Pls read this by Ogbo Awoke Ogbo



√Othman Dan Fodio is Not Done With Nigeria Yet - That's the Crux of the Whoooole Matter!

¶Nigeria is not dealing with religion. Nigeria is not dealing terrorism. Nigeria is not dealing with ethnic suspicion and tribal hatred - we really don't have issues with each other on personal levels. (Of my top five friends on earth, two are Yoruba, one Tiv, one Efik, one Igbo. And many of you don't know but I have Yoruba in-laws, nieces and nephews. So, don’t get these things twisted, if I must borrow the expiring slang of Nigerian teenagers.)

••• Nigeria is not dealing with corruption (or kwaraption, its current version).
Nigeria is not dealing with leadership crisis - we’ve been crying about leadership since 1914.

So, what is Nigeria dealing with? Nature - One simple Law of Nature - that if you refuse to learn from history, history will destroy you!

Nature is stubborn! Nature has this uncanny persistence that its lesson MUST be learnt before any progress can be made. And so, for 100 years, Nigeria has pined away on the same spot. Same stories. Same problems, same people, same mindset, same insanity. Nigeria thinks it can beat nature to its laws - repeating the same follies and expecting miracles.

••• We have learnt little from remote and immediate history. Very little! Perhaps no one captures the peril of our ignorance of history better than Sanusi Lamido Sanusi himself, the current Emir of Kano. Hear him:

"There is a new Igbo man, who was not born in 1966 and neither knows nor cares about Nzeogwu and Ojukwu. There are Igbo men on the street who were never Biafrans. They were born Nigerians, are Nigerians, but suffer because of actions of earlier generations. They will soon decide that it is better to fight their own war, and may be find an honorable peace, than to remain in this contemptible state in perpetuity. The Northern Bourgeoisie and the Yoruba Bourgeoisie have exacted their pound of flesh from the Igbos. For one Sardauna, one Tafawa Balewa, one Akintola and one Okotie-Eboh, hundreds of thousands have died and suffered. If this issue is not addressed immediately, no conference will solve Nigeria´s problems.”

That was prophetic ... 1999.

••• Look at those pictures in the post very well. I was there. That was my generation. I was only five years old but I vividly recall those protruding bellies.

I vividly recall standing in a long queue for a bowl of powdered milk being distributed by the Swiss Red Cross at the Ugoni Primary School, Okposi. I vividly recall the rich, heavenly taste of that heavily fortified milk as it made love with my grateful tongue. I vividly recall that first touch from the Swiss Red Cross.

••• My mother was a nurse during the War, a trained nurse. It was from her that I first heard the word “kwashiorkor” from which many children had perished. She treated scores of kwashiorkor children at our home.

Civil War!

So, the handlers of Nigeria terminated the study of history in Nigerian schools — deliberately. Can you imagine a sensible nation hiding its history? Partly to hide the atrocities of that pogrom from the memories of upcoming generations. But you don’t hide problems; you solve them. Every plea for the terms of the Nigerian water and oil union to be negotiated have been met with the demonic stubbornness that “Nigeria cannot be negotiated!” Says who?

••• And because history was banned from the school curriculum, we have a generation of Nigerian youth who know more about Arsenal, Manchester and Chelsea than their own reason for existence.

They are taught like parrots to sing a “national anthem” that has zero meaning. For instance, what is the meaning of the phrase “where peace and justice shall reign” or the more annoying “the labors of our heroes past?” Who exactly are these heroes past and what were their labors that won’t be in vain?

* Was Ahmadu Bello a hero? Yes… to the Northerners.
* Was Awolowo a hero? Yes, but don’t mention that to the Igbo man.

His new name is Muhammadu Buhari

...everyone is concerned only about his immediate need not the future...