Why we must not leave our fate to Jonathan alone

“Let it be said of us that we, too, did not fail. That we, too, worked together to bring America through difficult times. Let us so conduct ourselves that two centuries from now, another Congress and another President, meeting in this Chamber as we are meeting, will speak of us with pride, saying that we met the test and preserved for them in their day the sacred flame of liberty-this last, best hope of man on Earth.” ---- Ronald Reagan

 the I don’t really know about you, but for me I have long decided never to leave my fate in the hands of our politicians alone. Like Chinua Achebe, I have decided not to make myself available for any national award unless the presidency and the other arms of government find an effective lasting solution to the various wahala bedeviling my dear country Nigeria.

I think it is important and paramount that we all join hands together to save our one and only country from these man-made problems that are fast tearing us apart and robbing us of our shine. This is the time for the oppositions and opponents of the various political policies in this country to sheath their swords and contribute to the peaceful coexistence of this resilient nation. We must set aside our political, religious and tribal differences to confront the menace of bombings, kidnappings, robbery, ritualists, economic depression and ethno-religious bigotry now shaking our hitherto solid foundation.

We should not close our minds and senses and leave our fate to the ruling People Democratic Party and its candidates to continue to drive us at their leisure towards our destiny. We must continue to boldly tell them the truth and criticize them constructively for the good of all of us. It is important that we comprehend that this great rich nation does not belong to Mr. President and Co alone but to all of us and at such we must protect our land and rights from both internal and external threats.

We must not succumb easily to some of the political promises of our politicians and always be ready to scrutinize and find out the reality about their promises and policies.  It is our right to know and also part of our freedom to see how and what they do with our collective wealth. This country I tell you does not belong to Mr.Jonathan alone, including the vast reserved of oil and other rich mineral resources abounded everywhere. So, we must be courageous to resist his planned oil subsidy removal if we are certain and sure that it will never favour the majority.

This is actually the ripe  time for our religious, tribal and elder statesmen and women to stand up to defend this nation that sheltered and gave them a ray of life. The land that has in its belly their ancestors and hopefully one day retail them too. I just hope they will understand that this big country from the north, the south, east  and west should not be left to Mr. Jonathan and his cabinet  alone, neither should they sit down look  as our villages, towns and cities are daily held under siege by terrorists, kidnappers, armed robbers, ritualists and ethno-religious fundamentalists.

Perhaps some troubling questions we should ask our conscience are: should we keep silent while our country is constantly under threat which could affect anyone, anywhere? Should we just look at the Jonathan administration from the surface and view it as a mere government by a clique that should be allowed to come and go, while our roads are getting worst and our citizens are daily dying from different diseases and hunger? Should we leave the country alone to the politicians while our refineries are moribund and the price of Kerosene fast flying away from our homes? Or maybe  it is better that we keep silent and watch as some ungodly people  continue to maimed  and killed innocents people in the name of religion and tribe?

Presidents come and presidents go, this country and Aso Rock does not belong to Jonathan alone, so, we must never fold our hands and close our eyes while our cities are burning, our hospitals are dying and the rate of unemployment across the nation is becoming alarming. We must not leave our educational sector to Jonathan’s ministers alone, unless our large concentration of professors and other gurus in the education sector have accepted defeat and have succumbed to be led by mediocrities.

We must patriotically not leave this country to Jonathan alone and continue to shout out loud on the present security situation in the country. We should be wise enough to remind him that we are more interested in his administration tackling this scary situation instead of wasting time and resources on subsidy removal and other not so important projects. It is left for us to comprehend that the Nigerian army, the police, the navy the air force, civil defense and all the other security apparatus of this big country does not belong to our politicians alone and that we are all entitled to the security of our lives and property.

I want to believe Mr. Jonathan as a human being would not claim to know everything and at such know how majority of us downstairs really feel on the issue of insecurity, hunger, ethno-religious violence and all the other wahala that daily confronts the common man down the ladder. So, it is now left for us to keep raising our voices louder against these biting policies that hardly pinch those upstairs, like Mr. President.

 True, it is our duty and not only Mr Jonathan’s responsibility alone to eradicate those oppressed alamajiris on our streets. It is a constitutionally duty upon our raining politicians and leaders, both elected and selected to metamorphose our slums into modern cities and safeguard us from the calamity of man.

This country is bigger and broader than a single individual and it is our responsibility to protect it from invaders unless we are willing to let go the rights of our children and future Nigerians. It should be our collective duty to preserve this rich nation as those before us safeguard it for us.

It is the constitutionally liability of our elected representatives to sit up boldly on their seats and stop playing politics with our hopes, fate and lives. The right of every Nigerian to an efficient health care system, secured roads, modernized schools, economic freedom and security should never be seen and used as political tools. This country belongs to all of us irrespective of where we are standing in the ladder of life.  Change, which is inevitable, has this naturally way of changing the course of this temporary ladder and those upstairs sometimes come crashing downstairs.

 Every particle and atom that makes up Nigeria is part of every Nigerian and not for Mr. Jonathan alone.  So, we must and should never leave it for good luck unaided.