#nigeriarising

[nigerianheroes]

"Cheer Agba is a Nigerian soldier, my friend and model. He's been at the war-front, war-middle and war-back. Yet, he is more Nigerian than I am. He made the greatest sacrifice but will thank me for the little efforts I make. He is another man from the bottom that reinforces my belief in a better and greater nation.

Cheer is that brilliant soldier that changed my perception of our military. You can neither beat him in sense nor syntax. Oga Cheer, I don't care where you are from. I never asked you that question. If I find myself in the habit of the Nigerian military, you are the prime factor. If all Christians live the life like you live your military life, the world will know less crime. I am a Nigerian because folks like you give me hope. Forward ever big brother. You are my hero, my hero and my hero. God bless your root and family. 

Every day we end up cursing our leaders and naming our problems after the living and the dead. But, we go to work late, litter the streets with water sachets/cans, make life unbearable for others, take bribes to perform our duties, field incompetent folks into offices, leave the office early, pray half of the work hours, disturb the neighborhood in the guise of prayers and ignore all the oversights of humanity. After all these, we take to the social media to examine the budget of corruption. And you don't know your name? Hypocrite. 

Today, Cheer I know, who are you? Be like Cheer. He is not teaching his brother, cousin or relation. Cheer is teaching Hausa kids and potential enemies. Cheer is living humanity not ethnicity. I have not asked you to belong to nobody. Just see beyond the horizon. Change your family, neighborhood and community. Good nations don't just come to be, good people make good nations....”

Comment on yesterday’s post on NigerianHeroes about Cheer Agba

[nigerianheroes]

"After studying geology as a first degree from the University of Illorin in Kwara State Nigeria I came to Lagos in the year 2008 and started working as a banker with a micro finance company. It took a lot of belief in myself, hard work, tenacity and Gods favor to excel those in the city as a township boy. But with perseverance and hard work I was pushed from an ordinary field officer into SME banking. In one year I got two promotion letters backed and learnt my greatest lesson: No matter where you find yourself, just put up your best and your talent will be discovered." Portrait 1/2

[temmy101]

A Win for Nigeria

The 1st of April 2015 was a historical day for me. For the first time in the post-military history of Nigeria, PDP was no longer in power. Whilst i have limited information on the agenda of the APC and their president-elect, i had the following response to a friend of mine who cautioned wisely that the devil we know may be better than the devil we don't know. Two things, number one when i was in high school in Nigeria, i remember we had to vote for prefects, some of them had been assistant prefects before. One particular notoriously mean girl used the slogan, the devil you know is better than the angel you don't know. The outcome was that everyone voted for her. Long story short, it turned out that the devil we knew could get even worse, especially when they knew they could be in power irrespective of their wickedness (or in President Jonathan's case, complacency and insensitivity to the plight of millions of human beings). That brings me to my second point, the only reason i was so glad that APC and not PDP won, is that it shows that no one candidate or one party should expect to rule forever, each one has an alloted amount of time in which to use their power wisely or be voted out by the people (or rigging by an opposition party). Whatever the case, i think the fact that an incumbent lost to the opposition for the first time in Nigeria's history sends a message to politicians that you can't just do whatever you like and expect to be re-elected, you have to work for the people in order to earn their votes. #Thasall Whilst it remains to be seen what Buhari's government will do, I am cautiously optimistic that it will be better than what the incumbent did. I hope he has the wisdom to find the right technocrats to move Nigeria forward. I hope that the change they promised will be delivered and for the betterment of the majority. Maybe we will be that turning point generation afterall. Maybe, we'd use generators only a few hours in a week? Maybe commercial agriculture will become a major sector in the economy. Maybe Made in Nigeria will be a thing again? Maybe we will see the type of change that a man like Thomas Sankara brought to his nation or maybe i am hoping for too much.