Category: Femi Abbas

Femi Abbas

 

“We cannot always build the future for our youths but we can build our youths for the future”. – Franklin D. Roosevelt (a onetime American President)

 

 Monologue

The above quoted reasoning is   fitting only to to a serene society where institutions are built to nurture their managers and not one in which some dubious elements are fraudulently groomed to fracture institutions to the detriment of serenity in the name of managers.

 

Preamble

The writing of this letter to Nigerian youths of today is warranted, not by the current calamitous situation of insecurity and hunger into which today’s Nigerian youths have fortuitously found themselves but also by the seeming thorny path to the future which is lying dangerously ahead of them and threatening any certainty of their passage to the same future.

This letter is, technically, a response to a Yoruba axiomatic adage that compares the reaction of an elderly person with that of a young person in a situation of downfall. The adage goes thus:

“When a kid slips and falls down, he looks forward to see if someone is around to lift him up. But when an adult slips and falls down, he looks backwards to see the cause of his fall”.

That is an adage that clearly shows the distinction between potentiality and experience.  Youths who symbolize potentiality are supposed to be the heirs to men who personify experience.

And, the only way they can demonstrate their readiness to become their hairs is for them to prepare to convert the invaluable legacy of the elderly citizens into a worthy heritage for themselves.

Until those youths have attained the maturity that is capable of qualifying them for the status of the elderly, they must not aspire to hijack leadership from the elderly in their own interest.

Doing so will amount to jumping the queue of life which is a euphemism for erecting an insuperable huddle on their way to the top.

 

Contents of the Letter

Below are the contents of the letter: 

Dear Nigerian youths,

This historic letter being addressed to you through this medium (The Message) today is not coming to you by accident but by design.

Nigerians of our own age (about 70) never had to be so addressed during their youthful time.

Let it be known to you that besides life, sound health and freedom, no Allah’s bounties for man is as treasure-able as youthfulness.

 

Definition of Youth

The definition of youth varies from place to place and from culture to culture. But generally, youthfulness spans from teenage or puberty through adolescence to the age of reasoning (at about 40).

That is the second stage of human life after teenage or adolescence.

You must have noticed that all Prophets of Allah, except Isa (Jesus) were designated as Messengers and Prophets at the age of 40.

That is a confirmation that the juiciest segment of human life is what people call youth. And whoever is blessed with valuable youthfulness is surely blessed with positive hope and sustainable life.

 

Spur of Ambition

It will be well with you to note that youthfulness is the spur of ambition and propeller of risk taking. It is the period of determination and resolution.

It is the period that sparks off the feeling of attraction between male and female genders and elicits the sense of associations across the   boundaries of societal stratifications.

All efforts in human life that yield results at old age must have been made at youthful age. To an average youth, anywhere in the world, the sky is never the limit.

There are still many firmaments beyond the sky. Youthfulness is the stage at which hard work becomes manifest. It is the stage of planning.

It is the stage of vision and mission. It is the stage of planting today’s seed that will germinate and grow into gargantuan trees which will yield edible fruits tomorrow.

That is why the youths of any nation are seen by foresighted observers as the future bone marrow of such a nation and the beacons of the future.

Incidentally, it is the youths that invariably constitute majority of the existing human beings at any given time in any given nation.

 

Experience

In the years past, when life had meaning and culture had value, youths were seen as the pride of the nation. They were the natural arrows fixed to the parental bows which were often shot by parents through the iron gate of life.

This was the case in Nigeria before and during the colonial era. And, after the country’s independence, the youths constituted the glory and hope of their parents as well as that of the nation.

Their role in the family encouraged the bearing of as many children as possible. In that case, the males among those children partnered with their fathers in tilling the farmlands, in tendering the plants, and in harvesting the crops while the females among them joined their mothers in making their families comfortable to enable those families thrive gloriously in dignity.

In short, the youths of those days were, unconsciously, the live wire of their parents and by extension, that of the nation to which they belonged.

 

Family Wealth

When a father was said to be rich in those days, it was not because of the money or property he possessed but because of the many children (male and female) that he was blessed with to serve as the needed workforce and economic security for the family.

Interestingly, a father’s pride, in those days, was not just the number of children he was privileged to bear but also, the volume and quality of contribution that those children made to enhance his wealth.

Besides, the youths of those days were not just helpers of their parents on the farms or in their trades; they also assisted them in training the younger ones among their siblings.

In short, they were the invaluable assets for those parents as different from today’s situation in which the youths are permanent liabilities to their parents.

Yet, the esteem which the youths of those days accorded their parents in utterances and actions, even in the absence of their parents was nonesuch.

The general tradition in those days was such that boys were handled by their fathers in terms of discipline and sense of responsibility while girls were mostly handled by their mothers in terms of matrimonial training and values of societal decency.

Thus, in the process of bringing up their children decently, no responsible mother ever dared uttering a word while any child was being subjected to discipline by the father.

In a nutshell, the upbringing of a child was the main key to societal serenity as the discipline imbibed by the youths of those days was a foremost heritage from their parents.

 

Genesis of Change

The current trend of rampant societal indecency and criminal tendencies began in January 1966 when some uncultured youths in Nigerian military uniform who had a blind ambition to become leaders without any training, threw the value of experience to the winds and killed the then leaders of the   country in a military coup d’état that was evidently tribal and religious.

By that calamitous act, the youths of that time fortuitously plunged Nigeria, their home land, into a precipitate civil war that turned the country’s hope into an unqualifiable   despair.

It was the aftermath of that precipitate civil war that eroded the highly valued cultural heritage which would have paved the way for Nigeria’s greatness as Africa’s foremost nation.

 

Dangerous Side Effect

For 13 years after the first coup that enabled the vagabonds in military uniforms to  forcefully  hijack power from Nigeria’s legitimate rulers, the use of brutal whim, in place of cultural discipline and inheritable experience, became the order of the day.

And, when a brief civilian interlude came in 1979 for only four years and three months, those vagabonds perched on the governance of the country once again like hungry vultures feeding on the carcass of democratic corpses to their fill.

Through that unbridled usurpation of power, the so-called Nigerian military government only succeeded in weaning themselves from the ladle of integrity as they irredeemably destroyed whatever was to retain their nomenclature as embodiment of discipline in Nigerian history.

 

Outcome

Here we are today, looking desperately like starved hawks swinging restlessly in like a pendulum of no certainty. And, while Nigerian youths are blaming the elders for their multifaceted woes, virtually everybody has forgotten the real cause of the perennial calamity. The cry everywhere now is about the effect of that calamity on the nation and not its cause.

Unfortunately, without looking back to reassess the cause, no corrective regime, civilian or military, can easily rise to get a clue to how Nigeria can rise firmly again on her feet.

And, connotatively, looking back on this situation means initiating a  genuine reorientation for the new generations of Nigeria as a  possible means of rediscovering the country’s lost compass.

Banking on a gun-based potential ability to govern a nation that requires experience, as the eaglet Nigerian military boys did in 1966, could never have brought any meaningful result.

And now, the reality has manifestly confirmed that assertion in a hardly reversible way. In a country like Nigeria that needs all hands to be on deck, both potentiality and experience have roles to play. But neither can take the place of the other.

 

The difference

You, the youths of today, are quite different from those of yesteryears in many ways and the differences are very clear. The youths of the past were very hardworking, highly dedicated, unswervingly patriotic and resolvedly forward-looking.

They started their training from home by serving their parents diligently and by caring for those parents physically and psychologically in various circumstances of life.

They sought their parents’ advice and learned from the latter’s experiences. It was that home training that propelled them to become national or regional leaders in their time as they built their hope on hard work, contentment and destiny.

On the contrary, you, the youths of today, are very lazy, very slothful, incurably time wasting and orientation ally lackadaisical in your attitude to life even as you are served by your parents from infancy almost to old age.

Yet you despise those parents and treat them with disdain like nonentities in your erroneous belief that, as new school, that you often call yourselves, you are more exposed and more knowledgeable than them.

You believe, thoughtlessly and parochially, that those parents had come into the world to work on your behalves and that you are only in this world to enjoy the fruits of their labour.

The youths of the past were patient, contented and full of respect for the elders. They were humble, obedient, always eager to acquire knowledge and gain experience as they often queued up to learn from the elders.

On the other hand, you, the youths of today, are very inpatient, very pompous  and very greedily ambitious even as you see yourselves as masters of knowledge when, in actual fact, you are slaves of ignorance.

Unlike the youths of the past, you, the youths of today, are mostly empty-headed, implacably arrogant, highly materialistic and hastily avaricious.

You always want to start your lives from the peak of your parents’ achievements without asking about what those parents had gone through before reaching the peak.

That is why some of you joined politics and immediately contested for the office of the President in your visionless concept of ‘Not Too Young To Rule’ which some of your fathers who had stolen public funds tried to encourage vaingloriously to pave your ways through the political nightmare that you call a dream.

You, the youths of today, spend money lavishly without working for it and without asking questions about its source. And, when such abominable ‘booty’ comes your way you never think of bearing any responsibility either in your homes or in the society.

You are generally characterized by all the conducts that were classified as shame in the past. To you shame has its price and going by your myopic perception, it only takes money to pay that price.

That is why you worship money, day in and day out as your ultimate god. And as long as you can pay that price by all means in whatever currency, you are important in your own estimation.

Thus, shame, as far as you are concerned, is a vital aspect of culture which has no negative effect on your lifestyle. As a matter of fact you have taken shame for both pride and prestige.

If a few youths of the past were ever described as a bunch of societal problems, due to their misdemeanor, majority of you, the youths of today, are the real cogs in the national wheel of progress in today’s Nigeria.

To you, life has no meaning except it is heavily coded in money. From all indications, there is no better definition for shame than your conduct.

 

Life Span

Your slogan that “long life is irrelevant in the absence of money” is a testimony to the above assertion. That life span in Nigeria today has dropped so drastically is due to your disappointing lifestyle which often creates hypertension for your parents and leads to their early deaths.

Few parents talk of heirs nowadays because those of you who are supposed to be their heirs have long thrown away the toga of worthy heirs.

In the past, mothers were not known for staying with their daughters in the latter’s matrimonial homes while leaving their husbands behind without care.

This strange but new trend that has almost become a part of Nigerian cultural norm arose because the incompetence of today’s urban women, even after many years of training, is questionable.

Thus, despite the ubiquity of young men and women, there is scarcity of husbands and wives just as there is a dearth of fathers and mothers.

Virtually everything that matters to you, today’s youths, is devoid of our known core values. By your measure, the value of life can be found only in the volume of naira accessible to you.

 

Causes of Generational Change

Whenever there is cause to review the generational trend with the intention of righting the wrong, you, the youths of today are often quick in pointing accusing fingers mischievously at the generations before yours by saying they caused the prevailing debacle.

But while pinching the back of the elders you often forget that sooner or later you too may become elders whose back will be pinched by the youths who will succeed your own generation.

You have forgotten that most of the scientific discoveries and technological advancement of your age which lured you into roguery were not available for the past youths.

There were no such things as hard drugs, cybercrimes, armed robbery, kidnapping, sophisticated pen fraud through manipulation of figures and forgery of signatures.

There were no cases of rape, child trafficking, audacious prostitution and day light murder with impunity as are rampant among you today.

 

Professional Crimes

To you, the youths of today, all the above mentioned crimes are either professions or callings in which you actively engage with strong desire for perfection.

Thus, you do not believe in the existence of any demarcation between decency and indecency, an indication that ‘family name’ which was highly valued in the past has no meaning to you today.

Unlike most youths of the past, you were sent to school but your goal was mere certificate that would legitimize your anticipated fraudulent meal ticket rather than useful education and beneficial knowledge.

And, now, what you acquire in the schools that you are attending, which you call certificate, in the name of education is hardly worth the paper on which those certificates are printed.

For most of the years you now spend in higher institutions, your preoccupation is either cultism or other frivolous activities that have no bearing with education.

That is why most of you turn out to be unemployable University or Polytechnic graduates after leaving those institutions.

A few of you who might have secured public employments by whatever means, have been discovered to be sheer misfits on those jobs as your competence remains questionable.

 

Implications

The implications of all these are many. While most of you are not quite useful to the present time you are also not hopeful about the future.

There is hardly any major crime in Nigeria today that is not principally committed by you, the youths of today, all in the quest for money.

It seems that the only language you understand either orally or in writing is money and only those who can speak or write the language of money can command your respect.

Many centuries before our time, an Arab poet intuitively came up with a sonnet which fits perfectly into today’s Nigerian situation.

He said: “Here is the era against which we had been warned through the admonitions of Ubayy Bn Ka’ab and that of Abdullah Bn Mas’ud; an era in which truth would be totally rejected while falsehood and transgression would be kept aloft; Should this era further linger without any change, there will neither be any sorrowful mood at a funeral nor any joyful feeling on the birth of a new baby”.

Now, which of the situations narrated in the above quoted poem is not applicable to Nigeria’s youths today? What impact does religion have on the society again?

We used to know of motor spare parts. Today, spare parts are no more those of motor but of human beings. And the most active merchants of this queer business are you the youths of today (male and female, clerics and laity).

When we talk of illegal oil bunkering, it is the business of the youths. When we talk of kidnapping, it is the business of today’s youths. When we talk of suicide bombing and terrorism, it is the business of today’s youths.

And, all these are for money and nothing else. Where is Nigeria going from here?

 

Conclusion

The aim of this expository article is not to malign or denigrate the youths of today. All the children of this columnist are today’s youths who do not constitute a separate island. But preaching is like a mud pond surrounded by men and women in immaculate regalia.

No one of them will be spared if the mud is splashed. As a onetime youth and now a father qualified to be called an elder, it is not expected of my type to start throwing stones while residing in a glass house.

But truth, like rain, knows no boundary and recognizes no personality. It cruises on like a surging train without minding whose ox is gored.

To rekindle Nigeria’s old hope or create a new one for the future, the youths of today must return to the established values of yesterday.

It was through those values that the tranquility of the world was solidly upheld. On the other hand, it was through a deviation from it that the world became as restive as it is today.

If tranquility must return as wished by many, you the youths of today, must change your loins. And that is the only atonement that the world requires to return to global equanimity. GOD BLESS NIGERIA!

By Femi Abbas

“Let there become of you a nation that shall call for righteousness, enjoin justice and forbid evil. Such are men that will surely triumph”.

Q. 3: 104.

Dear Nigerian Legislators,

This is the third time in 21 years (1999-2020) that an open memo of this type is coming to you individually and collectively from this column.

The first was in 2008 barely nine years after the commencement of Nigeria’s 4th republic in less than 40 years of independence.

Although the contents of the first two memos were hardly different, the need to write this memo again is informed by the fact that a genuine preacher must never be tired of repeating his counsels and admonitions even where and when the addressees choose to be deaf and dumb as in the case of most of you.

Functions of Conscience

Conscience, according to Sheikh Uthman Dan Fodio, “is an open wound which only the truth can heal”. But one can talk of healing a wounded conscience only where it has not become cancerous.

Prophet Muhammad (SAW) once gave the precise definition of hypocrisy in one Hadith. He said: hypocrites

are known by three signs, when they talk they lie, when they promise they renege and when they are trusted they betray”.

Most of you (Nigerian politicians) so much typify that definition that one would wonder if he had Nigerian politicians in mind when he was expressing that axiomatic Hadith.

In Retrospect

You will recall that when, as politicians, you started nursing the ambition to become legislators, whether at the federal or state level, your first public announcement was that you wanted ‘to serve your people’.

And, based on that announcement, people rallied round you and embraced you as their servants in the understanding that whoever volunteered to serve in public office must have agreed to be servants of the people.

First Covenant

That announcement was your first political covenant with the people you claim to want to serve.

But that covenant was not just between you and the people in your constituency alone as you might have wrongly assumed, it also involved Allah’s hand as supreme the witness because your voluntary announcement to serve in whatever capacity was done in the name of Allah or whatever God you pretend to be serving.

And, in that case Allah will surely hold you accountable for making such a promise. It does not matter whether you were genuinely elected or characteristically rigged into office as usual.

Two Fundamental Issues

In Islam, two issues are exceptionally fundamental, both of which are not treated lightly by Allah. These are sacredness of life and justice.

It is a great iniquity for any human being to engage in murder and injustice under any guise.

Thus, anybody who kills fellow human beings extra-judicially under any guise, religion or politics or economy, is nothing but an agent of Satan who should also be treated in the like manner when caught with evidence.

In Islam, killing a fellow human being deliberately is such a grievous sacrilege that should not occur without application of commensurate punishment.

Besides recalcitrance to Allah through idol worshipping, nothing draws the wrath of Allah as fast as these two crimes which Satan may continue to ask you to ignore at your own peril.

How honourable are you?

Of the four estates of the realm in democratic governance, none is as fundamental as legislature. In any democratic dispensation, there can be no government without legislature.

Thus, whenever you are addressed as honourable legislator, please, refuse to be flattered. There is nothing peculiarly honourable in voluntarily choosing to serve people by joining others to legislate for them and to get heavily paid for doing so.

If you are a legislator today, it is neither because you are intellectually smarter or wiser than those for whom you are legislating.

Rare Opportunity

What makes certain politicians legislators is sheer expediency arising from queer inadequacies sadly foisted on us by our so-called political system which gives room for audacious gerrymandering.

If such opportunity comes your way illegally, let it not be mistaken for good luck. It may rather be a calamity waiting to strike at the appropriate time in future.

And, when it strikes, no one except Allah can tell the extent of its effect. At least you can see how the consequences of the heartless annulment of June 12, 1993 Presidential election have become an implacable spectre chasing the ghost of Nigeria as a country, even after two and a half decades of licking her wound with agony.

Lack of Conscience

Due to lack of conscience, most of you, politicians, may not have noticed, but you need to be hinted that shortly after you took oath of office as Ministers, Commissioners or Legislators, the people noticed that you started subverting the covenant which you voluntarily reached with them.

That covenant was to serve the people who paved your ways into those political offices. You promised passionately that you would serve them and anybody who volunteers to serve is nothing but a servant.

But no sooner had you been sworn into office than you started calling yourselves masters or leaders. That is why most of you often find it difficult to bend a little backwards and report to the people in your constituencies on how you are serving them.

Your deviation from your promise is a confirmation of the definition of hyporites as given by Prophet Muhammad (SAW) as quoted above.

Morality and Reality

Against cultural morality and constitutional reality of the moment, you, as politicians, have turned the privilege of participating in governing the country or your State into your personal right which you are using to intimidate the poor masses and ride roughshod over them.

When you occasionally pretend to interact with those masses, it is only for the purpose of preparing their minds for the next election in which you hope to be returned, possibly, unopposed.

And for this reason, you cunningly pay them some pittances while making another fake promise to improve their well-being during your second or third tenure in office.

Constituencies foe What?

Some Legislators among you politicians have spent about 20 years in those legislative houses. Yet, there is no sign at all in your immediate constituencies that anybody is representing the people therein to the benefit of the constituencies.

You are contented with their milling around you for the pittances that you randomly dish out to them even as you assume that they are satisfied with such pittances.

Budget Padding

And now, Nigeria is held to a standstill because the Legislators among you must pad the annual budget presented to them by the executive to their own favour so that the largess generated by the executive arm may be jointly shared in the spirit of ‘rub my back and I will rub yours’.

As parents, you will want your children to grow up as responsible men and women, yet, most of you have nothing in you that can serve as good examples for those children.

Which aspect of your conducts do you expect your children to imitate since none is worthy of emulation? If you did not know, those children, like the majority of Nigerian citizens believe that you Nigerian politicians are the real causes of the multifarious problems confronting Nigeria today. And, your political attitudes seem to confirm that assertion.

Law of Existence

Covenant with Allah is the most fundamental law of existence. It is not one sided. As man has responsibilities to bear so does Allah have obligations to fulfill.

It is from the covenant with Allah that all other covenants in the life of man, including those of marriage, family rites, trust and confidentiality, are derived. That covenant is what others call oath.

Oath of office

In Islam, oath, whether private or public, does not necessarily require Muslims to carry the Qur’an in one’s hand as ignorantly done in Nigeria particularly at this time when oath of office has become a meaningless symbol of assumption of office.

No oath is ever made without Allah being a witness to it. Besides, He (Allah) has assigned two Angels to every human being as secret monitors.

The names of those Angels are Raqib and ‘Atid. The duty of these Angels is to record all utterances and secret actions of each person to whom they are assigned.

The one records good deeds, the other records evil deeds. Their recordings are both in video and in audio forms.

This is a fact contained in Q. 50: 16 where Allah states that: “We surely created man and ‘We’ know the promptings of his mind and are closer to him than his jugular vein.

We assign two guardians to watch him, one on his right (called Raqib) and another on his left (called ‘Atid). No utterance from him/her (the watched person) or action shall escape the records of these vigilant secret mionitors….”

It is from the functions of these invisible police that researchers came about the idea of video, audio and other technological devices used for espionage today.

Blind Trust

With this scenario, you can see the damages some of you (politicians) are causing to the present and future generations of this country in a bid to display your illegally acquired loot through corruption.

By interpretation, the problem of corruption engendered by gross indiscipline and lack of functional conscience in Nigeria today is not with the youths as often alleged.

It is rather more with the parents, some of whom are in the executive, the judiciary and   the legislative  arms of government.

If certain Nigerian youths are found enmeshed in corruption, they are only proving not to be bastards. It is their inheritance from their parents.

Nigeria remains a country without electricity today, even after 60 years of independence, because the priorities of those of you in government are permanently at variance with the country’s national priorities.

For instance, one would have thought that rather than fighting corruption the way Obasanjo presumably started it in year 2000, what a focused and sincere government should have done was to initiate a re-orientation revolution to enable all Nigerians know why corruption is evil.

And if such a reorientation had been backed up with mass employment, it would have been a preventive rather than a curative measure.

Naira Denominations

The Murtala Muhammad and Buhari/Idiagbon regimes experimented  ulteration of naira denominations and Nigeria was briefly better for it.

Fighting corruption haphazardly as Obasanjo did during his agonizing eight year tenure was like starting the building of a house from the roof.

Nigeria only wasted those eight years chasing shadow in the name of fighting corruption while the monster kept feeding fat on the blood of poor Nigerians using as the term ‘BLIND TRUST’ served as its cloak.

It was the same Obasanjo as a politician, that introduced series of big denominations  of naira and technically eliminated coins to pave way for rampant political thefts and astronomical inflation as well as spiral deflation of Nigerian currency that virtually ruined the economy.

Archive of Naira Denominations

It can vividly be remembered that by the time the 4th republic commenced in 1999, the highest denomination of Nigerian currency was N50 which was popularly called ‘Better Life’.

It was Obasanjo, shortly after he assumed office as President, that   introduced  N100 on December 1, 1999, with the portrait of Chief Obafemi Awolowo; N200 on November 1,   200, with the portrait of Sir Ahmadu Bello; N500 on April 4, 2001; and N1000 on October 12, 2005, with the portraits of Alhaji Aliyu  Mai Bornu and Dr. Clement Isong (the two earlierst indigenous Governors of the Central Bank of Nigeria).

But for suspicious media speculation at that time, the portrait on N1000 would have been quite different. Your guess is as good as mine.

Ironically, after all those naira denominations had turned Nigeria upside down economically and the doors of armed robbery had been widely opened and other heinous crimes had become the order of the day that Obasanjo considered it right to change the then existing coins into polymer notes of N1 and 50 kobo while he completely faced out other coins in May 2007, the very month he was leaving office following the failure of ‘Third Term’ saga.

Thus, with the redesigning of other existing naira denominations, it can be con concluded that all the Nigerian naira denominations in circulation today are an evidence of Obasanjo’s governing era in Nigeria.

Rare Opportunity

Legislating is a rare opportunity to serve one’s nation meritoriously. But some of you (Legislators) seem to have turned that opportunity into one of self-enrichment as well as that of securing the future of your own children at the expense of the lives of millions of other children.

All these are done at the expense of the wretched people around you whose role in democracy has been relegated to voting once in four years.

You have forgotten that wealth is Allah’s endowment which cannot be inherited except by Allah’s will. Who inherited the expansive wealth and kingdom of King Solomon? Have you not seen some money bags of yester years wallowing in abject penury today? When will you learn your lesson?

My dear ‘Honourable Ministers,  Legislators and judges, search your conscience and fear God. Remember that some people had ruled this country in the past.

Among them were those who usurped the roles of the executive, the legislative and the judicial arms together, in the name of military rule, made possible by coup d’état. Where are they today?

The Limit of Governance

Governance, like elasticity, has its limit. Four years may look endless, but for the wise, it is not more than a flash of lightening which only a fool may want to rely upon to walk his way through the darkness of the night.

Service to Humanity

Honourable legislators, let it be kept permanently in your hearts that the only thing which keeps people alive in history even long after their demise is service to humanity.

Prophets Isa (Jesus), and Muhammad (SAW), had neither bank accounts nor estates to bequeath to anybody. Their heritage, after their demise, has become much more than any material wealth for the entire world today.

That heritage is service to humanity. What is your own planned heritage if only for posterity? That is a big question which only people with conscience and common sense can answer.

Remember that you are in a ship already voyaging on the high sea towards the shore. At the shore are the customs officers waiting to check the contents of your cargo.

Be always at alert. Remember that if you cultivate friendship with Satan he will favour your wish. But if he grants you one favour, he will take ten from you in return.

Be Muslims by name, conduct and mannerism. As public officers, whatever you do as Muslims will affect the image of Islam in one way or the other.

I hope you will return home as Muslims that you claim to be and not as renegades. Remember all this and adjust now that you may be able to raise your head aloft when others will be losing theirs.

Assalam Alyakum!

By Femi Abbas

Monolouge

This article is not new. It was first written and published in this column 11 years ago (2009). Yet, the situation that warranted its writing and publication at that time persistently remains an implacable spectre threatening to devour the lives of ordinary Nigerian citizens, days and nights even as the deceptively proclaimed democracy in 1999 has now become a mockery of itself. Thus, a repeat of the publication of this article here today is at the request of readers who still remember its contents and find a potent psychological respite in it.

 

THIS world is a dramatic entity mysteriously coded in heterogeneous   parables. Every living thing therein sees that entity and relates to it according to its own nature of existence. It takes history to decode it only after the actors in the drama might have left the stage.

Who are we? Where are we coming from? And, for where are we heading from here? These are some of the questions which all rational human beings, anywhere in the world, should ask themselves from time to time. Those questions are an indication of planned progress that can be pursued through positive actions.

But, ironically, in Nigeria, such questions have been rendered irrelevant because the circumstances of life imposed on this retrogressive country have changed the priorities of her citizens. The only question now in vogue, which every privileged person seems to concentrate upon is this: ‘what will I get for myself in this appointment?

That very question is the real drama that has permanently engaged the attention of overwhelming majority of Nigerian elites since the commencement of the country’s   fourth republic. It is the question that crowns corruption as the despotic king that now rules Nigeria with impunity. It is the question that fosters greed and impunity beyond imagination even as it fetters conscience to the stake of Satan. It is the question that presents mirage to Nigerian youths of today as the only substance that is worthy of pursuit.

Hmmm! We live in a material world where immaterial   substances are taken or rather mistaken for value.

 

No Answer

Incidentally, however, no effort has ever been made to answer that all-time question even if to confirm the aberration in sticking to the ephemerality of this world. If any such answer had been found and applied, it   would have drastically reduced the current rate of crimes in Nigeria to the barest minimum.

 

Hope or Despair?

What can we say of a man who fixes his eyes on the sun but does not see it? Instead, he sees a chorus of flaming seraphim announcing a paroxysm of despair. That is the parable of the country called Nigeria. Like the Israelis of Moses’ time, Nigerians have become like Egyptian gypsies of yore wandering aimlessly without a definite destination and wallowing in abject poverty in the midst of abundance.

 

The Wasted Abundance

What else do we expect from Allah beyond the invaluable bounties with which He has blessed us?

What is Nigeria not blessed with? We have land in abundance, not in terms of size alone but also in terms of agrarian soil and rich vegetation. At least over 77 million hectares of land was said to be arable in Nigeria over a decade ago. Out of this, only about 34 million hectares was reportedly being cultivated for various agricultural activities, including animal husbandry, at the time of writing this article in 2009. Today, this has dwindled to less than 17 million hectares as vicious insecurity is now virtually in control.

 

Bountiful Blessings

We are blessed with excellent weather that maintains our good health as well as torrential rainfalls that water our plants from the sky and greeneries   with which we graze our animals to satisfaction. We are endowed with a variety of nourishing food crops that are enough to feed us from generations to generations without importing any edible substance from anywhere. And, our population is large enough to form the needed market for the sales and consumption of our sundry products.

 

Qur’anic Attestation

The Qur’an vividly attests to the above assertion in chapter 80, verses….. Thus:

“Let man reflect on the food he eats; how ‘We’ pour down the rain in torrents and cleave the earth asunder; how ‘We’ bring forth the corn, the grapes, the fresh vegetables, the olive, the palm products, the thickets, the fruit-trees and the green pastures for you and for your cattle to

Delight in…”

 

Any Denial?

Allah’s blessings on us are regular and incessant. No sensible individuals or government can deny them.

In addition to the aforementioned divine blessings, we also have energetic and dedicated work force that is married to the farm land in Nigeria despite all odds. We also have intellectual brains that are capable of engaging in research work in all fields of human endeavours days and nights to ensure the growth and development of our country.

Nigeria is not lacking in forest and savannah. She is rich in rivers, mountains and minerals, all of which are great resources for people who are seriously seeking reasonable comfort and are not self-deceptive.

 

Dearth of Leadership

If Nigerians have consistently suffered from anything, it is a dearth of responsible leadership that should ordinarily care about our foremost heritage which is agriculture. That scarcity of food, or even outright famine, is now a major threat to Nigerians can only be blamed on naivety on the part of the ruling class, especially in the disastrous first 16 years of the so-called fourth republic, (1999 to 2015), when the rain of dollars was falling torrentially from the sky of oil.

That misfortune started when the first shot at the Presidency in 1999 was entrusted to a parochial ‘prisoner’ who had completely lost contact with the actual reality of the modern life.

On his assumption of office in that year, some equally parochial but die hard, fanatical Nigerian optimists, saw him as a reincarnate of the Biblical Yusuf (Joseph) of the Egypt of yore who could rescue Nigeria from an impending economic scourge.

But no sooner had he assumed office as President than those blind optimists realized that the man they classified as the modern day ‘Yusuf’ coming from the prison to transform the dream of Nigeria into reality was actually a ‘Mathew’ without any intuition.

As a farmer that he claimed to be, before his incarceration, this man had been expected to act like Chairman Mao of China who started the revolution of his country with agricultural self-sufficiency. But, far from acting like Mao, this parochial ‘Mathew’ eventually confirmed that no man can give what he does not possess. Thus, with his crude style of governance, he proved that he was never tutored in any decency that could fetch any expected good governance. Those who imposed him on Nigeria have since openly confessed their calamitous error while expressing a belated regret even as they are now liking their bleeding fingers with internal agony. Today, Nigeria is worse than what she was two decades ago.

 

Compounded Tragedy

The Governors of that time did not, also help the matter. Rather than focusing on agriculture which was the natural occupational endowment of their subjects, most of those political gold diggers preferred to depend on oil boom largess coming to them from the federal government through the so-called revenue allocation. To them, such a quicker way of getting money illegally into their personal pockets was more beneficial than investing in agriculture which could only yield results perhaps years after they might have left office. The only exception at that time was Lagos State where a foresighted erstwhile Senator held sway as Governor.

 

Cost of Governance

In Nigeria, the cost of running government alone is enough to render the   country bankrupt. What was the federal government doing with about 40 federal ministers and scores of Presidential Senior Special Advisers as well a retinue of Special Assistants when even America, with her huge economic resources, including technological wherewithal, had only about a dozen ministers?

Besides, what informs the idea of immunity and the so-called security vote for Governors and, even, constituency allowances, running into billions of naira, for legislators, at the federal and state levels, especially at a time when innocent citizens were crying for food?

 

Evidence of Hunger

No one could ever think, about two decades ago, that artificial hunger could be added to the abysmal level of poverty in the land despite the unprecedented rise in the price of oil in the international market during those wasted years. However, the lotus eaters in government, at that time, fraudulently turned governance into an artful trick which they adopted to bamboozle the populace into blind submission. The propaganda in the 1980s, spearheaded by a government agency called Mass Mobilization for Self Reliance, Social Justice and Economic Recovery (MAMSER), established by a self-styled military President, Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, and headed by Professor Jerry Gana, was almost hypnotizing. That Agency’s slogan of “Food and Shelter for All in the Year 2000” rented the air with wide, deafening reverberation. But in the end, nothing came out of it. Rather, some new multi-millionaires suddenly emerged from the smart project. That slogan was to later change, in the 1990s, to: “Vision 2010” with loud media propaganda under the blunt dictatorship of a dark goggled Military General.

 

 Vision 2020

And, when year 2010 was   approaching under the draconian Presidency of the mentioned visionless ‘Mathew’, the slogan changed again to: ‘Vision 2020, a year in which Nigerian government deceptively claimed to have envisioned making the country one of the 20 most buoyant economies in the world. Now, here we are in year 2020. Where are the indications of the acclaimed visions?  Now, the two deceptive visions and their initiators have naturally and fizzled out into perpetual oblivion.

 

Game of Deception

It takes two to tangle. If the deceptive leaders of those years could pretend not to know that a game of deception was in place, why was the deceived populace also pretending to play along? It takes a visionless populace to beget a deceptive government as the case has always been in Nigeria. No country in history is ever known to have achieved economic vibrancy by magic and Nigeria could not have been an exception. But that was the portion of a self-glorified country that calls herself ‘the giant of Africa’. And, today, what is the result of that self-deception?

 

From FAO’s Report

In a report of the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) some years ago, about 300 Nigerians were said to be dying of hunger daily. Only God knows what that figure might have risen to become now. That was the legacy of the past rulers which became the heritage of today’s government. Yet, ironically, the same layers of the foundation of destroyed economy in the past years are the most vocal critics of the county’s economy today. What a shame?

 

Yar’Adua’s Tenure

By some actions taken during his tenure, President Musa Yar’Adua of the blessed memory remains highly commendable for showing the example of governance with human face and human heart. He did not only admit that the election that put him in office was faulty, he also promised to correct that error even as he regulated the importation of food items and suspended tariffs on importation of essential food items to the relief of all and sundry. President Yar’Adua also released grains from the national silos to check inflation and pumped N400 billion into the economy for the purpose of creating about 10 million jobs then. And, besides reducing the pomp price of fuel, he also granted unconditional amnesty to the then South-South agitators and thereby opened way for negotiation with them in the interest of peace and harmony.

Although, such measures were far from being adequate for a country which was aspiring to become one of the 20 biggest economies in 2020, the move was generally seen as a good beginning of a hopeful future

However, as soon as Yar’Adua died, a change of gear was applied as all progressive steps which he initiated were suspended and the national treasury was thrown open for audacious thieves to scoop upon with impunity.

 

The Jonathan Years

Now, it is evident that no miracle could have yielded any success based on a ramshackle foundation laid down for Nigerian economy by a visionless ‘Mathew’ (from the prison) who, as President, could hardly reason beyond the siege mentality of the prison yard from where he had emerged. If Goodluck Jonathan who succeeded Yar’Adua as President had been well tutored in good governance, he would have known that the vessel which took this country’s ‘Napoleon’ to proverbial ‘Waterloo’ was incapable of conveying her to the Cape of Good Hope. But the accident of history must never cease to play itself out especially in a situation where a hidden agenda is given a premium focus. But one indelible fact must never be forgotten.  Without a historic ‘Yusuf’ in Egypt of yore, only Allah knows what the history of Egypt would have been today. And, without a Pharaoh’s dream of drought, the role of ‘Yusuf’ in averting  famine in Egypt would not have become recurrent decimal in global history.

 

Egypt of the 1970s

Yours sincerely was a student in Egypt in the 1970s when the hostility between that country and Israel was fierce. Egypt was then an ally of the now defunct Union of Soviets Socialist Republics (USSR), while Israel was a satellite of the United States by proxy. Not only did Egypt suffer isolation from NATO member countries but even the Soviet Union which was supposed to be the main ally of Egypt was not forthcoming with any meaningful assistance beyond the supply of light and medium range weapons. Thus, the Egyptian government had to buckle up firmly in order to fend for its people at that critical time.

Realizing the importance of food supply especially in a war situation, Egypt mobilized all her agricultural resources around the River Nile and forgot about any food importation. The result was tremendous as Egypt grew to become a food exporter rather than an importer that it had been for years.

 

Uganda for Instance

Less than three decades ago, Uganda, a sub-Sahara African country, found herself in the position of ancient Egypt. A colossal drought broke out in that country killing thousands of people and virtually wiping out the entire cattle business in the country. No Pharaoh had any dreamed premonition and no ‘Yusuf’ was in a prison to translate any dream into a solution.

What the Ugandan government did to find a solution was to reset the country’s agricultural focus. Rather than concentrating on tilling the already sapped land and rearing the cattle, which drought had eroded, a new focus was brought to bear. Uganda took to commercial ‘bee farming’ as a relieving alternative. The seriousness which the government of that country attached to the new focus was such that within a short time, Uganda became a leading country in the production and exportation of honey and other bee products to Europe and the United States.

 

Nigeria’s Situation Today

Today, Nigeria is not afflicted by drought or famine. Neither is she engaged in any uncontrollable war. Yet, the fear in vogue is hunger compounded by insecurity. How this country arrived at such a deadly scourge is irrelevant for now. What is relevant is how to get out of it. Like Egypt of yore, Nigeria badly needed a ‘Yusuf’ in 2015, to unravel the mystery surrounding the dream that brought this scourge about. With the emergence of Muhammadu Thus, with Buhari as President with military background,  that ‘Yusuf’ seemed to be here. But five years in office, so far, the difference is yet to be felt or seen. However,

it is in the interest of those in government, especially the legislators who are most active in sharing public funds, to let the national wealth spread across board legitimately if only to avoid the current situation in Nigerian cities where virtually every house has become a prison in which the occupants are self-jailed voluntarily. To ignore the rule of law and shun justice in a land blessed with milk and honey is to cultivate trouble with insecurity in all its ramifications.

 

Epilogue

Where people are well educated and conscious of their rights; where they perceive wealth as a divine privilege and not an exclusive right of any group; where they see themselves as qualified but denied their legitimate entitlements; nobody can consign them to ignominy indefinitely. They will react in no uncertain terms. That is what obtains now in the country which has given an unprecedented rise to insurgency and banditry to the amazement of all and sundry. These must not be allowed to further continue. Let Nigeria grow from a country into a nation that we may all be proud to be her citizens. “….God does not change the situation of a community until such a community is ready for change (its misdemeanour)”…. Q. 13:11

Femi Abbas

Monologue

This article is a reminder of an article written and published in this column by yours sincerely on Friday, January 20, 2017, in which I predicted what would become of the United States of America (USA) at the instance of that country’s newly elected President, Donald Trump before the end of his first term. The article was entitled ‘Welcoming a Trump of Sadism’.

Two weeks before the publication of that article, an earlier article had was written and published, also by yours sincerely, in this same column. It was entitled ‘Waiting for January 20’.

Excerpts from both articles can be found below as follows:

Like the hands of a clock, many democratic countries in the world do swear a new President into office every four or five years at the expiration of a previous tenure. Now, it is the turn of the United States of America to do that again. And the man to take  White Houseas from today, January 20, 2017, for the next four years, all things being equal, is called Donald Trump, a man that most people in the world, including Americans, who voted for him, have seen as a wild bull surging furiously into a china shop.

In an article entitled ‘Waiting for January 20’ and published in this column two weeks earlier, yours sincerely cited the example of Adolf Hitler’s oath of office and his inaugural address of 1933 that culminated in the World War II which started in 1939 and ended in 1945.

The dramatic events within that period of 12 years (1933-1945) were the main determinants of today’s world history”.

The above quoted excerpt was from the article entitled ‘Welcoming a Trump of Sadism’.

 

Another Excerpt

Below is also an excerpt from an earlier article entitled ‘Waiting for January 20’ and published on January 6, 2017, in this same column by yours sincerely. Its contents went thus in part:

“All eyes, across the world, are on the 20th day of January 2017.  That is the day that the new America’s President elect, Donald John Trump, will be formally ushered into the ‘White House’ in Washington, with a swearing in ceremony. He will be the 45th American President. That the entire world is waiting for this event is a confirmation of America’s undisputed leadership of the contemporary world. There is no doubt that this event will be historically electric positively or negatively. A similar wait had taken place in February 1933, in Germany, where a Nazi magnate, Adolf Hitler was sworn into office as the Chancellor of that country. The speech he delivered that day eventually altered the destiny of Germany and reshaped the geography of the world. Incidentally, Donald Trump’s ancestral origin is Germany.

Now, will Trump of the 21st century come out like Hitler of the 20th century to put the world on the path of another World War? That is a major question that the unfolding events of the days ahead may need to be answered fundamentally.

 

The Meaning of Trump

The name TRUMP is a short form of trumpet, a musical instrument with which the decision of a tyrant is often announced in a local cultural setting. Ever since he was declared the winner of the American Presidential election of November 2016, this Trump has been trumpeting his tyrannical plans to the world arrogantly. And, the jitters rolled out from that trumpet have started gripping the world with an imaginary icy hand. That an American President elect had begun to overrule his still serving predecessor even before taking an oath of office is a clear indication of what the world should expect from the china shop in which a wild bull will start to operate as from today.

 

History as a Teacher  

History is a well known phenomenal teacher. It teaches the old and the young alike. Its students are always drawn from far and near. It examines those students from time to time and gives them examination results periodically. Its lessons are as generational as they cut across races and cultures. Yet, it has no peculiar communication language. But then, history faces a fundamental problem. That problem is not in the repetition that has characteristically become its culture but, rather, in getting mankind to understand its repeated teachings as well as in heeding its warnings.

In virtually all celestial religions, history plays such a prominent role that gives it the permanent identity of a teacher. And, from its beneficial teachings, human beings build ladders of experiences with which they mount the pyramids of life, sometimes to the peak.

 

Christianity and Islam

Despite the seeming brutal gangsterism being vaingloriously displayed by the goon called, Donald Trump, the Muslim world is hereby advised not to write him off completely as an agent of the Lucifer.

In the histories of both Christianity and Islam, we are repeatedly told of certain arch antagonists of God’s divine message, who dramatically turned round to become voluntary Ambassadors of the same message to which they had been   viciously antagonistic. One of such antagonists was Saul of Tarsus, an avowed anti-Christ who dramatically turned round to accept the message of Jesus after the later had vacated the scene of this world. Saul later adopted the name Paul as a symbol of his new apostolic faith. That was in the Bible. Another known antagonist of Allah’s divine Message was Umar Bn Khattab of Makkah who had plotted the murder of Prophet Muhammad (SAW) but dramatically turned round to embrace Islam on the very day he was to practically implement his plot. Eventually, Umar rose to become the second Caliph in Islam and he conscientiously spread Allah’s divine religion across nations and continents even more than any other Caliph.

 

Jesus’ Wish

Jesus had wished that Saul, a well- educated Jew, accept his message while he was around. But that wish did not materialize until after his departure from the stage.

However, if Saul had not eventually accepted Christianity when he did, perhaps, the situation of that religion would have been completely different today.

 

The Case of Umar

In the case of Umar Bn Khattab, Prophet Muhammad (SAW) had prayed the Almighty Allah to enable one of the two famous persons bearing Umar in Makkah at that time, to accept Islam.

Although the Prophet’s mind was on the other Umar, It however turned out that Umar Bn Khattab was the one  Allah’s favour magnetized. And, Umar Bn Khattab’s acceptance of Islam became so remarkable that the Prophet was reported to have once said of him as follows: “Were there to be a Prophet after me, Umar would have been that Prophet”.

 

Irony of Life

Today, another thorny bud seems to be wildly growing under the armpit of an American bitter tree in the 21st century. That proverbial human bud is an avowed racist and morbid hater of Islam that emerged as President in that country in 2017. His physical appearance alone, anywhere, is a vivid reminder of the unbridled atrocities of a onetime originator of Nazism, Adolf Hitler, who brutally terrorized the entire continent of Europe for about a decade.

And, for the first time ever, majority of Americans who voted to choose Trump as President started to express fear of uncertainty about their choice even before he formally assumed office.

Thus, from the beginning of his four year presidential tenure, Trump had been perceived as an incubated egg waiting to be hatched.  However, the kind of chicken that would come out of that incubated egg was a matter of guess. Nevertheless, such a perception in 2017 might have been too early in the day for the eagerly agitated Americans. After all, the cited cases of Saul and Umar still remain very validly influential on contemporary history.

 

Future Shock  

From the foresighted perception of yours sincerely, the narration above was a virtual indicator of a future shock that the world was waiting to grapple with after the 2016 American Presidential election.

Now, the ongoing occurrences in the United States, besides COVID-19, have come to vindicate my perception. The only aspect of that perception that is still eagerly awaiting vindication is what will eventually become of today’s sadistic Trump.

 

Curious Questions

Why was it after the conversion of Saul, that the Greek Empire and, subsequently, the Roman Empire adopted Christianity as official religion? Why did the whole Arabia wait for Umar Bn Khattab to embrace Islam before it formally accepted that divine faith as her State religion? And, by analogy, shouldn’t America be getting ready for a similar eventuality? After all, centuries of religious practice in America have proved that Christianity is just a decoration with which Americans have been trading in fun as a mere symbol of public association. That fun has now virtually dwindled to its lowest ebb. And, in reality, nothing remains of Christianity in America today beyond name.

 

In Retrospect

It sounded odd in the yore, when speculations began to indicate that Rome could adopt Christianity as State religion. It also sounded unbelievable that the whole Arabia could adopt Islam as official religion following the reversion of Umar. But reality eventually prevailed and, today, the rest remains a property of history.

In the same vein, far from prophesying, I foresee a day, in a foreseeable future, when America will become the home of Islam and give that genuine divine religion the Impeccable reality of life that it deserves in the West. In reaction to this millennial prediction, as it happened in the Roman and Greek Empires of yore, the Nigerian doubting Thomases of this era may commence their repugnant arguments from here. But those who will engage in any argument on this assertion should remember that the roots of tomorrow’s gargantuan tree of peace are already being firmly planted in today’s fertile soil as it happened in Guantanamo, USA, recently.

The Guantanamo Bay

Terry Holdbrooks Junior is an American native of Huntsville in Alabama. He grew up a troubled kid with junkie parents that dumped him at age 7 on his ex-hippy grandparents to be raised. By 18, he’d completed both high school and trade school which is suggestive of brilliance on his part. But along the line, he indulged in drugs, illegal sex and tattoos which covered his arms from shoulder to wrist. His earlobes were stretched to a plug that a thumb could pass through.

Thus, when he walked into an Army recruiter’s office in Arizona a year after 9/11 saying he wanted to join the Army, to be able to kill people and get paid for it, the recruiter looked up briefly and turned back to his computer saying “No, thank you”.

Finally, it was only during his fourth visit to the recruitment office that he was allowed to take part in the military’s aptitude test when the recruiter realized the potential in him. Then, Holdbrooks signed up for the military police because it offered a bonus. And when his unit was transferred to Guantanamo, the sergeant detoured through New York to take them to Ground Zero where he told them to “remember what Muslims did to us and who you are supposed to protect”.

Thus, the 29 year old Terry Holdbrooks Jr., enrolled in American Army in 2003/2004 and was posted to Guantanamo Bay as a military Police officer in a detention camp earmarked for people pronounced as criminals. Part of his duties was not just to prevent those detainees from escaping but also to escort them to interrogation rooms and then return them to their cells. He knew the kind of stresses and tortures those detainees were undergoing in repeated questionings.

 

How Islam beckons

All along, Holdbrooks Jr.’s perception and understanding of Islam was not dissimilar from those of his military colleagues in Iraq, Afghanistan or even Guantanamo Bay. However, one day, the thought of accepting Islam as a rightfully guiding religion crossed his mind after several months of conversation with some Muslim detainees in that camp.

Before he became a Muslim, Holdbrooks was wearing the beard of a bald Amish guy, the tattoos of a punk kid and the twitchy alertness of a military policeman. Take him to a restaurant, and he’ll choose the chair with its back against the wall. Take his photograph and he’ll prefer to look away from the camera. That was Holdbrooks before 2013 when he embraced Islam.

 

He took  Shahadah

After three months of intensive study and conversation, Holdbrooks told the Muslim detainees one night that he wanted to become a Muslim. And in response, the detainees explained the implications of that to him. They said: “Converting to Islam means you would have to change your life style including your diet. You will quit drugs, drinking, profanity and tattoos. Then, be prepared for good relationship with everybody – wife, neighbours, the Army and the government”. Thus, little by little, Holdbrooks made the changes as he found a measure of health, discipline, family and peace of mind which he never had before.

“If Prophet Muhammad (SAW) were to come back to the world today, people would find the best examples of Islam in the United States. American Muslims have a responsibility to live their faith so that others can see a true example, not the perversions of the terrorists or the tyranny of corrupt governments. He concluded that: “For every little step I took toward Islam, Islam was taking more steps toward me”. Thus, the man who was employed to quench the glow of Islam became a propagator of Islam in America.

The same President Donald Trump, who is innately persecuting Islam and the Muslims today may become like Holdsbrooks tomorrow. Allah’s way of doing things is full of wonders. Nothing is impossible with Him.

By Femi Abbas

Dear Muslim parents, this is not a parents/teachers association meeting in which new school fees or new calendar year is to be discussed.

It is rather a meeting of positive and constructive minds over one of the most fundamental issues in the life of man. And it is to be moderated by the conscientious guideline divinely revealed in the ‘Qur’an’ by the Almighty Allah.

In relation to the wellbeing of children, the joys of parents are manifest just as their griefs and fears are secret. Hardly can you hide the one or openly express the other.

Happy are parents whose children tread the path of their divinely guided dream. And, sorrowful is the portion of parents who end up regretting bringing certain children into this world. All of them will account either for what bring them joy or push them into sorrow.

 

Prophetic admonition

Prophet Muhammad (SAW) had admonished on this situation when he said: “all of you (parents, teachers and leaders) are shepherds and all of you shall be asked to account for your herds”.

Children are the most invaluable gift of Allah to man. In a sane society, they cannot be bought. They cannot be sold. Even adoption or exchange of children for money is only a temporary illegal act which will become a permanent question later.

One day, the child will know his parents or know that the foster parents or slave drivers who take charge of him at a time in life are not his real parents. Then he will ask the permanent question: “whose child am I?

You may give your biological or adopted children your love and your ideas but not your thoughts. They have their own thoughts which you may never be able to alter. You may clad them in the most fashionable dresses.

Life of vanity

You may house them in the most comfortable residences. But you can never, never gain a way into their souls in the absence of the divine instruction of Allah.

While you may be able to interact closely with the bodies of your children today, you will discover that their souls dwell in the abode of tomorrow which you cannot see even in your dream.

Children are a bundle of joy. But they can also be a load of grief. At least, they form the source of both in the life of parents.

Manual of life

No man or woman becomes a parent without first being a child. What is perceived as experience today sprang from the childhood pranks of some years past. And the cycle continues.

Everything in life has its own manual. The general manual of life is the Qur’an; that anchor message of Allah, which leaves no stone unturned in the life of man.

In chapter 31 verse 13 of that divine Book Allah relays to us how Prophet Luqman counseled his son thus: “And (remember) when Luqman said to his son while admonishing him: ‘My son, associate none with Allah, for to associate others with Him is a grievous iniquity’…. (Go and know that) Allah will bring all things to light, be they as small as a grain of mustard seed, hidden inside a rock or in the earth.

Allah is All-wise and All-knowing. My son, be steadfast in offering Salat; enjoin justice and forbid evil. Endure with fortitude, whatever befalls you. That is a duty incumbent upon you.

Do not scorn fellow human beings nor walk arrogantly on land; Allah does not love the arrogant and vainglorious ones. Be modest in your gait and lower your voice when talking for harshest of voices is the braying of an ass….”

The above verses of the Qur’an are a good example of how Allah teaches us what to do in each circumstance of life and how to do it.

Harmonious life

Prophet Luqman and his son were just used symbolically. What Allah wants us to know is how to bring up our children as gentle and responsible men and women on earth, if only for nations and tribes to live harmoniously in peace? But that cannot be achieved without the fear of Allah which every parent is expected to preach practically to his or her children from the very early age as did Prophet Luqman.

Elite parents

It is quite ironic that most parents especially in the elite class do not see life as a queue which ought to be followed scrupulously. They rather believe that any queue, at all, is a fool’s rout to success where shortcut is available.

Those are the parents who create special class for their children right from birth. They show them how superior they are to other children and tell them the category of children with whom they should be friendly.

They provide for their children what those children do not need. They take them to schools in very expensive cars and create in them the impression that money is not their problem.

And when, occasionally, their children refuse to ride in old cars brought for them by their drivers, the parents quickly apologize and send new cars to convey them.

Easy money syndrome

These are children who have never worked for one kobo in their lives. All they know is that there is money. And they don’t want to know where the money is coming from.

And here are parents whose source of money is stealing public funds either by pen or by gun. With such dirty money, they sponsor their children in the most expensive schools abroad or at home.

They follow them to their schools to grease the palms of the teachers. At times they buy cars for such teachers just to ensure that their children secure the required certificate or marks for promotion into the next class.

It does not matter to them much whether those children know what they are taught or not. What matters to them is the shortcut which will see their children graduate at an early age of 19 or 20 so that by the age of 23, such children would have become Chief Executives of banks or multinational companies where the cycle of fraud would continue for the family unabatedly.

Now, why wouldn’t such a brazing desperation lead to mass cheating in examinations and greedy stealing at work as now being experienced in Nigeria? Are the children to blame? What else is expected of them when their parents will buy anything for them including live examination papers? And the children of the less privileged parents will also want to take advantage of the terrible rot to succeed in life.

Adorned children

Some parents have taken their children for an adorable ornament which nothing should tamper with. Such parents often treat their children like fragile eggs.

They lavish stolen money on them and give them the impression that they were not born to be poor. They often forget that no amount of fraudulent spending can make any child rich in life.

For such parents the Qur’an has the following advice: “Are they the ones who apportion your Lord’s blessings? It is ‘WE’ (Allah) that apportion to them their livelihood in this world, exalting some in ranks above others so that the ones can take the others into their services. Your Lord’s mercy is better than all their hoarded treasures”. (See Q. 43: 32).

Implication

The misfortune or calamity afflicting the world today, especially, that of Nigerian society, is mostly caused by the elite parents.

Right from infancy, most children of the elite, particularly the white-collar jobbers, would have the impression that they are born to be masters. And they behave as such at every stage of their lives.

It all starts with unwarranted lavish spending on children’s birthdays which has virtually become the past-time of those parents.

Sometimes millions of naira may be spent by parents to celeberate the birthdays of their toddler children. The implication of this is that such children are being taught how to spend money without being taught how money is made.

And by the time they grow up, they would have been so much used to easy that they quickly resort to desperation in the absence of easy mone. By that time, the parents would have forgotten how they indulged the innocent children into such act.

Advanced level fraud

Today, what used to be examination fraud in the primary and secondary schools has gone beyond that level. We now have black market certificates issued in most of our federal and state universities.

We also have election frauds at all levels of governance practically supervised by those who are supposed to be umpires. We also have lawmakers who must take bribe before voting for or against any bill.

We also have law enforcers in the name of police whose main source of income is open corruction audaciously committed even on the roads.

As a matter of fact, nothing symbolizes the extent of corruption in Nigeria than the uniformed government enforcement officials called Policemen or Policewomen.

We also have the unrepentant civil servants who live like kings and queens while milking the society shamelessly without any regard for their legitimate earnings.

We also have the half-baked lawyers who are feeding fat on fraudulent opportunities while capitalizing on the deliberate lapses created by our so-called constitution.

In all these, who will curb the ever-rampant examination fraud spreading like bush fire in Nigeria? Is it the parents who are so desperate that they would do anything including illicit sex to see their children through? Or school Principals and Proprietors who are the real architects of examination fraud? Or the officials of the various examination bodies who often facilitate and help to perfect the act? Or the police whose orientation is to call a spade a hoe where money is involved? Or the legislators who will prefer to keep mute on anything fraudulent, having dipped their hands so much into illegalities?

All of these and others not mentioned here are elite parents who can hardly come up with a clean hand on anything. How can they curb the largesse from which they benefit so tremendously?

Agonising result

Many Muslim parents have, in defiance to Allah’s instruction, joined the terrible cartel of the above listed crimes. They feel satisfied with their children’s mundane lives which entails no care for their spiritual lives. This has caused some temporal agony in certain lives and spiritual melancholy in others.

We were in an Islamic meeting at the University of Lagos Mosque sometime in the early 1990s when a septuagenarian parent of four grown up children suddenly burst into tears. He sobbed painfully like a housewife who just lost her first child at the point of delivery.

Surprised and embarrassed, we inquired from him what the matter was since the issue under discussion had no sad angle.

In his response after calming down, the man who was a former Nigerian Ambassador said he had lost his entire life. He narrated his pathetic story in a very sober mood and concluded that he had lived his entire life in vain.

He told us how three of his children (all boys) had their secondary and university education in London. The fourth child who was a girl joined them after her secondary education.

And after graduation, they all got juicy jobs and settled permanently in England. But by then, they had all crossed over to the other side of the spiritual bridge having married spouses from outside Islam.

This was however not the cause of his regret. The real cause of the man’s regret was the attitude of those children to his religious life which he claimed to cherish so much. First, the children never thought it right to pay him a visit in Nigeria despite his old age.

Secondly, whenever he visited them, in London, none of them allowed him to observe his daily Salat as they told him that it was uncivilized. After all efforts to persuade them failed, he had to abandon them and live like a man without children.

The old man’s most agonizing point was in seeing the children of his friends practice Islam very well even as they were all doing fine in their various careers.

That is the plight of a man who had the courage to voice it out after admitting his guilt. There are thousands of others like him who would prefer to lick their messy wounds secretly till death comes to strike.

Despite the Qur’an

If this can still happen in a Muslim home despite the Qur’anic lesson, what is the value of life? Why would any sane person want to lose his life and his life hereafter just to gain vanity? See what avarice is doing to Muslim parents?

It is only for the reason of avarice that most Muslim parents do not see any necessity in giving their children such qualitative Islamic education as they do in the Western way. But Allah has a wonderful way of doing things.

Some of the children who could not be given secondary education some years past, because their parents were too poor, are professors in the universities today.

What else is worthy of pursuit in life? You are your children’s real school. Let them learn the value of real education in your conduct.

it may be tomorrow. God bless you all.

Femi Abbas

“I shall pass through this world but once; If therefore, there is any good that I can do or any kindness that I can show to any human being; Let me do it now; Let me not defer or neglect it, for I may not pass through this way again”

Monologue

It was as if the young Nigerian Muslim Journalist, Waheed Bakare, who departed the shores of this ephemeral world on Eidul Fitr day last Sunday, May 24, 2020,
knew the secret of the divine schedule of his death date.
His concept of life, despite his virtual indigent status, tallied perfectly with the above quoted poem in accordance with Islamic philosophy of humanitarianism and welfare management. That concept, which the deceased young man willingly adopted
as his guiding principle of life now represents the footprint which serves him in death as an irrigation that nourishes the seed of kind-heartedness and philanthropy by which he lived his life.

Preamble

Life is like a cycle which constantly rotates around a permanent axis. Whatever goes forth comes back. Whatever goes up comes down. In summer season, the sun rises in the East every day and travels to set in the West. It comes back the following day to repeat the same journey without losing its track. That is the divine will of Allah which no mortal being can ever change.

 

Parable of Life

Human life is like the rotation of the seasons in their turns. Seasons exchange batons on a quarterly basis. Spring, autumn, summer and winter, all come at their right time without one taking the place of another.

Children come into the world daily and grow up to become adults with time. Parents rear their children the way they, themselves, had been reared so that the cycle of life may continue after their demise. We sleep and wake up just as we eat and defecate almost daily until we are stopped by the supreme force that fixes and schedules everything in our lives. And our successors proceed from where we stop if only to keep the cycle of life rolling in continuity.

Human beings are like cash crops. We germinate into embryo from spermatozoa. We transform biologically from stage to stage until we blossom into youthful adolescents and grow up into productive adults just like fruitful trees. And, then, we begin to grey as an indication that we are starting to wither away like trees which leaves are turning into yellow or red colours. However, when the icy hand of death comes to pluck us like ripe fruits, the indication is that our transit visa in this ephemeral world has become automatically expired. But our journey still continues from the unknown to the unknown until we are summoned by our Creator to give the account of that journey.

 

Man’s Mission on Earth

No man comes into the world without a mission. The mission may be positive or negative. It may be completed or carried out half way. But what is common to all is a place in history which may serve as an encouraging guide for others or a warning against the vanity of human wishes or both. In man’s initial journey into the world, the soul is firmly in harmony with the flesh. Both work in tandem physically and spiritually. At that stage, a spade is always seen and called a spade. And that is why children are said to be innocent. But after some time, the flesh outgrows the soul and becomes like a mossy stone eagerly wishing to crush the fragile lily that the soul represents in human body.

At that stage, Satan begins to assemble his destructive tools with which to rework or dismantle man’s engine of life to enable him propel his own destructive mission. No one drives a car without an engine. But when the engine is removed from the car or damaged, the body of that car becomes immobile. The same is the case with the corpse of man after the exit of the soul. But blessed are those who do not nourish the flesh at the expense of the soul.

 

Waheed Bakare

The similitude of the cited car is like that of the life of the young man, Waheed Bakare, a Journalist, who, like a falcon, flew away forever while leaving the falconer behind. Waheed had a young wife and four young children of school ages. Now, neither the wife has a spouse to call her husband nor the children, the eldest of whom is just about 16 years old, have any bread winner they can call their father. Now, for that wife and her young children, the reality of life has avowedly come on board to distinguish itself from imagination. Every married Muslim wife can put herself in the position of Waheed’s wife. And, every Muslim father can imagine what could have become of those children if he were to be in the present position of Waheed Bakare. This is where we, Nigerian Muslims, should honestly re-examine ourselves about our practice of Islam.

 

The Lockdown on Zakah

Ordinarily, as responsible adherents of Islam, we should not be calling on members of the public for help whenever we have a case like that of Waheed at hand. Waheed was only lucky to be associated with people who can do that for his family. What about millions of other Muslims, widows and widowers as well as orphans and elderlies who have no means of reaching out to the public?   Zakah as a whole pillar of Islam should automatically take care of the underprivileged people and give us a befitting confidence as practitioners of Islam. But here we are in the hands of certain clerics who dogmatically believe that Zakah should serve as a protecting factor for the rich rather than for the poor. Those are the clerics who insist that the Nisab of Zakah must be based on the current price of gold as determined by the Jews who are globally known to be the principal merchants of gold. To those clerics, the Nisab of Zakah must be far, far ahead of the incomes of most Muslims.

The statutory facts of Zakah are clear and obvious. And, Islam is a dynamic, not a dogmatic religion. Zakah is the only pillar of Islam that touches the lives of others, especially the downtrodden poor. But in a Nigerian situation where Nisab is rising astronomically every year and the number of Zakah payers is geometrically dwindling just because it must be done as it was done in the time of the Prophet. As of now, the locally prescribes Nisab is about N1.74 million or thereabout. How many Nigerians of today can boast of such net income? Thus, in a situation like this, where is the statutory protection for the poor? Yet, thousands of Nigerians are going Hajj and Umrah regularly witout ever paying Zakah in a country where millions are helplessly wallowing in abject poverty.

This is one of the reasons why yours sincerely promised to open a new column on the problem of Zakah in Nigeria after Ramadan. That column will be entitled ZAKAH REVOLUTION. And, its main objective is to discuss regularly cluster areas of Zakah, based on evidential research until Nigerian Muslims really understand it to the benefit of Islam. As a columnist in the defunct Concord newspaper I started writing  on certain major issues in since 1982, when most Nigerian Muslims were not quite familiar with them. Among those issues were Zakah, Hijrah calendar, Hijab, Indebtedness in Islam as well as orphanage and Muslim Will.

 

Personal Concern

As a payer of Zakah, in my own little way, I do not pray to become a recipient of Zakah again in my life. But the shame to which Islam is being subjected through the ridiculous rampancy of begging in our society is a major concern of my life. As for the modalities of Zakah payment and the issue of Nisab, when we get to the bridge, we shall cross it through this column in sha’Allah.

 An Appeal as Usual

As a Muslim and a Journalist, if anything implacably constitutes an irritating nuisance to me, it is begging in the name of Islam. But, unfortunately, that is not just the fashion in vogue now in Nigeria, it has also become the principal norm by which Nigerian Muslims are known in the society. And some clerics believe invariably that such a nauseating norm is preferable to payment of Zakah on a reasonable and lawful Nisab even when earners of the monthly minimum wage of N30000 in Nigeria are paying tax to the government willy nilly.

 

Back to Appeal

Lest I forget, my appeal here is to kind-hearted Nigerians whose children are joyously and hopefully attending schools as well as those whose children have graduated, to please, join some others who have kindly indicated interest in giving a helping hand to Waheed’s family whose bread winner has fortuitously vacated the stage even without saying bye to his innocent children. It should ordinarily be the responsibility of the Muslim Ummah to rescue this young family from an impeding scourge of poverty if seriousness had be duly applied to the management of Zakah in Nigeria. Actually, but for the highly laudable efforts of some Muslim groups and organizations whose commendable efforts have opened the eyes of Nigerians to that pillar of Islam, Zakah would have been completely forgotten. To    unwreawake the consciousness of Nigerian Muslims on Zakah, the unwarranted lockdown rigidly imposed on Nisab of Zakah by some theoretical lerics in the name of the primordial norm is must be removed.

 

Bak Account Details

The Bank Account Details of the wife of Waheed Bakare are as follows:

Name of  Bank: First Bank

Account Number: 3148987691

Account Name:

Bakare Basirat Adekemi.

I pray the Almighty Allah to safeguard the lives of kind hearted Nigerians home and abroad, who are ready to rescue the lives of these innocent children from the cobweb of moral and education confusion that would have put them on an endless rigmarole. I pray the Almighty Allah never to subject the educational lives of your own children to begging.

Read the Poem Again

Meanwhile, while appreciating the marvellous gestures of some brothers and sisters who have been enquiring about the bank account details for assistance, I call on the readers of this article to please, read the top quoted poem once again and try to live by its contents. Yes, it is Waheed Bakare’s turn today even in the month of Ramadan, no one knows whose turn it may be tomorrow. God bless you all.

By Femi Abbas

The month of Ramadan in the life of a Muslim is an annual cleanser. It cleanses you of all the past misdeeds which border on irreligiousness. It is also a rejuvenator of the mind as much as it is a reformer of the soul.

By abstaining from eating and drinking for 30 or 29 days during the month, you have reinvigorated the organs of your body to your own advantage. And, by abiding by the rules and regulations of Ramadan, you have reshaped your lifestyle to suit your conscience.

Ramadan has taught you how to be closer to your Creator and Sustainer. It has taught you how to moderate your relationship with your fellow human beings, in the family, in the neighbourhood or in business. It has also taught you how to simplify your mind and tame your heart against wild conduct.

With Ramadan, you have learnt how to sympathize with the poor and the needy by offering them financial help, kind utterances and good conduct.

You have also learnt the futility of gluttony and greed. And, by recognizing the rights of others including your wife’s and your children’s, you have learnt how not to imprison your conscience again.

In the first ten days of Ramadan, you have been showered with Allah’s blessings. In the second ten days, you have been forgiven your sins. And, in the last ten days you have been liberated from the claw of Satan. During those days, you have woken up in the nights in obedience to the will of Allah. You have spent the days enduring thirst and hunger. You have also boosted your health with the exercise of fasting and praying.

In other words, you have become a renewed person before your Creator. Your slate of record has become clean of sins and full of rewards. And, now, you have banished the fear of death in you.

Having achieved all these, would you want to go back into a wild world dominated by fear of death?

The essence of Ramadan is to remind humanity that this world is a transit and not a destination. No one has ever come to stay permanently in this world and no one will ever do. Would you then want to be lost in transit with your luggage? That is the question you should always ask yourself after Ramadan. God bless you and Ramadan Karim