Elliott Ugochukwu-Uko
1 A people confident and secure, even while dwelling in a foreign land. Totally dependent on their abilities, faith in their talents and self-confident in their mien and carriage.
Bold, audacious and skilled, gregarious and sure-footed, but misunderstood and envied. Resented, subverted and undermined serially, are suddenly woke.
Woke enough to insist on positive change. Truly woke and expecting a just and improved political template and a fair structure and system.
2 They desire to live in peace with everyone, they travel to and settle everywhere. They invest in and develop everywhere. They regrettably, are yet to learn how to manage the ensuing envy their lightning success in trade and commerce attracts. They grabbed western education with both hands less than a century ago. Caught up and moved ahead of everyone else. Quick learners, his personal strive for success, almost in over drive, he has no patience for those not catching up. Blinded by the innate desire to succeed, he offends without knowing and creates fear in the hearts of his neighbours. His undoing.
3 He is oblivious of and therefore, doesn’t really bother about the century-old blackmail that he is impetuous, cheeky and quick to dominate others, and therefore doesn’t understand the great need to counter such dangerous narrative by going out of his way to cultivate trust, respect and admiration from his neighbours, and to reassure everyone he means no harm. Instead, he unwittingly frightens and intimidates everyone the more, by acquiring and building up property everywhere, giving the wrong impression that he came to takeover and dominate everywhere, erroneously providing his adversaries with potent ammunition to grow and spread the blackmail that he must be put in check.
4 His intimidating success at the individual level, inspires awe and discomfort, his boisterous nature, suggests arrogance, his unique gift and talent at haggling and negotiating deals, creates the impression of an economic oppressor, even when he is the oppressed. Inability to or failure to build buffers and genuine political alliances, opens up his flank, making him vulnerable and a very attractive target in times of crisis. His weak political muscle ensure he is hit and blinded time and again. Only to rush home and rush back in droves, as soon as normalcy returns to the affected areas. He unconsciously established himself as the political underdog and the eternal cry baby. Those intimidated by his economic prowess console themselves, they’ll always whip and humiliate him politically by denying him his dues and rights. The unwritten conspiracy suites everyone, lest he dominates the land.
5 He sulks, endures and consoles himself he’s not doing badly economically. He silently hopes and prays for justice and equity. He is serially denied deserved promotion, appointments and infrastructural development. Everything is skewed against him since the end of the brutal civil war he lost. States and local government councils were created by soldiers without his input. Boundaries demarcated without his voice. Deliniation of federal constituencies, carved behind his back. Even the country’s constitution adopted unilaterally by the same soldiers. Almost like a visitor and a spectator in his own country, he wonders the future of his progeny.
6 His troubles began around a hundred and fifty years ago. The caucasians came first to hunt for slaves, and later to colonize and exploit. They noted his village square democracy and his culture of not only asking questions but talking back to the white man. They didn’t like both. Between the middle of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, when the colonial master forged a new country by amalgamating disparate and ancient nations into one country. That the colonial master imprinted his influence in shaping the destiny of the new nation, is not questionable. They shaped the new country accordingly to their needs and their whims. Since then, internal conflicts have successfully hindered any meaningful growth till date.
7 One of theirs, Olaudah Equanoh, sold into slavery in the mid 18th century told the white folks, that the land in Africa where he’s from, had no lords and masters and no serfs and commoners. That all men are born equal under God. The inability or refusal of his enslavers to believe him, informs the miseries and sorrow my people have been subjected to by both caucasian colonisers and aspiring internal colonisers. The story of our people, our world.
Earlier errors in nation building, costly mistakes by founding fathers and greed, paranoia, myopia and fear of egalitarianism by contemporary leaders, all cooked a cesspool of suspicion and poor national cohesion that defined the pitiable political condition of the land.
8 Colonial-assisted and induced injustices and manipulations, set the stage very early in the life of the country they clobbered together for the political and economic interest of their faraway empire. False census figures, rigged elections and preference of one region over another, instituted the dichotomy, impunity and nepotism, that has effectively retarded the growth and greatness of the land, and also gave birth to corruption, misgovernance, mediocrity and of course, restiveness and agitations of all kinds.
9 This region and her people are now woke, not because they consensually agreed to seek justice and equity. No. They are woke because an ensuing conflict between the leaders or elders, if you will, and the aggrieved younger generation of the region, steadily grew out of control due to mishandling by those who should have addressed the crisis with knowledge and wisdom, and created a huge generational division between the old and the young, with the agitators acquiring the upper hand, by commanding the loyalty of the masses of the region. Leaving elders and the leaders no other choice, than to accept the reality, seek for a truce, with a promise to embark on negotiations that would have been since concluded and done with years ago.
10 After too many mistakes by all sides, we thank God for the new awakening blowing through the land, especially now that the people who for decades, claimed they didn’t understand the meaning of “RESTRUCTURING”, suddenly seem to have woken up to the truth. Our people, our world.
The people of the East, beaten and battered, misunderstood and dealt very rough hand over the years, should put away recriminations and correct mistakes of the past. They must realise that the agitators who pushed the “sacred” boundaries and jolted everyone, are no villains. You have every right to disagree with their modus operandi, but the grave anomalies in the land, and the vacuous leadership of the region, created the vacuum that enabled their relevance.
That is the reality of our times. Our people, our world.
To be CONTINUED.
