“This is lovely. Yes i am very proud to be a Nigerian. We are truly the most happy people in the world. It's a pity that this side of Nigeria is never shown in the western medias.Yes 9ja, one Nation.,” One can read this commentary on the musical piece performed by an Areopagus of Nigerian musicians in connection with OGD production of Tade Ogidan . And this comment is reminiscent of the recent interview of Professor John Igué in which he said that our future with Nigeria is threatened. This threat according to him is a result of the contempt in which we keep our great neighbor. "The Beninese do not like Nigeria, he said, but they depend on it for their living and Nigerians know this."
Nor is it only Benin that despises Nigeria, except that Benin is a close neighbor, a country which, were it not for the vagaries of history, has no reason to be apart.. Different is the case of many countries around the world which nurture a bad image of Nigeria. Seen from afar, Nigeria appears to be the Country of the Biafran war with its procession of dead and starving children, or a country where swarm or from which come many crooks, traffickers of children or drug ; a country of corruption, political instability, military dictatorship, murders and endemic ethnic tensions. As for the neighboring countries citizens or those who have the opportunity to live in the country, Nigeria is viewed as the land of dreadful go slow, robbers and lawless, a land of violence, not to mention power shortages by a hopeless NEPA, etc ...
All this is not completely untrue, though. But can take on a deliriou when summed up ideologically with a prejudicial intention. For failures, irregularities and defects, are shared by all countries of the world. And Nigeria inherited a difficult sociopolitical situation which it is well aware of and taking appropriate steps to correct. It takes just love and objectivity to realize the genius of Nigeria, the immense qualities of its people and the dynamism of its society. The largest Black country in the world is still the one which Africa was proud of the Nobel Prize for Literature, the first in black Africa. A major oil producer, Nigeria is also a African giant film producer with Nollywod. The progress of regional cultures and languages as Yoruba is huge and can not stand any comparison with our ideological prevarication about the ephemeral Department for native languages. In Nigeria, Yoruba is a living language, written and taught in universities! Nigeria has been and remains a major center of African music with big names like Fela Kuti, Sunny Ade, Prince Nico Mbarga, Sunny Okosun, Haruna Ishola, Ebenezer Obey, etc ... In literature, in addition to the Nobel Prize Wole Soyinka, Nigeria is the country of the Great Chinua Achebe, one of the authentic African writers of all time, whose thinking has quickly embraced the technical problems of African literature. Contrarily to the demonizing trend which damages image of Nigeria, one can cite many other talents and blessings that Nigeria is the theater and the source.
But let us not fall into the opposite extreme. Everything Nigeria needs is to be viewed without glasses, as a country of men and women, full of heart, talent and desire to live, so to be loved ..
Ayechetan Bachirou
Copyright, Blaise APLOGAN, 2010,© Bienvenu sur Babilown
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