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The Blackman's world, nay
Nigeria, is one singular place on the surface of the earth
that its everyday people must rise not knowing what the day
would bring, survive through the hard realities and
circumstances of the day, and go to sleep maybe fulfilled or
maybe not, by the sheer grace of God; everyday. We must
grope our way through life's dark side without basis for
forecast, but by the special grace of God.
By now it should not be any wonder why “church business”,
and marabout “consultancy services” that have melted down to
spiritual assignments must always thrive in our environment,
because the portion of responsibility that is supposed to be
man's has completely been shifted to the Almighty. That is
why in our country, the people must fast and pray for
virtually all matter of the state, no matter how scientific,
trivial and mundane they may be. The state no longer bears
responsibility. Everything is now apportioned to God; and
all I see in this is a grand conspiracy, so that when thing
are not going right in the polity someone must take the
blame: God, for not answering our prayers. Imagine that?
Smart bums!
There is a clever kid in my neighbourhood. His parents and
others call him Udo-Mma, but I fondly call him Edima Ufan,
meaning “Dear Friend” and he calls me so too. He races like
craze to me each time I return home and gives me all the
“gists” while I was away, including whether there was light
or not. And next, Edima Ufan would settle for mock prayer
for light to come and for life's comfort like home
appliances to begin to function, and for life to be worth
living by chanting his usual mantra of “Oh God may NEPA
bring light”, and I would always chorus “amen”. Living has
become as funny and inane as that in here.
Here, man has no duty anymore. God must do every magic for
us! When we want to conduct an election we must pray and
fast, and those that are saddled with the responsibility of
managing and overseeing it will always preach to the people
to swallow whatever is the outcome as the perfect act and
will of God; even when it is obvious that they advertently
faltered in their management and overseeing duties.
When there was persistent fuel scarcity the nation had to go
down on her knees and fast too. For food, water,
electricity, etc. pray and fast we must; and the whole
affair is fast becoming a mockery, in that some of us fear
that while some hapless us fast the last breath out of us
and turn ourselves into prayers warriors, the mighty con
ones in our midst find pleasure in continuing in their
spoiling spree.
Now before you get me wrong and take yours truly for some
atheist, let me quickly posit here that my belief in God
Almighty and the efficacy of prayers is nothing but
sacrosanct in my Christian life.
After having taken that into account, we will remind
ourselves that it is contained in the Holy Writ that it is
God that puts in place ALL human governments. And if this is
so, then it goes without saying that God in His infinite
wisdom has reason for instituting human leadership and
authorities, chief among them which is service delivery, or
better still catering for the numerous needs of the people.
Granted that man has to seek God's face in his various
efforts and decision making for His divine guidance, but it
becomes foolhardy and amounts to calling the name of God in
vain if by mere reason of self-aggrandizement and all the
stuff that go with the basest of human traits we fail to
physically put the basic infrastructure in place and expect
things to work all by God's miracle. It is nothing but gross
self-deception.
For example, if a nation fails to put in place or properly
service its basic electricity infrastructure such as the
turbines, distribution and transmission power stations, the
right cables for high and low tension, right and workable
step-down transformers, honest, committed and conscientious
manpower, then no amount of prayer and fasting can save such
a nation from perennial power failure. This in effect goes
to mean that there is an extent to which prayer and fasting
can have meaning in human life.
The fact that core communist states around the world find
membership among the present G20 due to sound and strong
economic base while the Godly and prayerful but wasteful
democracies still wallow among the poorest of nations is a
clear demonstration that it takes concrete performance of
government of any sovereignty to wholly determine how well
or how poorly the nation fairs economically, and nothing
more, nothing less. All it demands is political will.
The Communist China and Cuba have what it takes, so does the
pragmatic America, the highly techno-scientific Japan, the
conservative and orthodox Britain and Germany, the
neo-socialist France, the Jewish state of Israel, these all
know the demands that translate to positioning oneself as
world's strong economy.
Let our leaders therefore do the right thing if they will
and save our shallow breath from expiring and our spent
energy from terminating through impractical marathons of
prayers and fasting in matters that should normally be
addressed by means of genuine service delivery which they
owe the people. That is why they are there.  |
