A man who has no control over the affairs of his home would definitely be subjected to public ridicule.
In the first place, if the Nigerian government and the presidency knew what it was doing, such demeaning statement from the president of America would definitely not have been made.
When you cannot put your house in order, you’re only setting yourself up for public ridicule.
With the resources embedded within the Nigerian state, the workable man power, skills and potentials that we have in Nigeria, we should be very far from having someone else poke-nose into our activities.
The mere fact that the presidency and the government of Nigeria has been thrown into confusion, quivering and jittering at a warning tweet made by Trump, is a teller that the Nigerian government has failed itself and its citizens. This will not only weaken the citizen’s security confidence reposed in the government but more so, cost us our dignity as a nation.
The government has allowed itself to be treated like an infant who has no control over its actions and knows not its left from its right but to be guided by the compass of the parents-in this case, the American President.
The warning statement made by Trump is a wake up call to not just the Nigerian government but to the general Nigerian populace that we must put our house in order. Nobody, anywhere, should make bold to come and issue a warning threat to stop aiding us if we cannot take care of our affairs.
We must begin to act as a country that is truly independent, not just in papers. We must live up to the true definition of what a democratic state truly is. We must begin to harness our potentials and build ourselves to a point where external relationships with other nations are not parasitic.
The bitter truth we must tell ourselves as a people and as a nation is that we have gotten it wrong somewhere along the line and we must go back to the drawing board to determine where we got it wrong.
We cannot allow ourselves to be cited as example of a nation of public ridicule. We must guard our dignity. We must show the world that we know how to take care of ourselves and our affairs. This, we must consciously do.
A stitch in time, saves nine.
JOSEPH ALIU is a Lagos-based Human Rights and Constitutional Lawyer, Social Crusader and Public affairs analyst.
