Believe you or not, Nigeria holds a lot of word - acclaimed, impossible - not - to - respect records; as a country and by virtue of her citizens. Aunty Kaffy's dance, U17 world cup and a few more good ones.
Then there are the others. To put it like a Yoruba man would say "iwa buruku wa yapa" (our terrible acts are numerous).
You'll find with us corruption, that one alone you can write an encyclopedia about (volumes 1 to 987), lately too terrorism has joined and we haven't forgotten our human rights problems, abuse of children and very high (1 in 4) number of children workers. And we can lie eh!.
Nigerians treat lying like its an important part of life, doing it when it is necessary (sometimes it is) and when it is not. We've all heard people lie on the phone while we remain there listening to them describe situations that are not present ("chairman if you see the traffic ehn, even bird no fit fly pass" they say, but you're driving them at full speed).
The most painful lies we hear come from our leaders. They are painful because their words always carry so much promise. Here's a little list.
* NYSC allowance increment
* Promise to quash boko haram in 3 months (as if they're mosquitoes to be swatted away)
* #45 fuel price (the irony of it is the unofficial increment we are facing)
* Change has come (so far the joke of the year)
The list goes on, feel free to remind us of more. The lies (promises) get worse every election year, and the nasty absurdness of it hit further home while watching the Bayelsa state governorship campaign over the weekend. And to an extent, I do not blame the politicians.
In my books, two sets of professionals employ lies in their daily activities; lawyers (no offence meant) and politicians. The problem is, we allow ourselves to be lied to every four years and we listen, believe and identify with their (pipe) dreams (I will transform the state in 6 months!! And its 6 years now). We accept the message of lies without any efforts to ascertain their validity.
One of my favourite movie quotes goes "I believe there are two things a person should hold on to for as long as possible; virginity and skepticism. Surprisingly I've lost the first, so I'm going to hold on to the second for as long as I can" from the first season of Sleepy Hollow.
Fellow Nigerians, it is ok to doubt people, especially politicians. We always allow people who have given us reasons to doubt them in the past the chance to do more damage. When someone says I will do better this time (meaning they didn't do well last time), we just agree, no skepticism whatsoever. And that is where we err.
So much has been said in this light but not much has been done. Let us stop apportioning blame and start using our power - in the right way, and we don't have to wait another four years. Let us lend our voices to the cries of our fellow citizens who have decided to say something regarding these deceits being perpetrated on us.
And finally, let us stop lying to ourselves, change has not come anywhere.
Fuel sells for #110 and above here, today after over an hour on the road, we found a filling station but the queue was so much we couldn't buy before they closed citing they are out of stock , so I'm in darkness till tomorrow (because we aren't expecting electricity today, something else we were also promised would get better which got worse).
Before they stop lying to us, we need to stop letting them.
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