We are in the magical year 2020. The young ones may perhaps not understand what I mean when I say magical 2020, but those who are 50 years and above would catch the drift and am sure it will cause them to laugh. In the eighties and early nineties it was not uncommon to hear our leaders tell us that by the year 2020 our country would have fully developed to equal what we see in the western world. Every time one read the newspapers, watched the television and listened to radio, it was common to hear such coinage like “health for all by the year 2020”, “education for all by the 2020”, “housing for all by the year 2020.”

The expectation, like I observed earlier, was that by the time we entered into this magical year, most of the challenges of nationhood would have been sorted out and a very beautiful nation put in place.

In those days it was like 2020 was indeed a magical year that it would never come but here it is, many of us are not just alive but very healthy to see this magical year. We have seen the year and we have seen our country and for us who knew the promises then and perhaps the money wasted, we find it very difficult to say whether our country has made progress or retrogressed; that would be for you the readers to say. I can affirm that 85 per cent of the population is suffering and passing through traumatic moment and I can add for no fault of theirs. These innocent citizens ought not to suffer in the midst of abundance. God has blessed this country and only the biggest fool would raise an argument against this. The only question could be what have we made out of it and if anyone asks this question, he would be perfectly on the right track. This is a question citizens ought to be asking especially at a time like this.

Our situation is bad and if the truth must be told, a huge chunk of the population is dislocated. Our country is said to be about 180 million people and statistics from various institutions, external and internal, seem to suggest that about 150 million of that number are out of employment. This is catastrophic and those who know say it is a ready recipe for bigger disaster. The consequences are everywhere: general insecurity, despondence and poor governance. Ask citizens why their conditions are bad, they blame poor governance and closed economic space. There is some truths in that, but certainly not the whole truth. Government should create enabling environment and avenues for citizens to actualize their dreams, but it should not begin and end there; the citizens should not be lost because government chose to walk the wrong path. The individual has his life to live. The individual state of our citizens appears terrible because government has failed in one of her cardinal responsibilities, which is indoctrination.

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Indoctrination is different from learning. Indoctrination of a country presses home a particular type of mentality, the can do mentality and the spirit of possibility. Leaders take time to teach citizens that they can of themselves recreate themselves and their nations. The developed western world did not get to their current positions by government actions alone. The mentality of the citizens and what came from it contributed significantly to it. The Israel of 70 years ago is not the Israel we know today. Before it was an arid land with few persons and no industrial base. Today, that story has changed and the biggest secret lies in individual creativity, almost every home is found a small factory. This is what is called the Eagle’s mentality. Being industrious! Citizens don’t wait until challenges of survival weigh them down, they stop to ponder and thereafter take a plunge in faith.

In our clime we sit back and complain and we have enough excuses. For many it is my father did not train me and my uncles abandoned me. For others, it is a case of ‘I don’t know where to start.’ For such the world is so blank, empty hearts and the devil is busy filling it with all manner of rubbish. For a good number, it is either the white-collar job or nothing else. In these days of collapsing industries, all they want is government job or nothing else. A worse trend is emerging and that is politics. Every citizen, man and woman, wants to play politics; it is not about quality participation since a good number of them don’t even have certificate, not tom talk of ideas. It is about helping to subvert the system in the hope to gaining something either before or after. It is the vulture mentality. Dead meat eaters! They don’t care about something fresh. This group would abandon all productive engagements in the false belief that once their candidate wins an election, their fortune will change. They become terribly frustrated when in the end they don’t see the man, let alone the change of fortunes. Government has the responsibility to tell citizens that vulture mentality kills and they can do this by enlightenment.

Governments, parents and other civil institutions have a responsibility to inculcate in the citizens that they can succeed in spite of challenges. Young Nigerians are running away into economic exile abroad on the false premise that they can’t find anything good here, but on a daily basis foreigners land at our airports in search of golden opportunities here. There are opportunities here but the challenge as observed by a foreigner is that most of us seem blind to them. The rudderless attitude of our government also contributes to the distraction. Citizens have a responsibility to refuse to be distracted. It is time we know that even in the developed world money is not picked on the streets. Besides, individuals have their challenges too, some of them posed by the environment which they must surmount before they can make a headway. It is time we know we must confront our challenges whatever they are.

We need a winning mentality. Bill Gates did not finish formal education but today he is one man that can pass for a nation. The staying power was a winning mentality which gave him a picture of his life and what he could do and told him he could do it in spite of obstacles. The losers mentality is what has been with us and it has done us terrible harm. This mentality sees obstacles everywhere, makes the individual think of himself as a victim instead of a victor. The winning mentality says yes even though my future is very big and beautiful I can start today from my small corner and in two three years time I can guarantee that my tomorrow would be far better than all the years’ one spent struggling. It is still happening today and will happen tomorrow. This is the truth our governments are supposed to teach which they don’t teach and our institutions are supposed to also teach which they don’t. Happy New Year!