You already know Nigeria is presently in a place where the sun doesn't shine, we're presently caught in dangerously troubled waters and if Jesus was on this boat, He might have to do more than just say peace be still. That's how bad things are right now. You know it, you have the facts, you have the statistics, you know the figures and the projections, so I won't waste fancy words and brain matter just to restate the obvious.

What I have for you is a question, it's left to you to decide if it's simple or not: what side of the divide will you be when we finally cross this bridge? See how I said "when" like I'm so confident we will scale this phase? That's because I'm more than confident we will. If you paid any attention in History class you'd know that the countries we call developed today were once worse than we are, and besides, this is Nigeria, we always eventually bounce out of things like this. So your worry shouldn't be whether or not we will make it out of this standing, you should worry about where you'd be when we finally do.

Let me aid your understanding with what I've termed my 'Sinking Raft' analogy. Nigeria is presently sailing on a wooden raft that is more than half-submerged, water is fast seeping onto the raft through the spaces between the joints, it's now tilted to one side and people are beginning to fall into the ocean. Put this picture in mind.

Now, a category of people will immediately take off to the nearest ferries and yachts. They will seem like the smartest people seeking the easiest way out. Of course raft-life is nothing compared to yacht-life, what with all the glamour and luxury and ergonomic design. They will give up everything to get on the yacht even if they'd only get to hang on the rails for the rest of the journey.

Another category of people will instinctively look for the next man to blame. They busy themselves with complaining and making noise about the condition of the raft as if it wasn't obvious enough. These ones will never miss an opportunity to feed every ear that cares to listen with words about how the raft is destined for the bottom of the ocean. They won't waste time in reminding you how the raft used to be one big fancy bulk of carefully attached logs that stayed well afloat. They will tweet it, re-tweet it, blog it and even share the horrid pictures on Facebook. Unfortunately, they're just dead-weight and would only make the raft sink even faster.

The category of people that will be on the better side of the divide when we eventually scale this phase are those who are wise enough to see that all the raft needs is a little pulling back to the surface and it will float again. These are the ones that will purchase locally made products to encourage local production, discourage importation and eventually grow the economy. These are the ones that will set aside their selfish lust for wealth and think of ways their fields and skills can better the whole populace and not just their pockets. These are the ones that won't exploit the situation for their selfish gains. They know it'll take a considerable amount of time for the raft to stay completely afloat again so they won't be discouraged when they don't start seeing results immediately. They would rather withstand the pain and hardship they'd face because they know it will only last so long, sooner than later they'd be the better for it.

So what should you do? Grab your side of the raft and pull with all you've got. If you have to dive into the ocean and push from beneath then get your life jacket on. Whatever you do, make sure you're contributing your best to making the raft float again. It will be tough, it will be rough, some will go down with pneumonia in the process, but at the end of it all we will sit on our floating raft and say we did it.

#GodblessNigeria