Right off the bat, we must all approach the proverbial priest and confess that being a youth in the 20th century is so starkly different from being one in the 21st century.
These two nature-inducing
circumstances are absolute opposite poles. They however barely converge unlike
the basic laws of physics which dictates an attraction.
The very idea that the
same rules can and should apply to both is a flagrant disregard for present
realities. This idea (the refusal to accept that tactics have to change) appeared
to be the chief instigator of the #ENDSARS
protests that rocked the country to its very core late last year.
It’d be an attempt to win
a gold medal at the “Stating the obvious” Olympics to conclude that those protests
did not entirely break out because of the rogue tactical police unit-turned-killer
squad. It is obvious even to one with a single digit IQ that it was an all-out
rebellion against a system that they (youths) correctly accuse for having its
old and rough hands tightly wound around their windpipes.
Credit where it is due;
the utter and meticulous destruction of this nation must be imputed into the
account of the generation that had it so good, their biggest problem was “not
money but how to spend it”
The generation who
despite being at the very center of the oil boom in the 70s, instead of
building the nation, resorted under no pressure whatsoever to dig up its grave.
The same grave their
children are now desperately trying to climb out of to at least get some air.
At the very top of the
food chain, the President has not successfully attempted to appeal to this
hurting demographic group with his body language.
The most notorious
example was the statement he made (largely unforced and unprovoked) to the
Commonwealth Business Forum in April 2018. In what was a disaster of some of
the most seismic proportions for a statement, the President appeared to suggest
that his ‘kids’ (as he is technically the ‘Father of the Nation’) were used to
sitting and waiting for things to come to them.
It was a particularly
exceptional job at de-marketing on the international scene, the country’s
most-prized assets- its young people.
His spin-doctors worked
relentlessly to do damage control but his body language kept driving home the
very point they tried hard to disprove.
It therefore is no shock
that the Nigerian youths via social media platforms have almost completely
defined the ‘Nigerian Dream’ as a furious drive to leave the country and
prosper in foreign and less youth-hostile lands.
The last decade has
witnessed a massive exodus of young Nigerians from all works of life and it’s
only about to get worse. Disillusioned about the country and harbouring deep
resentment towards it, patriotism has become a rare bird in the 21st
century woods.
The National Youth
Service Corps is largely becoming a white elephant situation. No one is exactly
sure what to do with it anymore. It’s a scheme that has outlived its relevance.
A painstaking effort to blood-transfuse a cadaver.
It was designed to set
the hearts of the young on patriotic fire but has in recent times lacked the
barest minimum oxygen supply required for such combustion effort.
It’s a scheme desperately
crying for a pragmatic overhaul especially to meet up with the current biting
realities of unemployment and poverty amongst the youths.
Strange policies like the
CBN’s ‘shock and awe’ nuclear position against cryptocurrencies (despite their
best intentions) represent another piece
of evidence that there’s no real understanding (or maybe there is) of the
dynamics of the 21st century youth and the need for national
thinking to move in tandem with such realities.
Even the country’s Vice
President has sounded a cautionary note to the nation’s apex bank on its
enthusiastic attempt to make this unforced error whose effects may last long
and further drive a wedge between two generations.
Nigeria must wake up and
smell the coffee. The gulf between its present leaders and its future leaders
is a threat to its continued functional existence. A generation growing up
practically despising the nation is shotgun pointed by a shooter at his own face.
Suicidal.
A generation who watched
some of their representatives get shot at during a peaceful protest by the
nation’s armed forces must be understood to harbour in their hearts, a mountain
of unforgiveness towards their fatherland.
Make no mistake, this
nation has not been fair to her young people and it therefore must not come as
a surprise that there’s no passion to serve her.
A generation whose very
rich legacy is garnished by coups and counter-coups, a silly Civil War, a
nation bitterly divided along ethnic and religious lines and the complete
shredding of the moral fabric of a nation must understand that they owe their
‘kids’ the mother of apologies.
In the harsh and biting
frost, instead of offering her young people blankets, the nation has resorted
to stripping them of the fine linen they have on.
Nigeria will in the
coming years be at the mercy of these young people who have been well-wired by
the deeds of the older generation to be deeply unpatriotic. That should shock
the national conscience into soberness and a drive for atonement.
The chasm must be
bridged. It’s not optional.
The nation must offer a
hand of fellowship in governance and policy towards the young people and quite
frankly, the young people must look beyond the frantically unintelligent
invention called the “cancel culture” and accept the nation’s offer of penance
(however insufficient it will likely seem).
We as youths must put our
“big boy” pants on and realize that there are in fact grey areas and that the real
world and its systems essentially thrive in such areas. We must quickly master
the art and act of compromise and negotiation as the world barely works in
black or white.
Both sides will have to
be less belligerent towards each other or the nation is in for a very nasty and
prolonged bout of insomnia.
P.S:
At
the risk of infusing gloom in bolus into the veins of the reader, I
like a little change of pace. I raise a glass to toast the recent successes of Damini
Ebunoluwa Ogulu (Burna Boy) and Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun (Wizkid) at
the recently held Gramophone awards.
We truly should celebrate both little and big Nigerian victories. The Grammy wins are godzilla's sized victories by all standards.
The likes of the Late Babatunde Olatunji, Ábami Eda' Fela Kuti and living legends, King Sunday Ade and Femi Kuti previously showed themselves tall with nominations on this stage but our boys have proved to be twice as tall by bringing it home.
Congratulations gentlemen! Congratulations Nigeria!
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