By MFON OFFIONG
For some Nigerians who dont know, let me tell them that the United Kingdom is a very small country compared to Nigeria. Though they colonized us (that’s where it ends), they are not our mate. Note that the United Kingdom (UK) is made up of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Based on Worldometer elaboration of the latest United Nations data, the population of Nigeria as at April 22nd, 2021 is 210,218,749 while that of the U.K is 68,172,895 (Broken down into England 84%, Scotland 8%, Wales 5%, and Northern Ireland 3%).
Let’s even assume that 70% of Nigerians are ‘poor’ and 30% of Nigerians are ‘not poor’. Simple arithmetic shows that the number of Nigerians who are ‘not poor’ is bigger than the population of England (57,265,232).
I suspect that the strategy of the West is to make you focus on the negatives so as destroy your self esteem and put you down. They want you to be obsessed with the negatives and the extremely poor in Nigeria, but have you asked them to give you the statistics of the rich in Nigeria?
They won’t talk about it. Why? Because if they tell you that half of Nigerians (50%) are above the poverty line which they drew using their own metrics, and that 1/3rd of Nigerians (33%) are rich; your eyes will open. This is because, ab initio, you will realize that over 100million (50%) Nigerians are above the poverty line and that 33% of 210million which is about 70million Nigerians are rich. The population of England (22nd April 2021) is 57,265,232; it is not up to 60million. The population of the entire UK today is
68,172,895; it is not up to 70million. They will rather frame the talking points to shift your focus to the 50%/ 100million Nigerians who are poor, not the 50%/ 100million Nigerians who are not poor or the 33%/70million who are rich.
Can you see what I mean? Presumably, their media like the BBC is a tool to destroy your self worth by making you focus on the negatives and the extremely poor.
I have once said that we should stop our excessive focus on the extremely poor in Nigeria. This is because its the rich that can pay the taxes that can be redistributed to help the poor. Nigeria should focus on the rich (which is a strength) to get the right perspective and self esteem to tackle its peculiar challenges one of which is lifting the poor from poverty. The money to lift the poor from poverty should come from the taxes the rich pay so we should interrogate if those who ought to pay tax, are actually paying taxes.
In conclusion, Nigerians should know that many predatory countries out there envy us and will want us dismembered for the picking, we should realize that we are bigger together and should not allow anyone to look down on us. Stop genuflecting. Stop seeing yourselves as inferior. If our fathers succumbed to physical colonization, we should not succumb to mental colonization. Nigeria is and will always be the greatest black nation on earth. Foreign agents and saboteurs with little minds living in the U.K., Nigeria or anywhere can’t divide Nigeria. Our military is equal to the task of protecting our territorial integrity and will rise up to the challenge when the need arises.
Respect the UK and its people to the extent that they respect you because respect they say, is reciprocal. But please, don’t genuflect for them.
God bless Nigeria. Long live Africa.
