By Aba Saheed March 2012

I can read your mind. Even as you screwed up your face and rest your extraordinary head on your huge palms, I know what is running in your mind. Your brain is being over worked, almost getting heated up. You may even suffer a heart attack the way you are going, or a stroke. Or some calamity yet to be discovered by science.


You are worried stiff. But, tell me who is not worried stiff in this nation that has lost its direction as it is wallowing in darkness, even in the face of the sun?

You have got bills to pay. You have school fees to pay for your last two children while the four whose fees you managed to scrape through had not secured job since they finished their Youths Service Corps. Your wife of over 30 years is contemplating running away.

You thought you would be able to complete your bungalow once your children graduated, but that has remained a dream. Your place of work is about to crumble as your employers owe you six months’ salary arrears.

But suicide is not on your plate. It was your wife that once threatened to end it all. I know you persuaded her against that option, quoting profusely from the Quran and the Bible.

I know. But you are worried she may go out and not return to your uncompleted place of abode.

“This country chokes life out of me”, that’s your refrain. You mouth it every now and again, and your colleagues have given you the phrase as your alias!

I know that you are saying to yourself that it is perhaps only the Military that can fix this country. “Look at it this way”, you once told your friends, “The Military were responsible for more than ninety percent of the infrastructure standing in the land today. All the motor ways, the long bridges, the National Theatre complex, the Refineries [while they existed], the National Stadium at Suru-lere, even the extra modern city of Abuja”

“It was the Military that created the many states in the federation. Only the Military can create more states. Or put another way, it was the Military that forced us out of the beautiful regional arrangement which once flourished in the land. If we are to go back to regionalism, it is only the Military that can decree it”

“The Military imposed bogus money –guzzling presidential system on us. And we are paying dearly for us. If we are to be left off the hook, it is only the Military that can save us”

These are wild thoughts going through your mind. But I am not sure whether you should be bothering yourself with high floating political thoughts when you are faced with hunger and crying poverty.

And Madam, what is it that is bothering you? I know you too are greatly upset. You believe Nigeria has not been kind to you or to your family. But why are you blaming it on your husband? Your husband did not create this mess. He was never a member of the House of Representatives or a Senator. He had not even been a Councillor.

Now you think you should run away to Abuja. But you need money to employ the services of necromancers and powerful ‘Juju’ men or Pastors or Imams that would give you charms to put the Senator target in your pocket. Or do you think those women in Abuja rely only on their size 46 boobs and 60-inch buttocks and bleached bodies?

Please perish the thought. Your children will find jobs. You yourself will see miracles of God. I am not kidding. It is only God that can fix Nigeria. And He or She will do it in His/Her time.

Do not be irrational. I know the times are hard, and man can get easily pushed into temptation.

I can see the League of Armed Robbers planning to take maximum advantage of ‘No Road Blocks” policy of the current Inspector General of Police. They and the crooked police that are alleged to be selling arms to them are planning mayhem on the highways. Please perish the thought. The Police have perfected ways of securing lives and property on the roads without menacing road blocks.

And you undergraduate girls who are considering following in the footsteps of some of your colleagues that have taken to full time prostitution should perish the thought. I appeal to you from the bottom of my heart to perish the thought. I don’t want you to discover later in life that your wombs had been damaged beyond repair or that HIV/AIDS had found a place of abode in your garment body.

I can see through my crystal ball that all those of you in authority are not bothered. You are still enjoying your roast ‘sikken’ and ‘torkey’. Your mind is telling you that you have nothing to fear and you can continue to plunder the country to your heart’s content. Your mind tells you there is no people’s power. And since you have cornered power, all the resources of State are at your beck and call.

This is a wishful thinking. Something tells me your days of gormandizing are almost over. Believe it. Your thoughts are deceiving you. This “I don’t care’ attitude will not be tolerated for any longer. And if you nurse the thought that you can ride on people’s back for ever, you better perish the thought.

Many have thought so before, to their damnable peril. Ask the French before the Revolution. Ask the Russians. Ask the Chinese. Ask Efunsetan Aniwura, the notorious power-drunk Iyalode of Ibadan.

Now, ask all those whose heads had been severed from their bodies.
Ask!!!

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