Much as I am pained by the unfortunate incident of the Dana Air Crash that claimed at least 153 lives, much as I am moved by the realization that I my preferred airline has been Dana and I have flown it more than 30 times this year, I sincerely am bothered by the hypocrisy surrounding so many comments I’m seeing all over the place. I’m sure you are wondering what’s this all about, please be patient, don’t judge the book until you have read its content.
Bad news sells, I guess, otherwise I don’t understand why we are gradually making an industry out of the ill fate of others. The newspapers brandish the faces of the deceased via the air crash, they eagerly produce the manifest and show the names of those who met with their untimely death. In all this, we all quite easily overlook how many people died at that very same sight that were either at home on their beds, or in church in service after service. We talk about the 153, and we subtly ignore the 25! What exactly is the noise about?
I got an sms, purportedly from a church, about how not to pay lip service to the people that died on the plane crash. How a certain pastor had spent sleepless nights the previous nights worried about a solution to the family of the deceased, and how there is a plan to get people to contribute money together to sponsor a widow, sponsor a child or sponsor a family bereaved. While all these are noble, they do not allay my worry – “What about the scores who died from the 26 car explosions on Lagos-Ibadan express way the previous day? What about those who died in the bomb blast in Bauchi, while in church the same morning?
All of a sudden, I see people waxing lyrical and being touched by the fate of those alive, and the “choicelessness” of those about to die. I see people all of a sudden seeing a reason to witness, or just a reason to hook up lyrics to mourn the dead. These are great, don’t get me wrong, but what about those who crashed on the same day without celebrity effects? What about those whose crash was motivated by malaria, or those inspired by typhoid, what of those driven by childbirth or ordained by bad roads? How many do we want to count of good teeth in a rotten mouth? Why don’t we leave the leaves and together face the roots of our problems? Do you know that as number 4 on the highest death rate list in the world, at 16.06 per 1000, we actually have approximately 7,031 people who die in Nigeria daily? At 153 per plane, that’s over 45 Dana crash equivalents per day! Unfortunately, on most of those days, we don’t paint black, we don’t make a show out of their demise, nor do we get creative about the families of the departed, or the fate of those gone. We simply move on!
Am I writing so that we move on? No, I’m saying let’s stop patronizing the current issue and appearing hypocritical. Let’s ask ourselves the tough questions and face the answers, “What is the root of all these mishaps?”. I have thought about it, and if you have, I believe you will agree with me. At the heart of our issues is the fact that as a nation, we are led by wicked and incompetent leaders. Their wickedness is not really in what they do at night or behind the scenes, their strongest credential for wickedness is their incompetence. When the wicked rule, the people are destined to mourn, it is the reign of those who do right and are competent that leads to joy. If 153 flight class people’s death can create so much connection among Nigerians, what do you think will happen if we decide to really pay attention to the 7,031 daily deaths?
Every time I arrive at the Nigerian airport, I am reminded of the fact I had come to discover, “That until we fix our nation from the top, we would continue to get shame from the things that are ours collectively”. We are a nation at risk! Our doctors cannot guarantee that our drugs are safe and authentic, journeying on our roads are aptly described by a senator as a macabre dance. In the air, we are unsure, at home, uncertain, even in our places of worship, we are screened for bombs, indicating no guarantees. When we cross the roads, we look left, look right, look down and also have to look up. We make light our predicaments, by paying fairly for the services of jesters, we sing away our sorrows, drown our worries in alcohol and move on in 3 days like nothing happened.
Here is a call to keep our eyes on the ball. For as long as we do not participate actively in the call to ensure proper leadership in our country, for as long as we do not step up from voting to participating, for as long as our only contribution to society is reactive, for as long as we do not engage the services of our mind and resources to dislodge incompetence from public offices, we would remain like hen in a pen, waiting for our day to come!
16 thoughts on “Air Crash – What’s all the Hypocrisy?”
The crash is a very painful incident. But we seem to forget that many people die daily on our bad roads as do those that die in our poorly equipped hospitals. In fact, I believe that some of the crash victims might have been saved assuming we had proper emergency-management facilities in the country. It’s just like you said, we don’t need to wait until a sensational occurrence like this crash occurs before we start tackling the root causes of these deaths. Bomb blasts have now become so regular that we almost see them as normal! Personally, I believe that the starting point is the quality of leadership. 2015 (or sooner) is therefore a very important year for us. Of course, closely following is the quality of the led too. Because whether we like it or not, the leaders we have had so far are not from the moon but from among us.
Thank you sir. I am glad you are voicing this out. Thousands die daily, their deaths have become so common that we begin to look for ‘uncommon’ deaths to mourn. What is wrong with our minds, our consciences – a bad thing has to change its ‘mode of occurrence’ for us to know its bad. God help us.
CM, you took this from my mouth this morning ooooo.
All rants and not action. My BB is full of “the Kingdom of God is coming message” because of the Plane Crash. I bet mortality rate at Child Birth might be more than that but ……………
What’s all the hypocrisy?The Senate calling for Dana Air to be grounded and a certain govt official suspended;where were they when a federal lawmaker ordered his orderlies to beat to pulp,a certain FRSC official who prevented the legislator from violating traffic rule.What’s all the hypocrisy!
Thank you Deolu, I said it from day one it should have been a three days national mourning for bad leadership in Nigeria and not for the plane crash. Many lives are lost on Nigeria roads on a daily basis, killing in the north, No electricity for thirteen years of continuous promises. It is beyond the crash, it is the people that are running the system.
Right on point 2 d very last decimal. I lost a secondary school mate in d Bauchi bombing, not 2 criticise, but I read new comments on my school group on facebook (he died a tragic death and suddenly pple were lookin 4wd 2 seein him). Its so unfortunate dat all dat tragedy happened. Going by your statistics, dis kinda reminds me of the frog and hot water theory…
We as a Nation face a huge problem, and unless we start askin d right questions, we’ll never find a solution.
Thank you for this message, i just hope many would get 2 read this and start thinking, not be sheeps ignorantly flocking 2 the slaughter house.
I was once talkin 2 a young politician who was complainin about d present situation of d country, and i told him dat its gud dat he can see d flaws in d leadership and he shud aspire 2 fix it as he goes further in his career. D young amazed me wit his next answer (i’ll spare you d details, but it was not d good kinda amazing)…
This article is unlike YOU. It had too many errors. You must have been pretty angry when you wrote this.
I hope all these deaths would bring a change to our nation.
@Jimi, The deaths won’t bring anything to the nation my brother. It is we that are alive that have that moral obligation. To do what we can while we are alive.
Digesting this piece brings to mind what has been a top issue on my heart for a while now. Beyond all the writing, complains, lamentations and ills of our nation, how do we as a people get the right person into the position of leadership amidst the intrigues that plague our political landscape? How can we have as it were credible godfathers mentor or support a just cause in order to entrench good governance? Whenever I ponder on the Nigerian project, its pains the heart to watch how individuals of excellent track record are strangled out of political race as a result of lack of support, threat to their lives, paucity of funds to bankroll their honest desires and mafiarism. As we watch unfolding events, we need to unlock the code that will guarantee success of credible individuals at the polls.
Lets get to the root of the problem, treating the outcome will never provide the real solution.
“That until we fix our nation from the top, we would continue to get shame from the things that are ours collectively”. We are a nation at risk!
The bane of corruption in Nigeria is traceable to our leaders. If the leader is corrupt, the subject will be encourage to do evil. This evil has led us to this level. We need to fix our nation urgently. I am afraid, if this pretence continues, then there will be more dealth through accident on our roads, air, sea, rail. The lawless will also take the advantage to do more evil that will result in the lost of lives.
CM, we appreciate you for sharing your mind from time to time. God bless
Here is a call to keep our eyes on the ball. For as long as we do not participate actively in the call to ensure proper leadership in our country, for as long as we do not step up from voting to participating, for as long as our only contribution to society is reactive, for as long as we do not engage the services of our mind and resources to dislodge incompetence from public offices, we would remain like hen in a pen, waiting for our day to come!
Word !!
On point CM, we are so focusing on the less important and ignoring the major cause of these predicaments.
“What about the scores who died from the 26 car explosions on Lagos-Ibadan express way the previous day? What about those who died in the bomb blast in Bauchi, while in church the same morning?”. All we need is a drastic change, which can only come from the involvement of the follower in what the leaders do and how its done enough of just moving on when there is an unusual crisis while overlooking the everyday crisis which is far bigger…..God help us but we must first help ourselves.
Our nation is driven by individuals in government that want to make profit for themselves. So the forth estate of the realm that is to check them is also in the business of profiting making. nothing in the nation is give real attention. is what they can get out of it that matters. human intrest is no more.
Once again spoken correctly, we need to not only create wealth in this country but start creating value.
protection of lives & properties should be one of our major goals in this country and not the other way round