The Guru Sunday Broadcast – Nigeria moves speedily closer to the cliff

Every one of us understands the word CLIFF, The Guru rightly believes. Some may say, however that such conclusion might as well be one erroneous assumption. For the sake of the latter, let us attempt defining the world again, before taking off with today’s assignment.

A Cliff can easily be described as:

1.?????? A mass of rock that rises very high and is almost vertical, or straight up-and-down. Cliffs are very common landscape features. They can form near the ocean, high in mountains, or as the walls of canyons and valleys.

2.?????? A very steep, vertical, or overhanging face of rock, earth, or ice.

3.?????? Steep slope or steep and rugged face of mountain

Above might just be few meanings of what cliff stands for, and there are few of them [cliffs] scattered around our beloved country – Nigeria. There is quite a few, terrifying, around the Mambila, in North-East Nigeria. Ditto few, not too frightening anyway, in the South-West Zone; mostly within the States of Ondo, Osun and Ekiti.

Talking of Nigeria moving faster to a cliff gives me worries so much – maybe, because of my knowledge of the second highest mountain in Europe, Mountain Dijon in France, about two and half hours’ drive from Geneva through the auto barn Way to Paris.

The most fearful thing about the road to the top of the mountain is the fact that, starting from when one turns off to the right - coming from Geneva, until one gets to the top of the place, it is most horrifying to look toward the right. And reason being the reality of this cliff that suggests the idea of a “bottomless pit” and a very sharp bend along the climbing till one gets to the top. Return journey is never different.

Another word that can be freely used in place of Cliff is Precipice, because to say that someone is on the edge of a precipice, simply meant that they are in a dangerous situation in which they are extremely close to disaster.

I think that is where Nigeria is currently. if we will pragmatically, judiciously and honestly evaluate things in our country today, we shall never be far from coming to this conclusion.

As we come into tomorrow, Monday, September 16, 2024, The Guru shall be throwing some of these facts into the public domain of the Nigerian people for discussion, at Lagos Talks 91.3 FM. But before that crucial hour – which starts from 0930 hours, let us have a preview of part of the Menu.

There is no gainsaying that the Nigerian economy, as things stand today, remains tattered, battered, and hopelessly lying comatose. Some people might even say that it is at the edge of liquidation.

Or succinctly put, the caption of this thesis - Nigeria moves speedily closer to the cliff, would just be enough for many to describe our economic situation. The irony of it all is that while our President; Bola Ahmed Tinubu, his appointed members in the Executive, and all members in the legislative branch of the government, live in a lavish lifestyle with abundant recklessness, the citizens are being told to endure the pains of abject squalor, that both wicked and inhuman policies of the Executive have submitted them to.

In addition, the citizens must not talk of the pain they are going through. For anyone that dares to talk, detention awaits him or her. The circumstances of the ordinary citizen on comparative analysis, is looking like better than what he/she went through during the Military Junta of yesteryears.

While Nigerian are fast loosing hope on the President, they “suffered” to elect to office, bad news cloud into the dark tunnel created for them by the government. What it means to the Nigerian citizenry is that all hopes are lost.

Who will ever imagined that President Bola Tinubu-led administration, over the last three months approved and paid Seven Hundred Million, Seven Hundred Thousand, Five Hundred and Thirty-Two Naira [?700,707,532] for the First Lady’s foreign trips to five countries, including two African nations.

In addition, the government spent a total sum of ?314,231,472 on six programmes of the First Lady within four months.

What about the events of May 24, 2024, when Rock of Ages Total Events Centre Ltd received the sum of ?131,921,786 for full-scale decoration of State House events for the First Lady’s programmes for women, youth, and children.

For decoration only?

Yes, you heard me well enough.

Nigeria’s calamity is not all about the presidency alone. Every stratum of the Nigerian Executive is a “killer” by their individual rights – be it the Federal, State or the Local Government. Except, that attention is more focused on the federal government hence the clamour for the President. Otherwise, they are all involved.

For example, how much do you know about the tornado in Zamfara State now, after a linked memo showing financing of terrorism and banditry against highly placed personae dramatis?

Won’t you agree that all these heart-devastative metaphor are not indicator of the Nigerian Nation State gravitating toward a Cliff?

Weep not however, as it is not all about bad news in Nigeria. There are some comforting tidings.

For example, The Guru reported last week that the Inspector General of Police went after some Killer Squad and dangerous armed robbers within the Police Force and got Six of them arrested.

There is additional good news. The Three Million Naira those notorious-armed-robbers-police-officers extorted from Citizen Isaac, has been handed over back to the victim, and The Guru considered it enough of good news to be discussed with fanfare.

These are just few Teasers for tomorrow, by the grace of God, at the Studio of Lagos Talks 91.3 FM, under the scientific command of The Guru.

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Godwin Etakibuebu; a Veteran Journalist, wrote from Lagos.

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You can also listen to this author [Godwin Etakibuebu] every Monday; 9:30 - 11am on Lagos Talk 91.3 FM live, in a weekly review of topical issues, presented by The News Guru [TNG].