A Personal Appeal to President Muhammadu Buhari
Dear President Muhammadu Buhari,
Permit me at the onset to say that I do not envy you. When I say I do not envy you, it is because I have closed my eyes and put myself in your shoes. I am convinced that if the tattered state of Nigeria as a nation was known to you before hand, the enormity of the burden you sought to carry would have made you stay away from seeking to govern a nation battered and wrecked beyond human imagination.
As things stand, you cannot wish away being responsible for a nation of over 170 million people. Within this multitude are many ignorant as to what the basic requirements of citizenship and governance are, those working assiduously for you to fail, as well as others yearning for a change but desiring it in the twinkle of an eye oblivious of the many years of rot that first needs to be dealt with.
At this juncture, may I as a loyal citizen of Nigeria and a strong advocate for your candidacy as President in 2015, remind you of a Yoruba saying: “Kini kan ba Ajao je, apa e, o gun ju itan lo“. Sir, you must always remind yourself of one peculiar malady which has afflicted us over the years and will probably continue to affect us in years to come.
Apart from lacking patience which is supposed to be a virtue, we Nigerians suffer from a very short memory. We are struck with what Prof Wole Soyinka famously referred to as collective amnesia. Nigerians’ memory of being blighted left, right and centre by looters who by now should be subjects of firing squads, is fast fading away.
They say there was Baba ‘CAN my foot’, followed by Baba ‘Go Slow’ and Baba ‘ATM’. They now call you Baba ‘Stand Still’.
In 2018, given their perceptions of your actions and inactions, they now have a preference for the latter in spite of their acknowledgement of his status as ‘Oninakuna’.
Regardless of what your media gurus may say, the drought and insecurity in the land are not seen as the cumulative effect of many years of wretched governance by those at the helm of our national affairs.
With an increase in poverty, armed robberies, kidnapping, rampaging and murderous herdsmen, as well as perpetual darkness, what they are seeing is the change you promised them on 30 May 2015 slipping out of sight. The hardships of unpaid salaries, unpaid pensions, expensive and sometimes scarce petroleum products, non-abating extortion by banks, telephone and other service providers, as well as sky-rocketing prices of staple food items are now associated with your government.
Your Excellency, I am pleading with you, in the remaining one and a half years of this tenure, it is not late to pull some hat-tricks out of the bag.
Do something fast, before your administration is formally endowed with the acronym of NYSC – Now Your Suffering Continues, and Nigerians change your appellation from ‘Baba Stand Still’ to ‘Baba Ajekun Iya La Nje’.