The vast majority of Nigerian are overwhelmingly theistic, believing in a omniscient, omnipresent, omnibenevolent God who intervenes hourly in humanly affairs, issuing justices, retributions, rewards and blessings. Not least, of course, the ultimate reward of eternal life in the bossom of their god.

To this end, Nigerians spend a great deal of their spare time, financial means and mental effort in praise and worship of their God, requesting all manner of blessings from him. But the factors of the ground in Nigeria correlates so poorly with a people who are so god-fearing and pious. How can this be explain?

Why is Nigeria one of the poorest nations on earth in spite of its wealth in natural resources, talent and most importantly a particular favourite nation of God? Is God sitting up in his thrown, folded arms, watching this utter waste of his blessings? In fact, does wealth, prosperity and well-being matter to God?

Nigeria ranks about 154 on the Human development Index scale. With the exception of the USA, all the countries in the top twenty positions report generally low levels of religiosity. How ironic?

Further irony is that the very same factor that the religious claim would help alleviate their poverty, is instrumental in anchoring them to eternal poverty and slavery, mental and financial exploitation - religion. Religion and all its accoutrements robs people of the ability to be self-reliant, and the desire to see this world as their only home for which all their efforts has to be dedicated. Thus, they have encouraged the dispossessed to throw their hands up in the air and wait for blessings for heaven. The problems for which the religious pray hourly for godly intervention still continue to afflict them; crushing poverty, hunger, starvation, diseases, bad governance, poor infrastructure, poor education, etc, etc.

Such feeble and weak minded believers have been raised to think that anything happening in their lives are due to supernatural forces. Thus a student who succeeds at her exams at schools achieved this thanks to God, a businessman struggling in business is being held back due to involvement with the supernatural, someone gets a visa to go abroad is usually ascribed to the benevolence of God. Where would such stupidity end? I shall leave the last word to the African American writter, Frederick Douglass;

"I prayed for freedom twenty years, but received no answer until I prayed with my legs"

God left nigeria 48 yrs ago

if GOD wasnt working for nigeria,dyu think it ll still be one and not in tatters after everything nigeria has been through?
the m.k.o abiola 93 election saga including abiola's death was enough to destabilise any country
the 3rd term intirigues during obj
the various religious and ethnic conflagrations
remember the likes of rwanda,congo,kenya,liberia,sierra leone dont have as peculiar a country as nigeria yet it took less than we have experienced to spark off a long drawn out war with massive loss of lives,i understand that u r an atheist but as a christian we r not to ask or grumble about what GOD hasnt done when we r despondent but to count our blessings,and see what the lord has done in our lives.
you contradicted yourself with the mention of america as they are rooted in christianity and the greatest nation in the world

seeing as you r tacitly advocating for nigerians to abandon their believe in christianity,would you rather advocate for china's system of governance?bearing in mind that all these things you listed about nigeria is prevalent in china as well in spite of their sucesses

lucabrasi:

if GOD wasnt working for nigeria,dyu think it ll still be one and not in tatters after everything nigeria has been through?
the m.k.o abiola 93 election saga including abiola's death was enough to destabilise any country
the 3rd term intirigues during obj
the various religious and ethnic conflagrations
remember the likes of rwanda,congo,kenya,liberia,sierra leone don't have as peculiar a country as nigeria yet it took less than we have experienced to spark off a long drawn out war with massive loss of lives,i understand that u r an atheist but as a christian we r not to ask or grumble about what GOD hasnt done when we r despondent but to count our blessings,and see what the lord has done in our lives.
you contradicted yourself with the mention of america as they are rooted in christianity and the greatest nation in the world

seeing as you r tacitly advocating for nigerians to abandon their believe in christianity,would you rather advocate for china's system of governance?bearing in mind that all these things you listed about nigeria is prevalent in china as well in spite of their sucesses

Look at some of the other countries in the top ten positions on the HDI, such as Norway, Denmark, Sweden, etc. Couldn't Nigeria try to emulate the attitudes and approach of such countries. Basically, I am arguing for rationalism NOT irrationalism and supernationalism.

My guy countries u have listed here are homogenous or largely homogenous.Look at them and compare them to nigeria.

kenya is not homogenous. she has many tribes.
tanzania has many tribes too, and has mus-lims and xtains too. but no violence

let me tell u guys something, we may have the biggest church in the world, be the most religious country in the world but we are no better christains. infact, we may not even be real xtains in that country.

going to church, choir, this and that, are just being religious. it aint being a xtain. w need to follow what we preach and those churches need to start preaching christ, humility and service, and not only wealth, success etc the way people defend pastor chris and pastor adeboye, if we use the same zeal to practice xtainity, corruption would not thrive, electoral malpractice wont thrive, violence wont thrive.

no matter what we may say about our leaders, my opinion is that the problem with nigeria is more with the followership than the leadership

otele:

kenya is not homogenous. she has many tribes.
tanzania has many tribes too, and has mus-lims and xtains too. but no violence

let me tell u guys something, we may have the biggest church in the world, be the most religious country in the world but we are no better christains. infact, we may not even be real xtains in that country.

going to church, choir, this and that, are just being religious. it aint being a xtain. w need to follow what we preach and those churches need to start preaching christ, humility and service, and not only wealth, success etc the way people defend pastor chris and pastor adeboye, if we use the same zeal to practice xtainity, corruption would not thrive, electoral malpractice wont thrive, violence wont thrive.

no matter what we may say about our leaders, my opinion is that the problem with nigeria is more with the followership than the leadership

so true. most nigerians are God users. we pretend like the so called leaders are picked from ghana and neighbouring countries.  the answer to the wrong question is nigerians are working against our God given blessings

country of bunch of pretenders. kill them softly and hand them a Koran or Bible. they preach wealth big time. they are forceful when preaching that wealth. you not rich today you will be tmr blah blah blah. humility, community service? ZERO!!! where! how many pastor can organize their congregations to come clean their community?

asha 80:

My guy countries u have listed here are homogenous or largely homogenous.Look at them and compare them to nigeria.

If these countries are homogeneous, what made them so? Could it be because collectively they agree to subscribe to the same worldview, loosely defined?

Why has nearly 50 years of statehood not produced a sense of nationhood in Nigeria. If homogeneity is vital for development why have Nigerians not forged a homogeneous identity. Why is God standing by and not assisting in this goal?

If these countries are homogeneous, what made them so?  Could it be because collectively they agree to subscribe to the same worldview, loosely defined?

Why has nearly 50 years of statehood not produced a sense of nationhood in Nigeria.  If homogeneity is vital for development why have Nigerians not forged a homogeneous identity.   Why is God standing by and not assisting in this goal?

You are asking what made them homogenous?Simple.The people that make up the countries you listed are from the same ethnic group.Any other person that says he or she is from that country but is not from that 'ethnic group' got assimilated into the dominant culture of that country.

You asked why has 50 years not forged a nation hood in nigeria? Good question.does the hausa man trust the yoruba man?Does the yoruba man trust the igbo man?Does the igbo man trust the ijaw man?

You also asked why nigeria has not forged a homogenous entity.Is a yoruba man willing to give up his culture and language for the hausa man and vice varsa?Same question for other ethnic groups for the other?Even as lingua franca of nigeria is english and peeps from south are much more readily to learn it and behave like the white man,are northern muslims interested in it?just chew on these facts.

asha 80:

You are asking what made them homogenous?Simple.The people that make up the countries you listed are from the same ethnic group.Any other person that says he or she is from that country but is not from that 'ethnic group' got assimilated into the dominant culture of that country.

You asked why has 50 years not forged a nation hood in nigeria? Good question.does the hausa man trust the yoruba man?Does the yoruba man trust the igbo man?Does the igbo man trust the ijaw man?

You also asked why nigeria has not forged a homogenous entity.Is a yoruba man willing to give up his culture and language for the hausa man and vice varsa?Same question for other ethnic groups for the other?Even as lingua franca of nigeria is english and peeps from south are much more readily to learn it and behave like the white man,are northern muslims interested in it?just chew on these facts.

You have just restated facts which is widely known but you have not said anything about how such diversity could be overcome. I live in Great Britain now, but time waa when there were no less that 10 ethnic groups, each with its own kingdom, in the British Isle. You barely hear of these groups today. In fact countries in Westerm Europe in still fractured into ethnic groups although this terms is rarely used with respect to Europe. The whole Western Europe is like a tiny fraction of Africa, but how many countries are there in Western Europe. Even within the present national borders there are local minority groups.

The mechanism by which Europe created homogeinity in the past cannot be adopted today by most civilised societies. Europe is forging ahead today under the European Community directives, another vehicle of unity, with the hamonisation of most gevernmental and legislative procedures. African countries will have to find its own way to build nations and overcome the diversity of tribes and cultures.

The mechanism by which Europe created homogeinity in the past cannot be adopted today by most civilised societies. Europe is forging ahead today under the European Community directives, another vehicle of unity, with the hamonisation of most gevernmental and legislative procedures. African countries will have to find its own way to build nations and overcome the diversity of tribes and cultures

The EU you are talking about is made up countries who decided to come together on THEIR OWN TERMS AND NOT FORCED LIKE NIGERIAN SITUATION.Even the UK you are staying is not in EU.Likewise Norway.Yo do not force people with different ideology of life together.Even in your UK are you not hearing rumbles that scotland and wales want out of UK?

ghana is gradually forging into a homogenous society. we can go on giving excuses with the british, it wont solve our problems.
tanzania, kenya, uganda, ghana. . . these dudes are forming a single unit. tanzania even developed a language (swahili) which is now spoken in three countries (uganda and kenya and tanzania)

we even managed to develop pidgin english but we disrespect it as a language of the uneducated. tell me then how we can manage to forge a union. we can blame the british forever. remember, ghana was colonised by the british too, hong kong too, tanzania too etc we need to move forward.

@otele
Believe me nigeria is not going to move any forward.Ghana had Jerry rawlings to thank.Now in nigeria who would do the jerry rawlings style revolution?

I also thought kenya was everything you can think of as good in africa until their last election that threw up deep ethnic rivalry that exists their that many foreigners do not know.

Also these african countries you named i do not think they have a situation where muslim population is about 50% and control the political situation in their country like nigeria not even ghana.

In fact if u ask me nigerian situation is similar to the scenario in sudan.How? Largely feudal muslim north in control of the poltics with mineral rich south of made of largely animists(in nigeria christians).

God works for no one. He is not a respecter of persons.

Also, asha80 is making more sense than others here seem to think.

tanzania even developed a language (swahili) which is now spoken in three countries (uganda and kenya and tanzania)

swahili has existed way before the creation of Tanzania. Swahili originated in Somalia and indian ocean coast.

African countries will have to find its own way to build nations and overcome the diversity of tribes and cultures.

agreed there's no reason why groups like ecowas can't thrive.

and swahili was adopted by tangania as a national language and it binds the country together. can u imagine that swahili is the only ''african'' language in the AU? the rest are foreign . .english, portugese etc

God left nigeria 48 yrs ago Huh Tongue Grin