The 5,000 clips, 10,000 bolts -By Festus Adedayo

For those who do not have an idea of how bad the Nigerian situation is, they only need to listen to the piece of news item that trended in the media last week. Managing Director of the Nigerian Railway Corporation, Fidet Okhiria, had announced to the world that 5,000 clips and 10,000 bolts, as well as knots, were stolen along the rail tracks that government was constructing on the Lagos/Ibadan rail line. “You can’t imagine that between Lagos and Ibadan, we have replaced over 5,000 clips and close to 10,000 bolts and nuts on the track and it is not a good thing at all. Without those things on the tracks, accidents can occur. We know the volume of passengers on a train. So vandalism of rail infrastructure has to stop,” he had said.

That alarm by Okhiria is why it should occur to government that the most basic provision that Nigerians need at the moment is the intangible reorientation of the minds of the people. Right now, the minds of many Nigerians are a cesspit, emitting such a frightening putrid that you may not imagine. Not only do Nigerians not believe in Nigeria, many Nigerians believe that Nigeria can go to hell. Thus, when Nigerians hurt Nigeria, they do not see themselves as hurting a recognizable entity but an alien.

I was with some school youths recently at a function where the singing of the national anthem was called. I saw that many of them still kept on chatting so I looked at them with a scold on my face, as I mouthed the anthem. Their response was a look of “what the hell, old man!” I instantly remembered that this was a people who were not brought up with any indoctrination of patriotism or any belief in Nigeria. Such a community doesn’t have any scruples about hurting Nigeria.

This and many more should make government know that nobody sees those edifices or structures as theirs. They belong to Nigeria, a very vague and non-existing construct. We can get the upcoming youths’ minds to do a U-turn by indoctrinating or orientating them about Nigeria, her rich history and how, no matter how difficult things are, hope lies at the end of the tunnel.