Once again, we are witnesses to the tragic abdication of responsibility by the Nigerian intelligentsia. Or how could one explain the current vilification of our rulers whose only offence is reverting to the old national anthem.
For the first time since the birth of the 2nd Republic, our rulers had the presence of mind and rare nerve to acknowledge that the now discarded ARISE O’ COMPATRIOTS anthem was both deodorized falsehood and elevated mockery. Or even something more odious!
Elsewhere, the intelligentsia would have promptly stepped in to offer the right interpretation, control the narrative and provide direction but here, pedestrians have since weighed in as a formidable mob to trivialize an unprecedented anthem reversion that presents prospects of eventual resolution of the
lingering National Question.
The recently discarded anthem was a costly assumption that the defeat of Biafra 8 years earlier meant the birth of a NATION; hence the call for Compatriots to “arise” and “obey”. Even a simpleton’s reading of the two stanzas would reveal an unintelligent attempt to feign ignorance of our fault lines and preference of the assumption that Nigeria had truly become a nation.
On the contrary, the NIGERIA WE HAIL THEE anthem proudly admits that we are diverse and distinctive nations willing to forge an alliance that would birth a stronger nation by means of evolution.
So for 45 years, Nigeria elected, true to type, to live a lie. For 45 years, we chased shadows and sought to build castles in the sky. For 45 years, we shamelessly played the ostrich. For 45 years, we wore the wrong badge, a fraudulent identity and for 45 years, we deferred the the commencement of the tortuous journey to nationhood by claiming that we were a nation already – and I have never seen a nation built on the ashes of falsehood!
Rather than tasking our rulers to become leaders and quickly proceed to build on this historic anthem reversion with a view to decapitating the centrifugal forces in the land and artfully wielding the different peoples and cultures into a nation properly so-called, the said mob had since distorted the essence and manipulated public opinion to ridicule an otherwise commendable bold step.
This is what obtains in a society where intellectuals and thinkers take regular turns to go on sabbaticals. And I’m afraid, the tyranny of the mob might rob us of this great opportunity to give the ship of state a soul and redeem the future.
However, it’s also thumbs down to both the parliament and the executive for failing in elementary civic engagement. Ordinarily, such a remarkable initiative should have called for proactive steps to amass public buy-in and drown possible opposition whispers of objection.
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