The Nigerian elite has become more cruel than the slave master and more dangerous than the colonial master. The slave master put our ancestors to work, and our hands helped build America and parts of the Arab world. The colonial master recognised our capacity for labour, made us cultivate our own land, and then left with the proceeds. Everywhere we find ourselves, we build, be it at home and abroad. But our own elites cannot see that same building power in us. They will not use it to raise Nigeria. Instead, they carry the little that remains to foreign lands. As we speak, hardly any of them receive treatment in Nigeria. If they do, it is certainly not in our general hospitals.
It was the colonial master who discovered the oil we now depend on. Left to our elites, oil would still be lying useless beneath our feet. They saw our trees. In Sapele, they built African Timber and Plywood (AT&P). They established corporations. Their only offence was repatriating what they made to their own country. But why shouldn’t they? The Bible says that a man is entitled to the fruit of his labour. Proverbs 14:23 says, “Hard work brings a tangible profit, whereas mere talk leads only to poverty.” Come to think of it, are we not indirectly begging to be colonised again, inviting foreign investors and promising them 100% repatriation of their profits?
Now, let us consider the Parable of the Tenants in Luke 20:9–19. If you fail to cultivate what God gives you, it will be taken and given to those who will use it well. Consider also the fig tree: Jesus cursed a fruitless fig tree, as documented in Matthew 21:18–22 and Mark 11:12–25. Today, our young ones are learning to speak Chinese; the same China that was hungry in the 1970s. Someone said that if we are not careful, we will be colonised again. I laugh: we are colonised now, not just by our elite but by our inability to cultivate our own land. God has no place for a lazy man. “No food for a lazy man” is a popular saying rooted in the biblical principle in 2 Thessalonians 3:10: “For even when we were with you, this we commanded you: that if any would not work, neither should he eat.” Proverbs has various descriptions of lazy men.
As for slavery, there was a time when we were forced into slave ships to the West. Today, our young men and women are forcing themselves onto the ship to become slaves. I am in the UK today, not because I refused to work, not because my land is not blessed, but because my blessed land has now become a curse. The Nigerian elite took the little proceeds the colonial master left and imposed harsher conditions on us. Unable to fight, I left, but this fight will and must come on a later date. The bottom line is that our elites lack the ability to govern. Today, our elites have doubled. They have doubled as politicians and pastors, all making life unbearable for the ordinary Nigerian.
To call them corrupt would be an insult to corrupt people. Our elites are morally and intellectually bankrupt. Election 2027 is here, and I cannot sleep when I open Facebook and see village opportunists calling themselves politicians. What an insult. Politics simply means management. Tinubu and Oborevwori are only good at subduing us. These men cannot tap into our ability. They cannot dress and keep our land as God instructed. We are indeed a wasted generation. “The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.” (Genesis 2:15).
