I have seriously lacked both the inspiration and commitment to write for a few months. Maybe it is because I feel unhappy about the perpetual lack of commitment from our leaders or because I feel that there is no topic or opinion under the sun that others have not spoken about.
I however promised myself that before the 2011 elections, I would be writing a note on the reasons why we should vote and how we should choose those we vote for…..so here goes….
I have realised with utter dismay that a lot of our peers do not understand democracy at all or even politics as it relates to elections.
In fact Nigerian’s don’t do team sports very well……Why? Because we do not understand the simple theory of building from scratch. We like ‘already made’!!
Let me digress for a little bit and speak about a form of development…when I was 18yrs old, I would often drive around Lagos in my 404 Pickup and run errands for my mum, buying building materials and delivering them to one of her construction sites…I marvelled as to how an empty, bushy plot of land would be cleared and look much nicer…and then sand filled cos it was swampy and then curiously the ground would be dug (hard work) and then filled with concrete by a small ‘army’…. and then a foundation was raised and then blocks were put up in an orderly fashion (suggesting that there was some sort of plan in place) when it reaches the lintel level, u had a choice to either put a roof on or deck the building so that you could have a second floor.
In either case the blockwork would still be ugly until the house gets plastered….then comes the final part of putting the fittings and painting….my favourite part
The colours and type of paint and fittings goes a long way to decide if it is an average house, a beautiful house or a fantastic house.
Even if it turns out fantastic, the type of characters who occupy the house, their habits and morals etc will determine the continuity of such beauty and radiance….it does not matter how beautiful a house is if there is rancour and uprising and shouting from within to the hearing of outsiders…if there is a lack of care and determination on the part of the occupants to either keep the place as they have found it or even make it better, then that HOUSE WILL SIMPLY FALL DOWN! It is only a matter of when……
Where was i before I digressed…yes teamwork, elections and democracy: Now I remember in the early to mid 90’s when as a student in London, many Nigerians started supporting premier league teams…Many supported Man U and Arsenal because they were the most likely to win….my sister and a few ladies supported Man U because of the cute David Beckham etc….I used to tease her many yrs later that i am shocked she still supported Man U because Beckham had left the club….or had she not noticed???…lol
I supported Newcastle (because they had a dude called Faustino Asprilla who was just as black as he was magical)…then a year later Chelsea (because they had an influx of players from the Italian League (Series A which was shown a lot in Nigeria before i moved) the likes of Zola, Di Mateo, Vialli, then this young left footed player Celestine Babayaro (my birthday mate and now close friend and easily the most gifted human being I know) and then they had Ruud Gullit as a player and then later a coach…..this was around 93/94…a time when both clubs never dreamt of winning the premiership.
The Chelsea team was fun to watch and Gullit when he coached them said that they played ‘sexy football’….they went on to win the FA cup and have in recent times won the premiership and Carling cups…
In that time…a lot of owners, coaches and managers have come and gone…and also great players, but the club has remained.
This proves that Change is constant…Leaders and Rulers are Not….but Citizens Always Remain…
In April, when we go out to choose our next leaders, we should not do it based on good looks and TV airtime or eloquence, we should imagine that we have only one child, and when he turned 16 we had to send to mentoring classes….who would we send him/her to knowing that the child’s future and life would depend on what was learnt….who can you TRUST??? Who you are sure without a doubt would do your bidding and sacrifice his life and comfort for you???…..who is that person who you know FOR SURE would take Nigeria’s matter so seriously that he would put himself last…
Choose a man that you can entrust your life and that of your family in his hands…
Choose a man with principle and integrity remembering that in the end failure to do so would result in four more years of decline and even more poverty and suffering…
Choose with SENSE…NOT SENTIMENT!!!