the men in "kaki" uniform.  Some senior army officers wilfully deduct from the salaries of junior officers right before the monthly salary payment, or is it the usual "take this money to buy plantain in the market, take it to my house to cook" statement from male senior officers to junior female soldiers in the rank and file of the Force - the Army being a major culprit. 

Can someone answer a painstaking question: Is it in the Armed Forces Decree for senior officers to treat junior officers like a piece of trash? Is it in the Forces decree for a male officer to issue command (sic) to a female officer to go and cook in his house or that she should be remanded by a "red neck" (those in Nigerian military circuit will understand this term) in a guardroom for disobeying that order.  My heart bleeds for a structured, institutionalised, corrupt and morally bankrupt Nigerian military. The canker of corruption has eaten deep into the fabric of the military to an extent they parade themselves as gods.  For those who may be seeking for evidence of my allegation, I must state clearly that I am a son of a retired officer and was partly raised in the barracks.  I have friends, some of whom have served and are still serving in the Force - both the military and the Police. Ah The Nigeria Police keh!!  "That one na another case". Just a hint here on the extent of canibalism of this monstrous institution called the Nigerian Police: It is on record that NPF is the least paid Force in West Africa let alone comparing with other Forces in the whole of Africa. Again this is not surprising to me given the extent of canibalism in the Force to such an extent retiring Police Officers cannot and will never get their gratuity and pension claims unless they pay "egunje" and guess who they have to make such payments to? Colleagues in various Departments of the Police Force of course (Source 1: Close confidants whose parents have served Nigeria only to be trapped in the cabal called the Police), (Source 2: http://www.thenationonlineng.com/dynamicpage.asp?id=70001 )

"Giant of Africa we are", someone retorted in order to bring out a serial dose of venom in me. Right to his thinking I snapped - Yes we are giant of Africa when it comes to epileptic roads and electricity, non-functional education and health care system and institutionalised corruption, Giant of Africa when it comes to looting public coffers in broad day light and using same proceed to oppress the same people that elected (sorry, selected) politicians into offices.  We are giant of Africa when it comes to putting perfection to silencing journalists for raising the power of their pen against the power that be. I think I should allow Sahara Reporters to put flesh on this bone (http://www.saharareporters.com).  What a show of shame to be called "The Gaint of Africa".

We are, as a nation, going the way of self-ruin either as result of blatant denial of the complexity of our problem or in submission to the same religious creed we have always retorted to in the phrase "one day, one day e go better by the grace of God".  Do not get me wrong, I do not in anyway suggest religion to be taken out of the equation. Far from it, the clime is we have bastardised religious belief in Nigeria to such an unprecedented scale that we now attribute everything that we ought to sort out by careful and purposeful planning to God.  We seize every opportunity to add religious undertone to common sense issues we ought to sort out as any sane being.  Pastors and Imams in churches and mosques have not helped matters as well. So many have led their followers to debacle of misguided religious ideologies, withdrawing vital information to set them free while feeding them with radical and obsessive religious doctrines that "keep them (the followers) coming for more" while they surfer in penury at the expense of affluent "bigmanism" lifestyle of the Pastors/Imam.

Let's take a critical long-overdue assessment the "Bride (or is it the Giant) of Africa" and let each one of us ask him/herself "Are my actions or inaction putting my beloved Nigeria on the way to self-ruin?" As my mum will always say, he who has ears let him take heed.
Roy
aderoy01@yahoo.co.uk

Aderoy and others,
Thank you for your contributions.

We thank God that Nigeria does not lack the men and women to reform our beloved nation.

As we welcome the New Year 2009, let us look forward to the beginning of a new era that can be made possible by every effort each one makes to turn our mistakes into miracles of change.

Happy New Year!

P.S: Aderoy, permit me to republish your rejoinder on the news blog Nigerians Report, because I want more people to read it in Nigeria and other places. I did not read it alone.

i pity some people

@ orinkinla
words.true talk.

@Poster
This one na correct Acada. You talk am Good.

@Poster

What is the reason for the feel-happy crap? Granted the Samuel Crowther was termed a linguistic, the man could not write or speak Igbo. He was just a producer of primer. The primer was written by Simon Jonas and Rev. J.C. Taylor whose parentage was a liberated Sierra Leonia Igbo slave. It is funny that throughout the article name of Simon Jonas, who was teaching Samuel Crowther Igbo language in Lagos, was not mentioned. Samuel Crowther also produced primer in Nupe with the help of fellows from the Nupe area. Why should this punk shot himself over the roof by insinuating that some Ndigbo are ignorant of the fact the Crowther was assisted to produce a primer in Igbo language?

One of the best articles I've ever read. Please permit me to use this peace. I'll need your full name to reference. thanks

Michael Chima right?

Sammy107_d:

Michael Chima right?

I will send it to your emial.

All the fans of GEJ should share this and pass it on to him.

@Orinkila,

Well written, with very clear points. I am glad people still feel the passion to say the right thing regardless of sentiments. But like the saying goes, "saying is one thing, doing is another".

my oh my, this is one of the best essay's s i have ever read, you blow my mind,am printing it out and pasting it on the wall in my office and mailing to all my friends now

Only the best is good enough for us my brother, I cherish this write up. I use to wonder if our leaders are from the moon b/c they are either christians or moslems but it dosent reflect on them when in office. Taking the oath of office, and saying so help me God is now a formality cos non of them abide by the oath. I don`t know if we are mocking God, like u rightly said even idol worshippers respect their gods more than us.

this should be nailed to the door of every church and mosque.

The obvious issue with the nigerian society is that intellectual standings are worthless to
them.

Infact the intellectual illiterates scorn and make mockery of intellectuals.
They refer to them as people that are bonkers but pay them to write their speeches.

The society has become so materialistic that the way back to a normal society is too far off.
The zeal to painstakingly do things right has no place at all in a society where every single
individual wants to be wealthy overnight.
The government is even worse.

The nigerian society is so helplessly corrupt that mere reading books will not solve it.
Though it is a start.

The essay describes not only the Nigerian situation, but the plight of the black man across the globe.

Contacts in SA are telling me how the blacks are gradually instigating decay into the polity over there. Shouldn't be long till they are right where we are now.

hackney:

The obvious issue with the nigerian society is that intellectual standings are worthless to
them.

Infact the intellectual illiterates scorn and make mockery of intellectuals.
They refer to them as people that are bonkers but pay them to write their speeches.

The society has become so materialistic that the way back to a normal society is too far off.
The zeal to painstakingly do things right has no place at all in a society where every single
individual wants to be wealthy overnight.
The government is even worse.

The nigerian society is so helplessly corrupt that mere reading books will not solve it.
Though it is a start.

Actually, Nigeria is not much different than medieval Europe prior to the Renaissance.
Somehow we just need to rally around someone that can break with the past. He doesn't even need to be cut from any idealistic cloth, just someone willing to break with the past.
Henry VIII unwittingly triggered the Renaissance because of his determination to break with the Holy Roman traditions, though his intentions were anything but noble. But he played his part and moved on.
From all the candidates we have jostling for the presidency right now, I'd say Jonathan is the most likely candidate to do so. IBB is obviously a desperate power-hungry hypocrite. Buhari is blinded by ego and the need to prove some kind of point, not by any desire to move the nation forward. He is a good man though. Atiku is a crook period. The other chaps are just the regular bunch of clowns hanging around every 4 years, Ribadu included.

AjanleKoko:

The essay describes not only the Nigerian situation, but the plight of the black man across the globe.

Contacts in SA are telling me how the blacks are gradually instigating decay into the polity over there. Shouldn't be long till they are right where we are now.
Actually, Nigeria is not much different than medieval Europe prior to the Renaissance.
Somehow we just need to rally around someone that can break with the past. He doesn't even need to be cut from any idealistic cloth, just someone willing to break with the past.
Henry VIII unwittingly triggered the Renaissance because of his determination to break with the Holy Roman traditions, though his intentions were anything but noble. But he played his part and moved on.
From all the candidates we have jostling for the presidency right now, I'd say Jonathan is the most likely candidate to do so. IBB is obviously a desperate power-hungry hypocrite. Buhari is blinded by ego and the need to prove some kind of point, not by any desire to move the nation forward. He is a good man though. Atiku is a crook period. The other chaps are just the regular bunch of clowns hanging around every 4 years, Ribadu included.

I have been thinking about this for a while i have also been trying to convince myself that it is not true until the earthquake in haiti made me realise that there seems to be a problem with the way the blackman thinks.

i mean haiti has been independent from france for more than 100 years and is not in the afriacan continent but country itself apart from the earthquake crises is no different from the countries in the african continent when you factor developent indices,thinking and gennral quality of life .

asha 80:

I have been thinking about this for a while i have also been trying to convince myself that it is not true until the earthquake in haiti made me realise that there seems to be a problem with the way the blackman thinks.

i mean haiti has been independent from france for more than 100 years and is not in the afriacan continent but country itself apart from the earthquake crises is no different from the countries in the african continent when you factor developent indices,thinking and gennral quality of life  .

Personally I don't think the black man is less deficient mentally than any other race. Culture, beliefs,  and experiences play a huge role in personal and collective development, in my view.

Haiti . . . well, some people would argue that Haiti stood no chance, given its small population and land mass, as well as the sanctions it faced against the developed world because it stood for self-determination.

In actual fact, I think maybe Haiti would have been better off if it had allowed itself to be colonized. That could have played either for the good or for the bad: Like the Fijis and Hawaii, even the Bahamas. They're not great world powers, but at least they offer their natives a tidy living. But the likes of Jamaica offer a similar lifestyle to that of Haiti, maybe marginally better, but still with a similar degree of poverty.

I have my own personal theory which is, a strong nation would have three things going for it: population, land mass or territory, and a progressive, robust and largely intact value system.

- Progressive, i.e. able to continuously adapt to the changing global realities.
  -Robust, i.e. it addresses most of the people's physical, social, and metaphysical concerns or issues.
  -Intact, as in not easily swayed by outside influences.

Nigeria as a nation apparently has only population and land mass. The value system is not all-encompassing, or doesn't even come close. If you drill down that far, maybe we have 15 nations in 1. then you lose the population and land mass advantage.