The American diatribe

By Anonymous

The United States Department of State has warned its citizens of the dangers of visiting Nigeria.

In a travel advisory recently posted on its website, the department warns that crimes such as armed robbery, assault, carjacking, terrorism, civil unrest, kidnapping, rape and piracy, is common throughout the country.

Reading the release, I expected to read that the American Embassy and Consular offices were being shut down, ditto, American businesses and organisations, and Americans being evacuated!

See the issues:

ARMED ROBBERY
The incidence we have does not require an official American intervention. And much has been done and is being done to reduce it, especially in Lagos, and in many states. Governments are spending on vehicles, arms, equipment and monitoring devices, and we can all see the upsurge in evening social activities and movement, proof that its a safer city of 24 million Nigerians and foreigners.

In the US, California recorded the largest number of bank robberies with 805, followed by Texas (464), Ohio (263), and Florida (243)

ASSAULT
Now, what is assault? Who is being assaulted? Are people not assaulted every four minutes in New York? This is official from the NYPD: Murders and rapes have increased in New York City so far this year. The city recorded 147 murders between Jan. 1 and June 30, an 8% increase from the same period in 2017, police data shows.

In Chicago, as of Dec. 25, the medical examiner had declared 539 deaths in 2018 as homicides. The Sun-Times has counted 542 murders in Chicago in 2018 as of Dec. 25. The Chicago Police Department has said 555 people have been murdered in the city as of Dec. 23.

More than half of Baltimore’s 309 homicide victims in 2018 were shot in the head, according to the police department’s annual homicide analysis released Wednesday. There were 175 victims with fatal head wounds last year, which accounted for 57 percent of all homicides.

TERRORISM
This is the definition of TERRORISM according to the UN: the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims. Boko Haram is pure murder; they have not defined any political doctrine but have been hiding under vicious religious proclamations. And terrorism is global, with quite a few of them as backlash against American duplicity. So why cite Nigeria alone?

CIVIL UNREST
Where? And if this happens in a non violent way, it is proof that we are exercising democratic rights as done in all civilised places daily. Where were the Americans when for weeks the French turned Paris upside down with their Yellow Vests protest? Why didn’t Herr Trump declare France an unsafe place to visit?

Indeed if there is a place that is unsafe, I daresay its the US, where easy access to assault weapons sees the regular decimation of lives. Let the US and its bully President sort out this violence.

A few years ago, the US classified Nigeria a “drug nation”. The irony was all of the drugs consumed in Nigeria was not even up to what was being consumed by addicts in the Bronx area of New York!

I will not waste my time commenting on the rest.

Under Fashola as governor, and with tremendous efforts to clean up and beautify Lagos, the BBC did a scathing documentary that Lagos was covered in filth; no effort was spared in diminishing the positive things Fashola was doing; no effort was made to show some of the improvements.The BBC forgot to show us the residence of the British High Commissioner and its High Commission covered in filth!

Someone must be prepared to engage the US and the West on this systematic attack, instead of diverting energies to publishing the names of Nigerians caught in crimes in the Middle East. The West had insisted Nigeria would disintegrate a few years ago. They had said this 2019 election would split and destroy the country. The other day, there were doomsday prophecies from the New York Times against us for doing business with China; but America wouldn’t give us what China is doing!!! the Economist attacks us in every weekly issue!

WHILE WE ARE NOT A PERFECT NATION OR PEOPLE YET, AND NONE IS, WE MUST BE PREPARED TO PROMPTLY RESPOND ROBUSTLY TO THIS DIATRIBE AND BLACKMAIL.