From time, man has always been man’s only worst archenemy. All the wars, all the hate, all the scheming, and all the greed that torment man come from man; not from nature, not from (lower) animals. Nature deals man a blinding blow intermittently; but the natural frequency and degree of damage pale into insignificance when placed side by side with man’s inhumanity to self. Nature is more humane than man!
Animals too have not dealt that horribly with man. Well, until the recent past, and even so only in Nigeria no animal competed with man. It began with a seemingly innocuous social media banter between the wife of the president, Aisha, and Kaduna activist senator, Shehu Sani, about hyenas, jackals, wolves and such other predators wishing that the then ailing lion king never returned. Pronto, these powerful animals, to show their anger, dispatched those little imps called rodents to raid the president’s main office in Aso Rock -of all places.
Humiliated and hurt fundamentally by those small-but-mighty mammals, the president the moment he recovered his workspace and self retaliated by declaring operations crocodile smile here and python dance there. Nothing in the kingdom has been the same again between man and animals. In fact, things have now so degenerated that snakes and monkeys are busy going to and fro devouring or swallowing millions of Naira.
Alas, this animalification of thievery is a classic example of mankind’s crass hate for mankind. The world over, man is own worst enemy. Ungodly, lousy internecine inter-country rivalries have permeated the human architecture down to the minutest fabric. Hate rules in the village and family.
In America, Europe, Asia, Australia and Africa, man himself is appalled by what he has done to himself. The craze for money, development, fame, politics and civilisation has hurt society irredeemably. It has left man sick: in the head, in the mind, and in the body. It is a dangerous terminal sickness, caused and fed by self.
What used to be the free world is now in chains. In a moment of one singular decision, man signed away his peace. Last November 8, man sowed whirlwind. May he not harvest tsunami!
Gun killings in North America have not aroused man from his deadly slumber, after all these years. The racist man in the so-called free world stays his Neanderthal course even after seeing the untold dents his ungodly mannerism has visited on his country’s image and pedigree. A most educated man carries on so illiterately, so hypocritically, so childishly. America would become more America if her man spread love and more love, not hate!
In Europe, the latter-day Cold War is the new normal. No other continent better epitomises a house of commotion. No friendship exists between western and eastern Europe. It’s either the man in Russia is pure evil or his co-European leaders are too suspicious.
It’s no different in far-flung Asia. Peace efforts by the two Koreas are being scorned. West of the continent (what most people call Middle East) man’s perennial shame persists. Man had since given up on man (read Syria).
The avoidable deaths in the under-reported horror, that the Syrian civil war is, is permanent blood on the hands of man. Man disfigured Aleppo, man literally snuffed life out of the city. Now, man has moved the action to Eastern Ghouta, on the fringes of Damascus the capital. Fierce air bombings that killed hundreds coupled with the discovery of a room filled with children said to have been killed in a chemical attack) has compelled the pretentious weakling called United Nations (read man) to force a ceasefire, for medical and food aid access.
However, America, Europe and Asia are not lone wolves. Man in Australia and Africa, etc is as bad. Even closer home, man is disastrous. He’s fulfilled the promise of replacing stone but he did so with rock, not bread.
Ditto his other promises: tight-fitted chain in place of change, wealth-guzzling snakes and monkeys instead of fish and egg, barefaced injustice and such other failings rather than el-doradoic governance. The way to go is for man to accept that not only has he failed but that he also cannot fix his mess. Let man make peace with his Maker and thereafter begin afresh. God bless Nigeria!
Like 2015, like 2019
Why do we have such short memory in this country? How does no one remember the eventful build-up to the whirlwind presidential election of 2015? Which writing on the wall in 2015 hasn’t yet recurred, this eve of 2019?
Many more questions, but we know the answers. My country trapped on this road again: so much motion very little movement. Yet, many noise bogus satisfaction just because their man is in charge.
Dapchi, the good people of Nigeria stand with you. We regret and condemn the abduction of those 105 innocent schoolgirls. We are praying for them and you.
Election-wise, Dapchi is the father of all premonitions vis-a-vis re-election. We only need to pray about the next man or woman. Father, give us somebody who knows the destination and the way thereto!
Have you ever had a hearing test?
The other day, I had the privilege of receiving a private lecture by an ENT specialist, Dr. Mfon Inoh. He told of a study that found an alarming majority of Nigerians tested suffered mild hearing loss or worse.
In fact, he said that of those covered only two had healthy ears. The loud speakers in our places of worship hurt, not heal, our ears.
Priests must help us just as we must keep down the volume of our earpieces. Go for eye, blood pressure and such other tests regularly!