Nigeria Content Online

Ask many
Nigerians, especially a class of young people, why they are not
involved or supporting a particular movement or campaign for change,
and their response is simple: the people working for positive change
are ‘not serious’.

The tragedy for
most of these people is that this knee-jerk reaction to efforts to make
change, is neither supported by reality or facts. They criticize a
project for a lack of thoroughness and then you find that they have not
in fact taken their time to be thorough in their assertions. They
accuse a campaign of lacking vision or depth without even taking the
simple step of perhaps checking the accused website to confirm this
lack of vision. They criticize a petition without even reading its
contents. They dismiss networks as ‘group of friends’ without any
efforts to indeed verify that claim. They nitpick on credibility and
sustainability, without any iota of fact-checking on the matter on
which they so confidently mount a soapbox.

In a sense, it is
nothing unusual. Across the world, apathy is always driven by cynicism
– another form of resignation and helplessness that effectively hides
itself under a garb of worldy wisdom and realism. However, in this
case, this resignation is hardly quiet. It is in fact alive and kicking
– fed by its own sense of justification, even necessity.

It has always been
perplexing to me, for instance, that people who have not lifted a
finger to make a difference, even in the smallest way possible, are the
ones most vociferous in decrying double standards, insincerity, lack of
reach or some other inadequacy in those who have stuck their necks out.
Fortunately, I am not one of those who assume an invalidity of opinion
just because certain people do not have the street credibility of
‘working for change’. However, this peculiarly Nigerian syndrome throws
up a lot of interesting challenges for anyone who understands the
imperative of waking the people up from slumber and cynicism.

Perhaps, column by
column, we might be able to engage the dimensions of this problem. But
a good place to start is with those who make twin accusations – about
people whose work is, in their words, limited only to urban centers and
people who don’t go national. One of my pet frustrations is in fact
those people who seek to invalidate the work of others because their
work is not sufficiently (who measures?) national.

What is really the
imperative, or utility, in a country of 150 million, of any initiative
that seeks, immediately, to reach everyone across the country? Is it
really possible for any development activity to reach the nooks and
crannies of a country when even big-budget telecoms companies, fully
capitalized and with all the relevant human and material resources,
have been unable to do that over the past 10 odd years?

Because our
country is so large and our resources so little, it becomes necessary
to focus on an area of engagement and do that properly. The most
effective development modules appear, to this inexperienced eye, to be
those that are able to focus on their strengths or their ‘catchment’
areas – be they rural women, youth in the diaspora, single mothers or
widows. It only makes sense that people focus on an area of strength
and do the best they can.

In the bid to
‘reach scale’ or ‘go national’, many organizations have become mere
noise organs, stretched beyond capacity. Why, for instance, will a
group, in Ibadan, unable to reach all the local governments of that
state, be hell bent on taking its activities to the north west? What is
the utility in that ambitious goal that is yet to achieve depth in its
area of origin?

How do I think
Nigeria will change? Little by little, milestone by milestone, everyone
working in their corners of influence – that’s the way I think we all
can solve this problem.

Rather than
criticize those working for change in their little corners, why not
take a hoe and start digging where they are not and make the impact
that you so desire to see? That would be the best way to build that
nation we desire.

P.S: Please join
one such initiative by reading the 7-point demand to #ProtectTheCorpers
and signing the petition here:
www.thefuturenigeria.com/protectthecorpers. Let’s do our bit.