By Francis Ewherido
I coined this title after the EndBadGovernance protests which started on August 1, 2024. I have no problem with any protest, strike or activity towards a better Nigeria as long as we avoid unnecessary shedding of blood. Too many Nigerians have died in cold blood and it’s not good.
I have been following governments since 1980 when Alhaji Shehu Shagari was president. Were Nigeria properly governed over time, we would have been at par with India, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, etc., by now. We were at par, slightly above or below them as at 1980 when I started following governments in Nigeria and international affairs and.
Spurred by the EndBadGovernance Protest, something was on my mind: EndBadParenting campaign. But I archived the heading after writing it down because I didn’t want the article to be seen as diversionary then. I am no apologist of government neither am I perpetual critic of government. Like human beings, I believe no government is totally good or bad. So when I see what I like, I say it. If I see a need to criticise or proffer a solution, I do. My ultimate interest is a better Nigeria.
All the above are just preambles. The topic for discussion today is the assault on the family unit in Nigeria. They say if you want to destroy a society, destroy the family unit. I am worried about what I am seeing. I was discussing with someone close to me over the weekend. They wanted to get some young men to hire somewhere in the South West. They couldn’t get any. It’s case of water everywhere, yet none to drink. He said the young men wanted quick money. They were not interested in going through the grind.
He mentioned a particular 16-year-old teenager who wanted quick wealth. He wanted to do money ritual. He was reminded of the implication of accepting “gifts” from the devil. He said he did not care if he lived for only a year thereafter, provided he lived large for that one year. When we talk about among youths he South West, some of us think of Lagos and probably Ibadan only. But he was talking about another part of Yoruba land. I didn’t realise the problem was also widespread in the West until he started talking. The challenge of internet fraud, prostitution, kidnapping and ritual activities among youths are already major problems in my state, Delta State. Edo State is no different. In fact, their problem of prostitution dates back to the 80s and 90s when parents sold family land and houses to send their daughters to Italy to do prostitution.
The evil bug is already entrenched in the East. When I was at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, the challenge was that the young men did not want to go to school. They wanted to become apprentices, learn the ropes of business, get their freedom and start making money. Apprenticeship in Igboland as a veritable means of entrepreneurship and wealth creation is acknowledged and celebrated universally. This is what some of the youths of today have turned their backs on. They are impatient to get the knowledge to acquire, sustain and protect wealth. They want the money here and now. The result is drug trafficking, internet fraud, rituals, kidnapping and other negative tendencies.
Though belated, the governor of Anambra State, Professor Chukwuma Soludo, has decided to confront the problem head on by going to the root (not necessarily the root, but the root of the upsurge). These heinous activities allegedly are fuelled by fake pastors and native doctors. The fake pastors pray for them and the native doctors do charms for them before they go on operations or carry out their nefarious activities. They tell them that scanning machines and sniffer drugs at the airports will not detect the drugs they are carrying because of the pastor’s prayers or charms from the native doctors. Like others who are already in jail in Nigeria and abroad those who get involved in it will end up in jail. The naivety of these young chaps is numbing. I guess it is desperation and lack of exposure. When it comes to scanning machines, you are dealing with pure science where one plus one is two; no maybe. As for the sniffer dogs, they are so well trained that they spot drugs even if it is hidden in the anus or vagina or swallowed, so don’t be deceived.
Today, Nigeria is dealing with many problems of monumental proportion. Bad governance of many decades across the three tiers of government is largely responsible for our problems, but let us focus on the family unit today. Many parents have failed woefully in their parental responsibilities across the nation. Let us look at a typical Nigerian family. From birth to 10 years, a child lives with the parents. Even if they go to school, they come home after school. The first 10 years of a child’s life is the most important and auspicious time to lay a solid foundation on which the child’s character is laid. Subsequently, you built on that foundation. Like a building, if you do a solid foundation, you build a solid house on it. Even if there are defects as the construction goes on, you can correct the defects.
But if the foundation is defective, how can you build an enduring solid structure on it? In many of the families that have produced great children, you see a deliberate effort to bring them up properly. The parents made sacrifices. A woman who earns about N36m per annum took a one-year leave without pay just to spend more time with one of the children she suspected was going astray. Okay look at this. Another woman said she has instructed her children that if their pen is stolen in school, they should steal someone else’s own. They must not come back home to disturb her to replace the pen. There are millions of almajiris roaming the streets in the north. Who is parenting them and giving them the right values? Some time ago, some under-aged children living under the bridge in Lagos said they fled from home due to maltreatment by their fathers or stepmothers.
How do you blame government for that 16-year-old boy from Delta State who killed his own mother and slept with the corpse ritual purposes because he wanted to become rich? How do you blame government for a teenager who is involved in rape? How do you blame some of these teenagers who are internet fraudster? How do you blame government when a father bought a laptop or android phone for his son to do yahoo-yahoo?
In those days, one woman was celebrating because the daughter bought the parents an expensive item of about N500 (that was more than the father’s monthly salary). The people around rejoiced with her, but after she left, some women expressed their amazement at her for celebrating without asking where her 21-year-old daughter got the money from. Today, parents celebrate when their children without visible sources of livelihood buy cars and build houses for them. And everybody is blaming government for all the ills in the society. While blaming government, we should go and put our homes in order.
