On that fateful day of January 1 1914, the British colonial
disciple, Sir Lord Lugard acted out a script with a hidden agenda of
exploitation by hurriedly amalgamating the Northern and Southern protectorates
into a single country (Nigeria) without the consent of the people concerned
(Nigerians). They shaved our heir in our absence. With this, they succeeded in
creating a nation with ethnic and religious bias through the ink of their pen.
This gave birth to
nationalist movements and political struggles for self
government. In the course of fighting for
After
independence, our founding fathers failed to restructure Nigeria in our own way; instead, they continued
with this indefinable federal structure that Britain handed over to us. They failed to unit the nation with their
actions, inactions, words and utterances; instead, they formed political
parties based on ethnic/religious background to muscle their way to power. For
example, The Action Group (A.G) for the Yorubas in the South West, the National
Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC) for Igbos in the South East, the Northern
Peoples Congress (NPC) for the Hausas in
the North. These divisions prevented Nigeria from having true leaders
who are not Igbo leaders, not Hausa leaders, not Yoruba leaders; but Nigerian
leaders. The power struggle and personality clash between these leaders
culminated into ethnic crises and then later the Nigerian civil war that
cracked all the knots of unity that were holding us together.
Again, like other crises in the
past, Nigeria
managed to remain together after the civil war. Though it was not yet uhuru for
the nation as crises upon crises continued to shake the already cracked Nigeria ’s
unity. Once again, our leaders failed to unit this nation through their
actions, inactions, policies, words and utterances. The ethnic and religious dust these leaders
raised prevented the breath of peace and stability in the polity. The result
was military coup upon military coup, election crises upon election crises,
census crises upon census crises, ethnic/religious killings upon ethnic and
religious killings.
As Nigeria grows in age, its problems
have continued to multiply in numbers. Patriotism among Nigerians is at the
lowest level with the fear of the unknown ever visible. However, Nigeria has
defied all these myriad of crises to remain indivisible as a sovereign nation
to the great surprise of the outside world. You could recall that a U.S think
thank had predicted that Nigeria
would disintegrate after the 2015 general elections; we proved them wrong!
Though we have remained together as a nation with a million crises, we have
failed to swallow the bitter pill of truth and purge ourselves of divisive
tendencies. Nigeria
has remained as an unfortunate sick man whose illness is not responding to
treatment and yet he has refused to die. He has been bedridden by an illness but
instead of looking for a permanent cure, he has continued to take pain relief
drugs to only suppress the illness hence the deteriorating state of health of
this unfortunate sick man called Nigeria . Britain prepared and gave to us a
sick nation, but since 1960 we have refused to die (Disintegrate) yet we are
not responding to treatment. We have continued to receive wrong prescriptions
(Advice) from the west (IMF, World Bank, UN, USA, U.K Etc) and take wrong
medications (bad leaders) under the guise of experience hence we have remained
sick and paralyzed (Disunited and underdeveloped). Until we search and get the
real cure to our sickness as a nation (Restructuring, true federalism, unity in
our diversity, equity and justice, good leadership, and patriotism), we’ll
remain incarcerated just like the unfortunate sick man.
God Bless Nigeria !
Written by: Justice Agan
Email: justiceagan4@gmail.com
Phone: 08064645620
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