Finally, our country has arrived at that stage of national maturity where everybody accepts suffering as a public policy and inconvenience as a personal drill. Our country once promised prosperity, dignity, security, and modern development to its citizens. Experience has since changed these aspirations. Citizens now wake up each morning with the practical understanding that survival itself deserves collective applauses. Petrol queues have disappeared because many citizens can no longer afford enough fuel to justify standing in line. Economists may eventually classify this development as an innovative market adjustment introduced by the genius of President Tinubu. Transport fares rise with such determination that taxi drivers now announce prices with the solemnity of judges delivering prison sentences. Passengers protest briefly before entering vehicles because outrage remains cheaper than trekking.
Electricity supply has also embraced philosophical consistency by appearing occasionally and departing without goodbye. Entire neighbourhoods celebrate the arrival of light with the excitement previous generations reserved for weddings or childbirth. “UP NEPA!” The Isokos are not screaming the familiar refrain. They are on the streets and across social media demanding the dignity and satisfaction of having electricity to make their screams meaningful again. Children rush to charge their phones. Barbers attempt three haircuts before they are restored to the tyranny of blackouts. Small business owners rush to buy fuel for generators with the certainty of men funding private wars against darkness while public officials continue commissioning power projects that survive mainly in speeches and photo-opp. The hospitals deserve national appreciation for teaching citizens the importance of local herbs. When citizens are not searching for herbs in bushes, they are arriving hospitals with drugs, syringes, gloves, and sometimes prayers carefully prepared in advance because the public hospitals in our country have become self-help centres. Elected public officials who cannot trust public hospitals with common headaches still deliver inspirational speeches about national progress with admirable confidence.
Education continues to produce graduates equipped with certificates, unemployment, and motivational quotes. University students spend years studying courses repeatedly interrupted by strikes, and labour disputes. Graduation ceremonies finally arrive with elaborate gowns, expensive photographs, and parents calculating the financial consequences of raising educated job-seekers. Public office holders encourage entrepreneurship from podiums guarded by armed security personnel while millions of our young citizens attempt business ventures in an economy determined to punish them with excessive taxation.
The roads across the country deserve historical recognition for preserving archaeological conditions within modern civilisation. Travelling between cities requires patience and prayers. Potholes enjoy prominence and permanence than public policies. Contractors receive billions to rehabilitate highways that return to ruin shortly after commissioning ceremonies conclude. Citizens driving at night approach every dark stretch of road with the combined fears of armed robbers and kidnappers. Journeys that should last two hours gradually turn to testimonies in churches on Sundays.
Praise the Lord. Alleluia.
Security announcements from government officials often arrive with generous promises. Armed groups continue their activities with stubborn independence from official optimism. Farmers abandon farmlands after repeated attacks while food prices rise, enough to convert ordinary meals into luxury dinners. Schoolchildren in rural communities attend classes under the shadow of abduction. Parents pray quietly each morning before waving goodbye to children whose greatest offence involves pursuing education inside a troubled country. Public corruption has matured into a national bazaar conducted with fanfare. Investigative panels appear regularly, produce lengthy reports, and disappear before meaningful consequences emerge. Politicians accused of financial misconduct frequently return to public office with fresh party memberships and renewed enthusiasm for national service. Citizens discuss stolen billions with utter consternation because the figures have exceeded ordinary human imagination. A man stealing bread receives immediate punishment while another accused of looting public funds arrives court premises accompanied by supporters beating talking drums and dancing.
Religious institutions have also adapted creatively to economic hardship by transforming hope into an expanding enterprise. Prosperity sermons flourish magnificently among congregations struggling to afford food. Pastors promise miracles to worshippers whose immediate miracle would involve stable electricity and affordable medicine. Politicians occupy front pews during thanksgiving services after supervising years of public sufferings. Congregations clap respectfully because criticisms have become spiritually dangerous in a country where many people depend on divine intervention to survive the heartlessness of rulers. Our political class deserves admiration for maintaining extraordinary unity whenever personal benefits require protection. Lawmakers who cannot agree on urgent national questions suddenly discover remarkable cooperation regarding allowances, convoys, constituency projects, and official privileges. Citizens enduring inflation listen carefully as elected representatives debate the necessity of luxury vehicles purchased with public funds.
Democracy increasingly resembles an expensive banquet attended by a small circle of privileged guests while millions observe proceedings through television broadcasts powered by borrowed “I-better-pass-my-neighbour” generators.
Public communication itself has undergone useful transformation. Suffering now travels under respectable labels such as reforms, transitions, policy outcomes, and temporary difficulties. Hunger receives intellectual treatment from commentators who discuss economic pain with statistical elegance while ordinary families reduce meal portions quietly inside their homes. Market women no longer ask customers whether prices are expensive because everybody already understands the answer. Conversations in public transport now resemble WhatsApp group meetings conducted without an agenda.
The police maintain its traditional relationship with citizens through checkpoints that combine suspicion and negotiation. Young citizens driving decent vehicles often prepare explanations before officers request documents. Bribes circulate through everyday encounters with a certain familiarity that refusal sometimes produces deadly consequences.
Meanwhile, public celebrations continue faithfully. Political rallies attract songs, dancing, banners, and speeches promising transformation shortly before another cycle of disappointment begins. Independence Day celebrations return annually with colourful decorations and solemn declarations about national greatness. Citizens listen politely because patriotism remains compulsory even when daily experience encourages private doubt. Social media has become the national psychiatric ward where citizens gather to share jokes about collective hardships. Humour now serves as relief from failed governance. Citizens laugh at high fuel prices, electricity failures, bad roads, and political absurdities because sustained anger requires energy already consumed by the struggles for survival.
Finally, our country has perfected the dangerous art of adaptation. Citizens adjust to conditions that should provoke outrage because continuous hardship eventually reshapes public expectations. People celebrate ordinary competence from public officials as though efficiency were an unexpected miracle. Parents praise schools for remaining open. Travellers celebrate reaching destinations alive. Communities applaud politicians for completing projects financed by public money. Our country’s decline survives with the culture of reduced expectations.
History offers many examples of countries that mistook endurance for stability. While our country edges toward that condition with disturbing confidence, the rulers continue to display poor rulership through sloganeering and carefully rehearsed concern, ordinary citizens carry their country daily through labour, prayer, improvisation, and stubborn resilience. Their sacrifices deserve more than the speeches delivered from air conditioned podiums by rulers who escorted by lead and chase cars through sufferings they rarely experience personally. Our country has become a place where citizens survive despite governance rather than because of it.
Finally, they said I had ported to the All Progressives Congress, APC. To borrow from the late iconoclastic American author, Edward Abbey’s The Journey Home, political parties, like the sun and the air, belong to everyone, and I belong to no party.