By Isah Aliyu Chiroma
“I have concluded that the best people in the world are those who regard service to their country and their society as the chief purpose of their lives, apart from their private and personal duties and obligations”. -Alan Paton
Almost eight years have come to an end. The atmosphere is now condensed waiting for the rain to shower its blessings upon a beloved country, longing to be replaced by a bright and new cloudless atmosphere. An atmosphere of hope, where the poor will live a peaceful and have valuable life that future generations can benefit from.
We need to understand the debate raging across the political climate, between dark and void, a debate in which we are fully engaged that will shape our future and restore our hope for the country we dream of becoming. A country filled with compassion, and development, which will be developed and secured for a future full of cheer and life.
Distant voices appeared to grow hoarse, recalling a past that left us feeling frantic and exposed, but we were also ashamed. Not because that past was painful, but because it was a moment between life and happiness, which we chose to have in our communities. What strikes us most was looking back at the mirrors of our worries, we’re a family becomes disconnected from the bond of humanity into a world so cruel, walking in shackles.
This has brought uneasiness. Nigerians have seen too much, where passengers are set ablaze in passenger vehicles, where mothers run for their lives and leave their children behind; where farmers are slaughtered on their farms, female children rapped in the presence of her parents, where school children are abducted, where there are attacks on airports, trains and people killed major roads. One hears the pain in the voices of the populace as they began to have thoughts shuffling out of their minds.
When you search our faces, it is filled with hollow eyes that have cried and drained those tears. The trail of those tears erupted from our pain. We no longer know who we are and the country we came from. The tragedy has made us forget the sweetness of peace from the flowers of a conducive atmosphere.
We are trapped in history and history is trapped in us and our history cannot be forgotten. In recent times, our history trapped us, losing our hopes, like a pilot who found himself in a plane crash, living between life and death, only being concluded after landing.
From our history, we then should understand we need a savior, who will steer the wheel of our county, driving against currents and tides of challenges in the race for excellence. This savior can come from the hills, plains, plateau, Savannah, knocks, and creeks. This is not time for sitting at the table and debating about our future, speaking about culture, ethnicity, or even religion.
Now is the time for doing and taking charge of our future and bringing on board someone who can steer the wheel and navigate us towards coordination that can take us to the shores. A shore where we can be accommodated and welcomed, which will serve as a shield to humanity, filled with fragrance and hope of restoring peace that we have lost.
At this point, we need someone who will serve his people and save our beloved country; the fatherland that we inherited with love, and which was filled with nationalist and patriotic citizens. We need to protect ourselves from scrutiny, from a journey without direction. We need an interior journey filled with promise and service to the people.
This is a time for us to shine our eyes in the dungeons of darkness, where those with light in the cave of ambition are enormous. We need to identify the person who has the brightest light that will shine on our path, which will stretch us across oceans and continents of development.
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Chiroma is a writer and freelance journalist based in Abuja.
