MAVERICKS, HERETICS AND REBELS

This piece was inspired by the recent happenings in the country and the desire for a better Nigeria.

Early this week, I watched an Indian movie title: “Gabbar is Back” and it was worth the watch. The main character of the film doubled as a College Professor and a Vigilante on a war against corruption in his country, had a large team who had keyed into his vision and dream to stamp out corruption in the country by factually investigating corrupt officials in government, kidnapping and sometimes executing them as well.

Gabbar became an unseen voice with a seen result. His crusades pierced every corrupt heart with fear and led some to radical and immediate repentance. Succinctly, from top government officials, who are used to enriching their accounts at the expense of the poor masses down to even cab drivers, corruption became a monster dreaded by all and sundry. Hence, one can certainly say, the fear of Gabbar was the beginning of the end of corruption.

Subsequently, Gabbar exposed a corrupt business tycoon who owned a private hospital that has been juicing its patients unjustly; even to the point of receiving payment for the treatment of a man who was long dead. The same owner of the hospital happened to be responsible for the dead of hundreds of people in a collapsed building, Gabbar’s wife inclusive. At the climax of the film, Gabbar surrendered, only to the amazement of people to know that he is the most loved and popular Professor in one of their National College.

Explaining the brain behind his course, Gabbar said that he started out to raise a movement, carried by like-minded and value-minded youths, young men and women who are not comfortable with the status quo of corruption in high places, and are ready to die for the true freedom of their country. Gabbar was tried and executed, but before then, he addressed thousands of youths and students, telling them that they all are Gabbars, urging them to carry on the course of fight against corruption and shape out the kind of world they and the next generation will be proud of.

So much of Gabbar, what is the gist of this piece? Lately, I have been discussing with my circle of value-minded friends, and we often agree that we owe our generation so much, seeing that the conveniences we are enjoying  was born out of the inconveniences of some selfless people in the past. And truly, unless we are bonded by a worthy course, bended towards the direction of achieving same and branded as one people in the fight to change our generation, the next generation will have no world at all to live in.

The above anecdotes may just be a movie, but I tell you the picture painted therein is no different from our current reality in this part of the world. Lately, several government officials have been called to account for their offices, we can remember how dramatically shrewd and rather pathetically dumb the exercise turned out to be. Isn’t it alarming how corruption has deeply ingrained in the system and we are doing little or nothing against it? Are you not worried how that soon anything done without the touch of corruption will be a capital offence in this part of the world? I am deeply concerned about this and every other thing that is not working well in this country.

Beyond words without action, above perfunctory awareness, and faraway from withdrawing into the shell of passivism, the time has come for us the reach out with every weapon in our arsenal as youths in this battle for the future, and the future is now. This may require us becoming mavericks, heretics and rebels, but for a worthy course. This will also demand that we lay down our comforts, selfish ambition and everything that divides us on the sacrificial altar of unity and collective efforts. Indeed, the song writer Timi Dakolo captured it beautifully well; ‘we’re all we have”.

You see, for a start, our effort may seems small but significant; nothing big started big. The seeds start with our individual selves, detesting every act of corruption and everything that will harm us as people, this will then ripple to our immediate communities, worship centres and then to every organized system; public or private. Again, it also begins with you and me, speaking out against wrong regardless of the cost in our little areas of influence.

Borrowing from the film Gabbar, we also need to create a network of value-minded, selfless and patriotic young minds who wants nothing but the best for our generation. This is because no worthy course is ever executed in isolation, and as John C. Maxwell will always say: “One is too small a number to achieve greatness”. Again, we owe our generation a great debt of service, I know this may not go down well with some Nigerians, but I tell you, you have everything to lose if you fail to contribute your quota in changing the narrative of this country, – last last na this country we go dey, we die here.

If there is any right time is now, if there are any right people it is the youths, and if there is any right place it is right here, this very country. What will posterity remember you for? What will be added to your name when you are no more? What harvest will you approach God with as your service to humanity? These are the questions on my mind right now and they are pushing me into action first as a person, second as a Christian and most importantly, a patriotic Nigerian. I pray they push you into action as well.