| HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY……………………
I have enormous tracts of land and vast
volumes of water, but cannot feed myself.
So I spend $1 billion to import rice and
another $2 billion on milk.
I produce rice, but don ’t eat it. I have
millions of cows but no milk.
I am 50, please celebrate me.
I drive the best cars in the world but have
no roads,
so I crush my best brains in the caverns,
craters and crevasses they crash into daily.
I am in unending mourning,
please celebrate me.
My school has no teacher and my classroom
has no roof.
I take lectures through windows and live
with 15 others in one room.
All my professors have gone abroad, and
the rest are awaiting visas.
I am a university graduate, but I am
illiterate. I want a future,
please celebrate me.
Preventable diseases send me to hospitals
without doctors, medicines or power.
All the nurses have gone abroad and the
rest are waiting to go also.
I have the highest maternal and infant
mortality rates in the world;
and future generations are dying before
me. I am hopeless, hapless and helpless,
please celebrate me.
For democracy ’s sake I stood all day on
Election Day.
But before I could ink my thumb, results
had been broadcast.
When I dared to speak out, silence was
enthroned by bullets.
My leaders are my oppressors, and my
policemen are my terrors.
I am ruled by men in mufti, but I am not a
democracy.
I have no verve, no vote, no voice,
please celebrate me.
My youth have no past, present nor future.
So my sons in the North have become street
urchins;
and his brothers in the South have become
kidnappers.
My nephews die of thirst in the Sahara and
his cousins drown in the Mediterranean.
My daughters walk the streets of Lagos ,
Abuja and Port Harcourt;
while her sisters parade the streets of Rome
and Amsterdam .
I am grief-stricken,
please celebrate me.
Pen-wielding bandits have raided
everything in my vaults.
They walk the land with haughty strides
and fly the skies with private planes
They have looted the future of generations
unborn;
and have money they cannot spend in
several lifetimes,
but their brothers die of starvation. I want a
kit of kindness,
please celebrate me.
I can produce anything, but import
everything.
So my toothpick is made in China; my
toothpaste is made in South Africa;
my salt is made in Ghana; my butter is made
in Ireland;
my milk is made in Holland; my shoe is
made in Italy;
my vegetable oil is made in Malaysia*** my
biscuit is made in Indonesia;
my chocolate is made in Turkey and my
table water made in France.
My taste is far-flung and foreign,
please celebrate me.
*** To think that Malaysia came to NIFOR in
Edo State in the 70's to acquire the Palm Oil
Technology
My land is dead because all the trees have
been cut down;
flooding kills thousands yearly because the
drainages are clogged;
my fishes are dead because the oil
companies dump waste in my rivers;
my communities are vanishing into the
huge yawns of gully erosion, and nothing is
being done.
My very existence is uncertain and I am in
the deepest depths of despondence,
please celebrate me.
I have genuine leather but choose to eat it.
So I spend billions of dollars to import fake
leather.
I have four refineries, but prefer to import
fuel,
so I waste more billions to import petrol. I
have no security in my country,
but send troops to keep peace in another
man’s land.
I have hundreds of dams, but no water.
So I drink ‘pure’ water that roils my innards.
I need a vision,
please celebrate me.
I have a million candidates craving to enter
universities,
but my dungeons can only accommodate a
tenth.
I have no power, but choose to flare gas,
so my people have learnt to see in the dark
and stare at the glare of unclothed flares.
I am shrouded by darkness,
please celebrate me.
For my golden jubilee,
I shall spend 16 billion naira to bash around
the bonfires of the banal.
So what if the majority gaze at my
possessed, frenzied dance;
drenched in silent tears, as probity is
enslaved in democracy ’s empty cellars?
I am profligacy personified,
please celebrate me.
Why can I not simply reflect and ponder?
Does my complexion cloud the colour of my
character?
Does my location limit the lengths my
liberty?
Does the spirit of my conviction shackle my
soul
Does my mien maim the mine of my mind?
And is failure worth celebrating?
I AM NIGERIAN, PLEASE CELEBRATE ME |
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