THE CHANGE AGENDA. By Chigozie Amadi

It’s no secret that I have said that eradicating political corruption would not suffice in Nigeria. Change or transformation is uniquely an ideal with comprehensiveness. Today, we have a new president who stresses “change”, a national budget of his own. Ben Bruce asked why $1 m dollars is given to the African Writers association, instead of the Nigerian Writers body,? And this is in our national budget. Those kinds of questions are necessary and valid. Charity commences from home. Anyway, now, I hope we as a nation fully understand the scope of change. For over two decades, Nigeria has failed to live up to its claim as the giant of Africa. In fact, we have been the deserving butt of jokes and mockery by the outside world, while our citizens are equally stereotyped, enslaved, falsely imprisoned, and even condemned to death in nations whose citizens in Nigeria are impunitively violating our laws. If we must be asked to embrace and celebrate “Change”, it must be seen and felt. We cannot continue to follow old models and attitude. Certain incidents last year did not help but give me reasons to be hopeless. And these were all in one month. If one travels back to the rest of the past year and decades, you would be greeted by scenes that despicably force you to draw conclusions that we are perpetually crude, uncultivated, and uncivilized. The remedy (Change) we must then seek, is the kind that precludes us from being viewed with mockery, being perceived as uncivilized. Not long ago, we saw our citizens being made to use ladder to climb out of an airplane. The world took notice, some nations mocked us, and yet we did not see our “Change” government transparently demand explanation, levy fines and take measures to discourage such dangerous, demeaning image. Then, we saw people pushing planes and our leadership was silent. In Nnewi, a fuel truck exploded and leadership, state or federal, remained mute. The dead were thrown into open trucks, their blood and fluid streaming down our roads to their final destination. Could one imagine the trauma we expose our children everyday, driving them down the roads and seeing these gory sights? The same with all these years that Boko Haram has been blowing up Nigerians. We cannot accord the dead any dignity. The mass burial of victims of Army massacre of Shiites also depict us as a nation unprepared for civilization. Nigeria could care about African Writers by giving them $1 million dollars, but disregards decency and honoring our innocent dead. We can make all kinds of fashion clothes, but yet we cannot make bags to place our dead as civilized nations do. We do not see the need to include funds in our budgets for ambulances, Emergency Response teams. The incidents like Nnewi and road accidents everyday, are enough to provoke any government to enact laws to prevent repeat occurrences, and budget for equipment to respond to such tragedies. Our restaurants and food selling places are situated in places so unhygienic, and the fact that anyone can wake up, cook anything and sell to the public, compromises our health and safety. Yet, we keep living and approving such models. Our government’s silence on matters of safety, decency, fairness, national image, pain and suffering of our people is equally tragic. And this extends to local governments. Social upheaval hardly describes our condition. We defecate and urinate under the sun and moon, and yet there are no laws to curb our primitive instincts. How can there be “Change” faced with all these inhumaneness, incivility, insensitivity, and inaction? What is the criteria or standard of our “Change? Can we truly change?