A PRESS BRIEFING
ONTHE STATE OF THE NATION BY MAJ. GEN. JOHN GBOR (RTD) AT THE OCCASION OF A
COURTESY VISIT BY AREWA JOURNALIST FORUM AT THE OFFICE OF JOHN GBOR FOUNDATION IN
CONJUNCTION WITH PATRIOTIC ACTION NIGERIA (PAN) IN ABUJA ON 4TH
MARCH 2021.
Executive
Members of Arewa Journalist Forum,
Ladies
and Gentlemen of the Press.
It
is my great pleasure to receive you, members of Arewa Journalist Forum, who are
here to interact with me on the State of our dear nation, Nigeria. As General
Buhari used to say, “We have no country but Nigeria,” to parley on the affairs
of Nigeria in order to proffer solution to our problems, is a noble course. I
welcome all of you to the John Gbor Foundation office.
John Gbor Foundation was
duly registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) with the
registration number CAC/IT/65851 on 3rd December 2013. The
Foundation is for Hunger Eradication, Youths Development and Women Empowerment.
Patriotic Action Nigeria (PAN) was registered with Abuja Municipal Area Council
(AMAC) with the reference number 6082. The vision of PAN is a united, secure
and a prosperous Nigeria. It became full knowledge to us that the problems of
hunger, youths development and women empowerment cannot be achieved successfully
in a badly divided nation as our own, the John Gbor Foundation has entered into
partnership with Patriotic Action Nigeria (PAN) in order to encourage PAN for
her effort to bring about the unity of Nigeria. The unity of Nigeria is the key
to our survival and success for all aspect of our development. Our unity is
central to the eradication of hunger, the development of our youths and the
empowerment of our women.
THE
STATE OF THE NATION
Our dear nation,
Nigeria, is beset with a variety of problems. Our problems are not insurmountable.
There is no nation on earth that does not have problems, but a nation that
desires to survive and succeed to ensure the wellbeing of its citizens must critically
and continuously re-examine itself to determine the root cause of each problem
and deal with it appropriately. The essence of nationhood is to ensure the wellbeing
and peaceful co-existence of the citizens. The followings are some of the
Nigeria’s problems.
Nigeria
is badly Divided: The lack of unity among the various
component parts of the country is the source of all Nigerian problems. After 60
years of independence, Nigerians are more divided than ever before. Coming from
the divide and rule of the colonial heritage, the people who call themselves Nigerians
still lock up themselves in their ethnicities and colonially inherited
geo-political divides of North and South and the sub-regional divides of East,
West and North. Nigerians also yield to the pressure of religious enclaves of
Islam and Christianity. Despite the efforts of our national leaders, from 1960
to date, the ethnic divides and the geo-political dichotomy of North and South
still persist.
Youths
Unemployment: The majority of the teeming population
of our youths remains unemployed. The youths are a critical link between the
present and the future. It is a national error to perceive the youths in their
ethnicities as Igbo youths, Kanuri youths, Hausa youths, Tiv youths, Fulani
youths, Yoruba youths, Ibibio youths etc. They are not ethnic youths. They are
Nigerian youths and must be given full attention as a critical segment that
connects Nigeria with future generations to ensure our perpetuity as a nation.
The next 30 years when Nigeria’s population is expected to be over 400, million
people, it is these youths as full grown adults that will be responsible for
their security, the provision of foods and health services, and to conduct our
foreign relations. The most regrettable thing any nation can do is to ignore
its youths.
Poverty:
Many
Nigerians in both urban and rural areas are under the condition of extreme
poverty. Nigeria is richly endowed with inexhaustible natural resources that
can provide sufficient foods and wealth to our citizens. Unfortunately, despite
the abundance of our natural resources, Nigeria is reckoned the “Poverty
Capital of the World.” It takes only Nigerians to rid Nigeria of the conditions
of poverty.
Insecurity:
The
problem of insecurity in the country is increasing by the day. Citizens can
hardly move freely to conduct legitimate businesses from one part of the
country to another. There is insecurity in all parts of the country. People are
attacked on the highways, on their farms, in their homes and even in their places
of worship. We have cases of insurgency and banditry in some parts of the
country. It’s unfortunate how our vulnerable women are being raped unprotected.
Corruption:
Corruption, the act of taking illegally what belongs to the commonwealth of a
nation or of using one’s means and authority to influence people to take wrong
actions that are detrimental to the wellbeing of society. A British politician
once described Nigerians as being fantastically corrupt. A thief who does not
want to be called a thief must, either, stop stealing or should not fight those
who call him thief. The allegations against us as a corrupt nation are
evidenced in the discovery of public funds stolen by public servants and hidden
in dug out pits in grave yards and in and around residential buildings, in
overhead water tanks, and in funds found in foreign and local banks. The monies
stolen from our commonwealth and stacked in foreign banks are used by host
nations to promote the education of their youths and for the wellbeing of their
citizens.
Lack of
Patriotism: Patriotism is an extremely scarce
commodity among Nigerians.
Electoral
Malpractice: Individuals who seek to lead the nation
as President, Governor, Senator, Member of House of Representative or State
House of Assembly, and Local Government Council Chairman, must necessarily
prove to be above board. He or she must be honest for to lead is a noble cause.
To be noble is to be self-sacrificing. A noble person who seeks to lead the
people, but turns around and rigs or steals and buys votes to win an election,
has automatically lost his nobility. An ignoble person, who is proven to be
dishonorable and unpatriotic, cannot be trusted with the responsibility of
leadership at all levels of the national society. The Nigerian people have the
responsibility to decide who leads them.
SOLUTION
TO NIGERIA’S PROBLEMS
We
must Know, Understand and Trust Ourselves. In order to
proffer lasting solution to Nigeria’s problems, we must make bold to know and
say who we are. We are citizens of a nation of many ethnic nationalities who
live in absolute ignorance of one another. We neither know nor understand
ourselves as a people, though we co-exist as members of one national society.
Knowledge leads to understanding. Understanding leads to trust. Without trust
and understanding there can be no unity. Unity is the product of trust. In the
absence of the knowledge, understanding and trust of ourselves, we depend on
our personal imagination to relate to others. We must take steps to know and
understand ourselves in order to achieve realistic unity of our dear nation.
The
Unity of Nigeria is the Key to all National Problems:
Several decades after independence, Nigeria is badly divided. This is because we,
the citizens, have not sat down to look critically at the issues of the nation
we inherited from the British colonial government. When the British invited and
offered us independence, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe suggested to the political elite,
the need to set our house in order before becoming an independent State. He was
opposed by the majority of the political elite, the Nigeria’s stakeholders of
the time. Many years after independence we are yet to sit down together to
recreate and make Nigeria a solidly united nation.
After 60 years of
Nigeria’s independence, we are yet to become Nigerians just as Chinese are
Chinese, Americans are Americans and Canadians are Canadians. We are still
Northerners, Southerners, Westerners, and Easterners. We are still Igala, Nupe,
Kanuri, Ibibio, Fulani, Yoruba, Tiv, Igbo etc. The official policy of the
British colonial administration was to bring up Nigerians to pledge their
loyalty to their ethnic group. This encouraged “tribalism.” Nigerians were
denied the privilege of developing national consciousness despite the appeal by
nationalists like Barrister Solanke Oladipo. We must give up ethnicity in favor
of national consciousness and pledge our loyalty to Nigeria.
The
Colonial Government Created Regions to Decentralize Nigerian Nationalism:
The unstoppable Nigerian nationalism which came into force in the 1920s was
truncated by the 1947 Sir Richards Arthur’s Constitution. By creating Western
Region, Northern Region and Eastern Region, Sir Arthur Richards succeeded in
regionalizing Nigerian nationalism. The Nigerian nationalist of the 1940s
viewed the regionalization of Nigerian nationalism as a stratagem of divide and
rule. The British created the three regions to serve as a defence against the
possible seizure of the British imperial power by the nationalists. The
educated elements concentrated around Lagos and constituted a strong
nationalist force. Sir Arthur Richards created the Regions as a deliberate
attempt to break the ridiculously predominant influence of Nigerian
nationalists who converged in the coastal towns of Lagos. Many educated
Nigerians moved to Lagos in search of opportunities for a better life.
Today, Nigerians still
see themselves in the eyes of British contraption of the country. We have
organized ourselves in line with the British contrivance. In the West, we have
Afenifere fighting the Nigerian central government from the West. Ohannaeze
fights Nigeria from the East and Arewa Consultative Forum fights the central
government from the North. These are powerful centrifugal forces that negate
the realistic unity of Nigeria. We must give up regionalism and accept being
just Nigerians.
Conclusion:
I want to reiterate the point that the unity of Nigeria is the key to the
solution of all Nigerian problems. Patriotic Action Nigeria (PAN) is determined
to work with all stake-holders of Nigeria to ensure the guarantee of
inclusiveness and fairness to all Nigerian citizens. Once the citizen is guaranteed
inclusiveness and fairness, the individual can pursue the fulfillment of his or
her dream and aspirations without oppression and suppression. We must, therefore, necessarily give up
regionalism, the North-South divide and religiosity and become just Nigerians.
