The Ministry of Information, Culture and Orientation must not be another fiction of deceit but an important tool of emancipation of our people, We are not communicating as a government because there seems to be a lacuna between those in government and a very critical sector of the population, the youths who have lost touch with government connection and programs. The youths are a critical sector of our population because without the youths the future is uncertain, any viable society built its future on its youths, in values, concepts, rules and regulations not excluding culture because they are the future of any society.
Information and orientation should not only be about politics but nation building, there cannot be nation building without the youths because any nation that had lost its youths not only lost its past but its future, while information is not only about informing, it goes beyond this to social, educational and economic knowledge to reposition.
We cannot make information and orientation an arm chair of office status but policy, we must use both print, electronic and town criers to sell best intentions of the government, through education, in values and orientation of the people. Our youths today are polluted with foreign values because we have become helpless to foreign media intruders and this was the same under Mohammadu Buhari junta that necessitated the “Andrew” advert, educating the youths and populace not to travel abroad illegally, highlighting the dangers of brain drain and illegal migrations, it flooded our media waves but if the military then that was not elected could easily connect with the mindsets of Nigerians, why not so under present Democracy?
Today politics is demonic; we play politics with region, our values, culture and politics over sanity, food, dress code and everything, et cetera. The dangerous aspect is that we are playing politics by destroying everything good while elevating everything bad like the house rat that destroys important books and documents because of our selfish intentions of greed and avarice. As Fela Anikulapo-Kuti puts it in one of his songs “The time when I dey inside prison, I call am outside world but when I commot inside prison, no be outside world but na craze world be that”. This is because in our prison world there seems to be sanity, inside prison there seems to be control but outside prison we have all manner of contradictions.
We have drug abuse despite the help of NAFDAC, it is booming daily because down the grass roots it a daily business with law enforcements arresting the poor users while the big shots who are financiers of this illicit drug trade are untouchable because they work hand in hand with local law officers who are financially settled. Drug trade is so pervasive in every nook and corner but what is the ministry of information, Health and orientation doing to discourage youths from dangers of drug abuse and also educate them by taking the war to the nook and cranny of the state? What are parents doing to confront their children and even report them to law enforcement agencies? What is government doing apart from speeches and elephantc statements? What are the agencies doing to help society and youths from the dangers and use of illicit drugs? What are concerned bodies like religious denominations doing to carry the campaign to our primary and secondary schools, even to higher institutions? What are they doing in setting up anti-drugs and cultism clubs in schools to sustain the campaign? What are they doing in engaging school heads and teachers across the state in collaboration with important agencies in the state to facilitate campaign against drug abuse?
Most times our greed and avarice blind our reason that today politicians are concerned about what they can get not what they can give and this blindness is polluting society unknowingly, this greed is everywhere in homes, streets and various working places and this is the tragedy destroying society today, if the good work Gov. Oborevwori is doing is complemented by everyone we would have a better state and a better society, as a political leader or appointee expected you discharge your duties very well;as a teacher you should be dedicated to duties, in whatever you are saddled with, you should execute it to the best of your ability. If everyone is doing the right thing, we would have uplifted the state, socially, politically, economically into stability. We must save the youths by sustaining the rule of law, enable a stable and better society, entrench a functional system where we are all seen as partners for a brighter futuristic future.
How can a society strive when an important part of its population called the youths are not taken care of? When they lack education and orientation? Ignorance is the greatest undoing and disease ravaging the youths today. When they indulge in crimes for survival and into drugs abuse, prostitution, immoralities and other strange acts detriment to upbringing? When crime is good if you are not caught or you have the muscle to bribe law enforcement agencies and escape justice?
We have entered a very dangerous era where we teach our school children that bribe is good and a social norm in society, what do we teach children as we take them to school in a public bus and they witness the bus driver bribing the policeman that stopped the bus on demand in the roads? Today money guides our life negatively; money is our god that even in religious ceremonies it dictates the pace! We need political agencies that can re-orientate our people from the state level to the grassroots; we need committed partners who can partner with law agencies, in schools and local governments to sell the mantra of government against these social ills destroying society.
This is the issue confronting us as a people, the illegal use of drugs is so common that relevant agencies, law enforcement agencies, advocacy groups need to have effective thinking to compliment the good work Gov. Oborevwori had begun, drugs is one danger confronting our youths and society, the campaign should not be left to the government alone but churches and religious groups should take it seriously as cardinal to the gospel of Christ for a better society, again community leaders and the traditional institutions should similarly be involved to compliment government because destroying the youth is destroying our future, the ministry of information and orientation agencies should act as monitors and co-ordination on the side of the state government, because we cannot encourage evil.
Another factor that is closely associated with drugs abuse is immorality and prostitution, it fuel and sustains it, immoral conduct, acts, nude dressing and prostitution are encouraged by greed, avarice and quest for easy quick money, we must curb these through discipline and values in our homes, the hallmark of any society is the home, it’s the basis for a stable family.
The failure of our youths could be tied to our individual homes, when parents fail in their responsibility, when parents fail to instill discipline and enforce it, when parents are not there for the children, it becomes a case of nobody is there to guide the children and through peers learn strange values that are inimical to their development and this is how the “borrow, borrow” culture comes in, no society encourages evil because any society that does is consumed by it, some youths put on earrings, in their nose and chains in legs, they shampoo hair, dress half naked and go against normal social norm, they sustain their greed with crime, the question is where are the parents? Some parents are negligent but so many others are not, yet the children deliberately went astray.
However, in individual homes, parents must compliment government to have a stable, better society, the task of a good and better society does not lie with the government alone but with the society at large, if we must have a society sustained by the rule of law.
The youths have lost it, there is absence of patriotism and self-worth, many are ready to sell themselves including the country and their ancestral landmarks to feed their greed and the outcome is calamity plaguing our norms and values, you can see this for the love of foreign tastes and football, our youths have developed inordinate love and knowledge for foreign clubs that in every vicinity you have Arsenal, Manchester united, PSG, Inter Milan, Barcelona, Chelsea and Real Madrid et cetera club fans that whenever they are playing, the streets is Jam-packed with supporters, pro and against, making the vicinity a noise gong but ask them about Nigerian clubs, they know nothing and their attachment to these foreign leagues is another way we lose foreign exchange to these foreign interests.
The love and zeal shown to foreign leagues if showed to our local clubs could speedy development. Another factor is our women, the African woman have lost their culture and values, they act, think, dress in foreign attires, put on wigs and other attachment, they put on false hips, buttocks and renovate their body with eye lashes as Delilah did in the Bible, but the African woman have a culture just as the Indian because when you meet an Indian you know through their culture but the African woman is lost in Identity and even if those in power could not show us how much they value culture of identity, how much more would the downtrodden do?
Part of the colonial mentality of disrespecting Nigeria doesn’t only lie with our renegade youths but some adults who administer our sports and football, is it not strange we hire a foreign white coach to coach our football national teams when we have retired football stars that played football in the best of the leagues in Europe, won laurels before retiring? The question is why do we prefer unknown coaches who were never the best in their playing days in Europe to manage our football? We prefer foreign coaches maybe because of envy for one of our own, ethnic and other considerations, like corruption, because hiring an unknown foreigner with modest football knowledge, when we have the best is unfortunate. We could see that our football administrators who hire these foreign substandard coaches are not different from the legion of youths that deify and have unquenchable love, adoration and stigma for foreign football teams over love and patriotism for the development of Nigerian teams like Lobi stars, Bendel insurance and others. Our love for foreign goods over Nigerian goods is encouraging poverty, creating unemployment, stigmatizing production and services of goods which is not good for the Nigerian economy. We must produce what we use and eat if we must have a buoyant economy, if our women could have value for our culture as the Indian women do, they would do away with foreign European hairstyles, and wigs et cetera to embrace traditional African hairstyle that is distinct and save the country foreign exchange.
How can the naira improve in value when we don’t produce and our love for foreign importation is high? How can the economy revived when we patronize everything foreign, including strange culture, values and even food? We are the architect of the falling standard of the naira, our youths not only patronize foreign clubs and our football administrators hire foreign coaches to be paid in dollars not in naira. The value we give is the same depreciated value we get, Nigeria is not only sinking but dyeing, ‘Japa’ is a Yoruba word that has been elevated to a national slang of acceptance, similar to why the military government in the 1980s did the advert ‘Andrew’ to discourage illegal migration abroad but today it has assumed a very alluring proportion that important government agencies are not paying attention to discourage the exodus of our youths to Europe and this has encouraged professionals who too have joined in the madness called “Japa”.
The government must do something to curb the lures of foreign illegal migrations in the mentality of “Japa” by our youths, aggressive campaigns are needed in both electronic and print media, we also need to involve state governments and communities, we need to inform traditional rulers of the dangers inherent in the illusion called “Japa” by our youths, we also need to use same energy to campaign against abuse of drugs that is more common among our youths and while this is ongoing, we need to also engage critical stakeholders and strengthen law enforcement agencies to live up to expectation by not only arresting the youths who use these illicit drugs but by cracking down on the drug barons who are financially rich and powerful but above the law. It is very sad to see poor, vulnerable youths who buy and use these products; arrested but the drug barons untouchable! It is a sad reality that confronts our quest to fight against illicit drugs, and if one may ask are the agents of these drug barons and the drugs baron’s ghosts that cannot be arrested? Why arrest only the end users? The youth is very important to economic and political stability and that’s why nations invest on their youths, we cannot have a society with values, morals, economic boom, and political stability if we fail to invest on our youths, we just have to invest on the youths if we desire a better country now and in the nearest future.
Prince Akpo. Abugo
Wrote from Uzere Delta State.
