Last Friday, the United States of America recorded her 22nd school shooting this year alone. Considering the year is just five months old, no one would tag you a prophet of doom if you wallow in anticipatory sadness for the world’s number one enviable nation. At Santa Fe High School, Texas, that fateful May 18 morning, Dimitrios Pagourtzis, 17, literally reconstructed his country’s all-too-familiar scene when he killed ten students and teachers, using his father’s legally-owned shotgun and .38 revolver. As some of these things go, the teenage murderer was however sane enough to spare those he liked so they could tell his story.
The foregoing is neither a movie review nor some hypothesis. Apart from the fact that Pagourtzis who turned himself in after his failed suicide told investigators that much, Sadie Baze corroborated to CNN that her daughter, Shana Fisher, 16, one of the victims, had only recently in class publicly asked him to stop pestering her life; that she would never date him. Baze who said the guy previously dated Fisher’s best friend, added that she had taught her daughter never to date her friends’ exs. The only other part of this nonsensical puzzle that may interest you is his confession that he acted alone!
So, what has this American foolery to do with Nigeria? Let’s answer that together by flipping the political or, to be specific, electoral pages of our country. Every election year, Nigerians -all 180 million of us- act like people under a curse: we think money, chickenfeed; we side with blood or friends; we sacrifice excellence, preferring to vote in mediocrities. This has been going on forever.
It is going on even now, with our country wobbling and fumbling towards the next electoral bend. Less than nine months to the next general elections, how are we the masses responding to the crass ineptitude, horrifying selfishness and alarming thievery by our leaders? If you don’t know, I can tell you. Rather than slap our leaders into rude awakening, we salute them with untold apathy, shameless ignorance and what I call crumbs-greed.
The result is that we find our country where she should not be, more than a century after. Yet, immediately after every election we will start praying and expecting manna to fall from heaven, a place our so-called leaders know nothing about, are not working towards and can never make. Compare also our inhuman nonchalance, as leaders and as followers, to the systematic massacre in Benue, Plateau and Taraba by herdsmen. How more defining can our nationwide deafening silence be?
To pair up the unpairables and drive home this USA-Nigeria matter, one only needs to rely on their tragic circumstantial similarity. See how a First World nation would allow her population to be depleted or decimated every other month by gun killings and yet do nothing because of lousy politics. Isn’t that how our Third World fatherland idles away while her people perish because of avoidable leadership, poverty and corruption? I don’t even know which is better in the circumstance: USA or Nigeria?
But, redemption is easy and available if both nations are ready and willing to do the needful. Whether in USA or in Nigeria, the students, media, civil society and indeed the masses must stand up and say enough is enough. Politicians can’t withstand sustained pressure or protest let alone threats to their seats (for example voting them out during the midterm elections or in 2019). God bless Nigeria!
How I love to laugh at mockery!
Like play, like play -as we say in Nigeria- Rachel Meghan Markle whom those who play God derided as biracial, divorcee and too old for the young Prince stylishly took her pride of place in destiny last Saturday. Her story feeds my Christian faith, compels confidence and encourages patience 24/7. Born on August 4, 1981 in Los Angeles, California to Thomas Markle and Doria Ragland, Meghan graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in theatre and international studies in 2003.
She played what Nigerians call ‘waka pass’ roles in a few television series in the US; her best known work being portraying Rachel Zane, the main character of the legal drama series, Suits, from 2011 to 2018. She married Trevor Engelson in 2011 but they divorced peacefully two years thence. If you scream the loudest amen, your off-writers shall soon stay glued to television to watch your global coronation!
Meanwhile, over to Wikipedia: ‘when she announced her engagement to Prince Harry, then fifth in the line of succession to the British throne, Meghan also announced her retirement from acting. The same year, she was included in Time’s ‘’100 Most Influential People in the World’’. The couple were married on May 19, 2018, and became Duke and Duchess of Sussex’!
Arsenal: Between Thierry Henry, Mikel Arteta
Apart from politics and love, the only other game I think that can make an adult to behave like a child is football. No fan reasons intelligibly and without sentiments.
Imagine, I am out here now allotting my space and time and energy to worrying about something that does not and can never affect the price of fish in my personal or national economy. Can there be any greater frivolity?
Alas, I can’t help but voice my position on the matter since Arsenal is in my blood. I understand all that argument about Arteta having understudied Pep Guardiola but our post-Wenger coach must be someone who loves our club and is known to.
In the Emirates Book of Records, Henry is that man. However, should Arteta win, Henry should be humble enough to bid his time by accepting any other offer made to him!