WHERE DO WE BEGIN TO RE-BRAND NIGERIANS?

I have lived all my life in Nigeria. Expectedly, I should have thoroughly imbibed the sprit and culture of Nigeria. Fortunately or should I say unfortunately, (because the lesson from the following story has left a big burden on my mind) within the decade, I have had few opportunities to travel out of Nigeria. My first of such travels became for me, an eye opener- I have had to live with the burden of the desire for us as a people to do things right.

Sometime ago, on my first visit to the United States, I was traveling on a bus from New Jersey to Maryland. At some point we had a stop over at a petrol station. As we approached the station, the driver of the bus announced to us that we would be stopping for five minutes. I thought within me, that, that was a good opportunity for me to get myself a light refreshment as I was beginning to get hungry.

On getting down from the bus, I made for the small store within the petrol station; picked some snacks and drinks from the shelf. As I moved to the clerk to pay for these items, I found a number of people on a queue wanting to do the same. So I joined the queue. At some point, I realised that the time to get back to my bus was very near and I still had a few more people ahead of me on the queue. In my seemingly normal way of reasoning, I decided to move ahead of the queue to the clerk to try to hurry her up. I believed most of the people on the queue were not traveling and so should understand. I said to the clerk, in, a raised voice “Why don’t you hurry up so we don’t miss our bus, couldn’t you see that there are many people on the queue? You are just too slow, am on a journey and my bus is about to take off. Please answer me and let me leave this place” in my own opinion she was wasting too much time with every individual. If I was expecting the response I got to those statements it would have been a lot better for me. I was not. Almost in a split second, all eyes turned to me in a manner like “where on earth is this man from? Why is he so indecent and un-couth? Gush! And perhaps, many more of such questions running through the minds of practically everyone present, from the looks on their faces.

On her part, the lady clerk asked me just two questions. The first was “did the bus driver mention in his announcement that you have only five minutes to stay at this station? Second was “when you got into the store did you figure, that with the number of people you met on the queue, five minutes would be enough for you to take your turn? Sincerely, I just could not answer those questions because at that point I had realised how un-acceptable my behaviour was. I was so ashamed of myself. That experience and the shame I felt has been for me un-forgettable.

I decided to share this experience for some reasons. Amongst them, the fact that in Nigeria and especially in Lagos from where I came, that behaviuor wouldn’t have been viewed in any bad light, it would have been a normal thing to do in the face of the circumstance. As a matter of fact, other people would have joined in raising their voices too. Today, when I look at our society, I realise how much we have lost in terms of mannerism and simple etiquettes. Thinking that these actually cuts across all the strata of our society, regardless of status, makes me weep inside. This obviously is part of the reasons we have so much image problem. Have you witnessed an average customer service desk of a typical Nigerian bank? how 10 or more people try to speak to the customer service officer at the same time, New or old generation banks, it doesn’t mater, or an average fast food restaurant, street corner supermarkets or store, petrol stations, name it. Everywhere you go, this is the norm. Sad enough, nobody seems to notice that something is wrong. I have witnessed situations where some so called mystery shoppers would approach a bank’s customer service officer and put up this same show of shame as a way of trying to measure the officer’s ability to handle such horrible situation. How well she handles it is the measure of how good she is at the job. In my opinion, these mystery shoppers should, rather than encourage people to behave this way, urge the bank to encourage their customers to behave decently. It would be a great service to the nation.

It’s a common sight to see people roll down the windows of their expensive looking air-conditioned cars, to throw dirt’s on the street. Even in a modern city like Abuja, as good as the roads are, and in spite of the comparatively light traffic, you would notice that whenever a driver stops at a junction to make a turn say to the left, maybe at a traffic light, while waiting, any car coming behind that car at the junction, rather than stay behind the car in front, even if its just the two of them, would prefer to stay beside it. Thereby creating a second lane and the next car creates a third lane. Meanwhile they will all try to merge into just one lane on the left when the green light comes on. Most times they end up behind each other eventually. This does not mean anything to anybody. It’s the norm. What a people? How crazy.

Correct any wrong doing in this country and hear people’s response. Watch our children, the way they have religiously imbibed these spirits. Attempt to correct them and watch the expression of surprise on their faces. As if saying “what’s wrong with what I have done”

The question is how did we get here? Many have blamed these on prolonged military rule. But isn’t the military said to be a highly disciplined people? When General(s) Buhari and Late Tunde Idiagbon tried to instill the spirit of discipline in us in the eighties how did we react to it. Is anything generally wrong with our make up as Nigerians?

Do we have a future? If we do, then where do we begin from?

May God help us?