For a peaceful and prosperous future to emerge, right thinking Nigerians have work to do. Those endowed with vision in Nigerian must resist the temptation to apathy and despondency. We must rise up and be counted on the side of reason, truth and justice. We must refrain from joining the bandwagon in a life of greed and graft.
I congratulate the four Rotary International Districts in Nigeria on the hosting of the ongoing All Nigeria Rotary Conference 2021. I commend members of Rotary District 9125 who I believe are hosting this year’s Conference. I pray that the interactions at this Conference and the outcome will be a significant contribution to the realisation of the united, peaceful and prosperous Nigeria of our dream.
My brief intervention today is titled: Re-Parenting the Nigerian Youth of Today, That Tomorrow May Not Be Lost. I would begin with a poem I composed over 20 years ago that very sadly still captures our embarrassing national situation today.
SCANDAL
Daddy has eaten/ the sour grapes
And today/ My brothers and sisters
Are gnashing their teeth.
Mummy has tasted/ the forbidden fruit
And now/ the kids are out
Naked in the cold.
They have desecrated/ the Tree of Love
And violated/ the Sanctuary of Justice
And so the children flee/from Wisdom’s Child
And fall/ into the callous embrace
Of the angel of death.
Tomorrow has become/ a stone wall
That my brothers and sisters
Stare at/ with angry desperation.
Cursed be that blind day/ when daddy resolved
To steal food/ off the hands
Of his own children
Alas for that dark hour/ when mummy chose
To mortgage tomorrow
For the fleeting pleasures/ of today.
–From George Ehusani, Petals of Truth, 1998, pg 105
Many will agree with me that the Nigerian nation is sadly comatose and on the verge of disintegration today, largely on account of the successive generations of thoughtlessly corrupt, senselessly nepotistic, recklessly lawless and astonishingly incompetent elite class that we have been plagued with since independence, and particularly since the first coup of 1966. Though there are a few positive indications here and there, the conduct of the younger generation today does not particularly inspire hope in the immediate future. See where we have put ourselves today: For while the rest of the world is competing in digital technology, and flying high at jet speed in business and economics, and while some others are exploring the outer space and working hard towards colonizing other planets, the citizens of own country are standing still, weighed down by the vestiges of a profligate past and a confused or clueless present that is superintended by a regime of arrogance that is largely born of culpable ignorance. After 61 years of independence, Nigerians are filled with regret and nostalgia about broken promises, dashed hopes, and shallow dreams of a land of unity, peace and prosperity. For many of us here, the story of Nigeria is that of a Paradise Lost.
It is said that a society grows great when elders plant trees under whose shade they know they will never sit. The embarrassing truth we must acknowledge today however is that many of us who qualify to be called elders; many of us who constitute Nigeria’s political, economic, social, and religious elite, have over the years been largely blind guides, greedy opportunists, wicked fathers and callous mothers, who have shamelessly and unrepentantly stolen food off the hands of their own children. Our successive military rulers and political overlords have often turned out to be reckless plunderers and mindless looters of the commonwealth. They have often exploited the poverty and ignorance of the majority of our people, and cashed in on the existing ethno-religious antipathies and polarities for blind and selfish political and economic ambition.
The perpetuation of the culture of impunity, the lifestyle of crass materialism, attended by greed and graft, the resort to instant gratification, the heightened indiscipline, the widespread celebration of sensual perversion, and the normalisation of sexual aberrations that used to be considered abominable by previous generations, among many in the up-coming generation of the Nigerian elite class whom we call leaders of tomorrow – these are not good indications of any major transformation to be expected in our society in the next few years. No society in which these aberrations thrive can expect a wholesome future, and individuals who operate along these destructive lines cannot possibly find lasting happiness, wholesome development and peace.
Over the last sixty-one years, as we the leaders, the parents, the teachers and the preachers, became more enterprising in greed and political mischief, and as we failed to inspire the young people in the pursuit of higher values, we lost control of the younger generation. Many of our graduates from secondary schools, universities, and polytechnics, became social deviants, internet fraudsters, sexual perverts, drug addicts, vicious kidnappers, criminal bandits, and terrorist insurgents, constituting an embarrassment in our homes, a nightmare in our schools, and a nuisance in our offices. With juvenile bravado, many of these young people have been visiting their vengeance on an adult society that has failed to give them a sense of direction. They have gone about cheating and stealing, robbing and raping, and killing and maiming, and they have often committed these crimes with the sophistication of the Italian mafioso.
Thus, I reason that the collective psyche of our young people has been so seriously wounded, and their delicate consciences so brutally battered by the atrocities of the adult society that we now stand the chance of losing tomorrow altogether. Our fear is heightened by the number of delinquent juveniles who are daily paraded on TV by Nigerian security agencies as suspected assassins, armed robbers, kidnappers, bandits, and insurgents. It is amazing how many Nigerians often discuss and lament the rising crime rate among our youths in the country without taking into cognizance the acrimonious socio-economic and political circumstances that gave birth to the phenomenon we are now having to contend with.
We have engaged in a life of debauchery. Like the prodigal son in the parable of Jesus, we have left our palace of pride to dwell in pit of shame. We have often thrown decency and integrity to the dogs and flushed justice and truth into the septic tank. We have often violated love and trampled on the poor and the weak. We have enthroned bribery and corruption, and elevated the menace to such a high state craft, that government business can almost not happen without corruption. We have badly neglected our educational institutions and made our teachers an object of ridicule in the eyes of society.
Our schools and colleges in turn have lost their sacred character as formation centres, and they have rather become breeding grounds for thieves, thugs, touts, secret cultists, gangsters, rapists and prostitutes. We hear these days of school children beating up their teachers, sacking their principals, and burning up their libraries. Examination malpractice in some of our schools has now assumed the frightening dimension whereby teachers and principals organize cheating at external examinations, and parents annually contribute money to “settle” supervisors and invigilators. How bad can things get in Nigeria?
My own reflection is that we are about to lose many more millions of our young people whose teeth are on edge as it were, because their fathers have eaten sour grapes. We are about to lose millions of young people who are constipated because their mothers have eaten the forbidden fruit. Our young people, like their peers elsewhere are blessed with numerous talents and they are full of energy and ingenuity, but they lack the necessary pride in their fatherland. Yes, our youths are highly resourceful and creative, but they are often devoid of any sense of purpose, meaning and direction. Our children have not been adequately parented. They have not been adequately taught, nor have they seen practical examples of truth and justice, love and compassion, sacrifice and patriotism, enough to motivate them.
When our young people see the hypocrisy of the adult society, they convince themselves that there is no truth or justice in the world. They make up their minds that there is no such thing as love and compassion. They conclude that the world is one big jungle, largely inspired by the principle of mutual exploitation and often governed by the law of the survival of the fittest and the triumph of the villain. Even more distressing is the fact that our young people seem to have lost hope. And this is the greatest danger. I reason that it is the absence of hope amid hardship that has led many of these young unemployed and unemployable people into some of the most terrible behaviors that we witness today. When we see our young people becoming beastly in hate, ruthless in violence, and reckless in destruction, we do not need prophets and soothsayers to tell us why.
The progressive degeneration of our national landscape in the last sixty-one years is a commentary on the quality of life that many of us in the adult generation have lived. We of the adult generation must now own up before our young people that we have betrayed our fatherland and failed to lay the necessary foundation for a prosperous future. We must own up to the fact that we have often stolen food off the hands of our children. Each one of us is guilty to the extent that we have contributed in some way to the mess of the moment by our corrupt and selfish lifestyle. As parents, teachers, preachers and elders, we have often failed to inspire our young people to live a life of righteousness. As leaders and elders we have often failed to be a beacon of light. Instead, we have often been a source of scandal for our own children and the children of our country. Yes, in the past we have seen and unfortunately we continue to see today too many leaders and elders that are habitual violators of truth and outright liars. Leaders and elders in this country have over and over again sacrificed truth and integrity on the altar of greed and in exchange for the lust for power.
There is serious work to be done by all of us who belong to the adult society in Nigeria, if we are not to kill tomorrow before today’s sun sets. Those who seek to bestow hope on the coming generation must recommit themselves to such values that make for nation building as truth and honesty, and justice and equity. There is work for the adult society to do if we must bestow hope on our young people. The time has come for repentance. For those who are believers in God, the situation may be bad enough but not hopeless. We can experience rejuvenation, if today we begin to retrace our steps, and get back to the basics. We should believe that from the rubble of our shattered motherland, a rich, powerful, peaceful and united country can emerge, if today we identify and get rid of the demons that have be-witched this land since independence.
Those who seek to bestow hope on the coming generation must recommit themselves to a life of truth, justice, and righteousness. Parents must be ready to make sacrifices for the sake of their children. Teachers must recognize that they teach more by their lives than by their lessons. The world has too many teachers and preachers. What our young people need today are living witnesses to love, compassion, truth and justice. We talk too much about truth, honesty and fairness. What young people need instead is to see this truth, honesty and fairness at work in the family setting, in the conduct of school activities, and especially in the examination hall, in the civil service, in the award and execution of contracts, and in such processes of governance as the just and equitable distribution of opportunities as well as application of sanctions. Young people are constantly let down and disappointed when their leaders are fraudulent or when they see teachers assisting unscrupulous students to cheat at examinations. Young people are shocked when they discover that their governors, ministers or parents are liars. Then they wonder whether a life of truth is ever possible on this side of heaven. Their trust is violated when they themselves or their peers are sexually harassed or abused by elders, leaders, preachers and teachers.
For a peaceful and prosperous future to emerge, right thinking Nigerians have work to do. Those endowed with vision in Nigerian must resist the temptation to apathy and despondency. We must rise up and be counted on the side of reason, truth and justice. We must refrain from joining the bandwagon in a life of greed and graft. We must reject the foolish pattern of life which has led our nation and people to the mess of the moment. We must start now to cultivate the virtues of sacrificial love, truth, justice, discipline and patriotism, which alone can bring peace and prosperity. If today we cultivate these virtues, then we would have laid the foundation for a more wholesome future for our country.
We need leaders of conscience with sufficient sense of mission to champion the all-important project of youth formation for national rejuvenation. In an age and in an environment where material power and status are pursued with religious passion, and where wealth is made into an idol; an age and environment where many are plagued by a social pathology that has come to be known today as “acute celebrity syndrome,” by which the cover-page girl, the beauty queen, the movie star, the social media influencer, the sports the pop music legend, and the social deviants who win big money at reality shows – are elevated, adored and worshipped like deities, the task of nurturing the youth for effective, purposeful and selfless leadership in this kind of environment is arduous one.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I am here to say to you today that the challenge of re-engineering society and effecting a paradigm shift in our social orientation and value prioritisation lies squarely on the shoulders of those of us who are sufficiently dissatisfied with the quality of existence of Nigerians today, but who have refused to give up on our corporate existence. Those of us who accept the call to take responsibility for the future must now step forward from the madding crowd and be counted on the side of reason. Members of the Rotary Club in Nigeria as elsewhere often belong to the class of people we refer to as political, economic and religious elite. Rotarians have often been prime beneficiaries as well as victims of the theatre of the absurd that is the Nigerian enterprise of today. We have had Rotarians among the succession of criminal gangs that over the years have senselessly conspired to crush the Nigerian dream, to plunder the Nigerian landscape and to devour the Nigerian people.
Yet, the core values of Rotarians worldwide, which have propelled laudable charitable and humanitarian efforts every include Service, Integrity and Sacrificial Leadership. These core values of Rotary International are some of the urgently needed ingredients that we must find ways of teaching our young population, if there is to be any hope of rejuvenation for our ailing and nearly comatose country. Nigerian Rotarians and others of goodwill must rise up today and be counted at this critical point in our nation’s history. We must take seriously the words of Brutus in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, when he declared: “There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat. And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures.” I call on you Rotarians to think of investing heavily in the formation of our youth population in the kind of values that would make for a life of meaning and purpose.
Our young people in this country must be taught that a better Nigeria is possible, and they must begin today to work towards it. They must be taught to shun crass materialism, senseless consumerism, and blind pleasure, which have become the dominant preoccupation of their generation. Young people must be taught that they will never achieve their full potential in life, if they allow the unruly passions of the flesh to overwhelm and enslave them. They must be taught that instead of seeking escape in the plastic wings of sensual pleasure, the stupefaction of hard drugs and alcohol, and the vanity and vainglory daily offered by celebrities on social media, they must invest their youth in the quest for solid, qualitative education, for real power is attained through the acquisition of knowledge. If today we begin seriously to help the Nigerian youth shape their lives along the path of deferred gratification instead of the instant gratification that is now the order of the day, then the future may still be salvaged, then tomorrow may not be lost. If today we are committed to showing our young people how to choose life in place of the prevailing death- wish that is expressed in widespread violence and crime; if we help them choose the culture of discipline, service and sacrifice, in place of the destructive culture of reckless and unmitigated pleasure; then they may have a brighter future ahead of them. Yes, if we help our young people embrace these higher values and principles, they shall one day sing the National Anthem with a sense of respect for our heroes past, a sense of pride in their fatherland, and a sense of belonging to a nation bound in freedom, peace and unity.
It is not enough to identify the problems and keep bemoaning our plight. We cannot continue to sit idly and complain endlessly of the deplorable state of affairs, for it is better to light a candle than to forever curse the darkness. We must begin by getting all the young people under our sphere of influence to commit themselves to the all-important task of national rejuvenation. Let us all get to work and light the candle of hope in our homes, in our offices, and in our schools, by struggling to exemplify the virtues of truth, justice, honesty and discipline wherever we find ourselves. Let us be deliberate and purposeful in modeling for our young people the virtues of sacrificial love, truth, justice, discipline and patriotism, which alone can bring about the desired peace and prosperity. Let us be deliberate in cultivating and propagating a new ethic of life, and pursue such roadmap relentlessly Let us work seriously on devising creatively new intervention strategies towards changing the narrative of our country, for indeed “where there is no vision, the people perish.”
Let me end this reflection by proposing that Nigerian youths along with those of us who are ready to assume responsibility for the future, should learn the following pledges by heart, and recite them daily, until we come about the new Nigeria of our dream:
- I pledge my commitment to the emergence of a new Nigeria, recognising that greed and avarice are a cancer that eats its own host to death; that corruption ultimately kills not only the victims, but also the perpetrators; and that unless we change our course we are bound to end up where we are headed.
- I pledge my commitment to the emergence of a new Nigeria, recognising that lies, manipulation, and political subterfuge have never, and will never nurture a people; that thievery, robbery, and roguery, by whatever name else it is called, when it becomes king in a land, that land rots; and that when hooliganism and banditry get into high places, the superstructure soon comes crashing down.
I pledge my commitment to the emergence of a new Nigeria, recognising that where lawlessness becomes the norm, and illegality becomes the rule, the nation collapses; that righteousness exalts a nation, but that sin is a reproach to a people; and that where there is no vision the people soon perish.
Rev. Fr. Ehusani is a priest, poet, writer, social crusader and Executive Director, Lux Terra Leadership Foundation. He presented this paper at the 2021 All Nigeria Rotary Conference in Abuja recently.
