If there is a place where hypocrisy is deep-rooted and has become an art, it is no other place than Nigeria. Honestly, I love my countrymen because we are a bunch of jesters. Success is a process, not an event. Success is not something that happens per chance. We all know this, but we’re not ready to follow the process, yet we want to succeed somehow. Always believing that God will do it. Yes, God has His own responsibility, so also we have ours.
When Jesus Christ warned against hypocrisy-this deceitful act, this outward show, eye service, doing things for the sake of self-gratification and not for service to our country-over two thousand years ago, Nigerians were certainly among those He had in mind.
Nigeria is a country where the leaders and the led do things for the sake of self-gratification and not for the sake of service to the country. In short, patriotism is a lip service. All what the leaders, subordinates are after is not the good of the country, but what profits them. In short, the financial reward they stand to get, hence frauds, contract inflation as no one cares about the quality of service.
If not that we are hypocrites, we covet success and abhor failure with relish. Not that I covet failure, for no one does. Even when no one likes failure, it is an integral part of life. Without failure success can never be mastered.
What amuses me is that we, as a people, have refused to carry out our own responsibility believing that God will do it for us somehow. But it doesn’t work out that way. God expects us to do that which He has asked us to do, while he does His own part of the bargain.
Many would be wondering why this column seems to lack direction, against my style. The reason is that I am disillusioned going by the quality of facilities provided for the 2019 FIBA World Cup that held in China. I was there and I realised that we are not serious about sports in this country.
The truth is that despite that we abhor failure, we are not ready, do I say, prepared to do the needful for success to be part of our culture. Those who succeed in life go through a path that is never smooth. The path to success is filled with ups and downs, joys and sorrows. **Success is a function of sacrificing something for the other. In truth nothing good comes easy. But we want to have it the easy way in Nigeria. This is why at the verge of success the country always falters because we have refused to take that narrow path that leads to success.**
For example, no one wakes up one morning and becomes a physician-medical doctor. He or she must go through a designed educational programme that takes not less than 17 years before qualifying to be a physician. Ditto an architect, or any of the engineering courses, geology or any other course for that matter. Though the years required for these courses differ, truth is, one must go through the specific programme before becoming a professional.
The same principle also applies to sport. We want to be best in Africa because we see ourselves as the giant of Africa. We want to be recognised globally as a giant sporting nation, but we are not prepared to do the needful. We must discover the athletes, train them, provide up to date facilities for them, and ensure that the athletes get the necessary funding they need to concentrate on training so as not to engage in half measure training.
But we are not ready to do the above, hence we always undertake shortcuts. Use of players with questionable ages in age grade tournament has become the rule rather than the exception.
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