Nigeria: It’s a Matter of Upbringing – By Ikechukwu Enyiagu

Posted by admin Articles, Columnists, Ikechukwu Enyiagu, NNP Columnists Monday, January 23rd, 2012

By Ikechukwu Enyiagu, NNP, Jan. 23, 2012 – “Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”- Proverbs 22:6. This passage in the Holy Book, the Bible, is arguably the most recommendable for children’s upbringing – both for Christian and non-Christian parents. It therefore places on the parents the ultimate right and responsibility for raising better children, therefore, making up a healthier society. This advice also ties most, if not all, of the culpability of a child’s undesirable character and choice of direction to its parent(s). While it’s highly commendable for parents to teach their children (wards) the times of life they live in, it’s equally pertinent that these parents train them in the way they should go. Those compelled under One-Nigerian society, more than having been infested with all manner of abominations, still have the opportunity for a better tomorrow; this opportunity is seen by the free gift of God in our children. This is why St. Paul rightly said, ““All things are lawful,” but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful,” but not all things build up.”- 1 Corinthians 10:23 (ESV) Parents need to teach their children properly and bring them up to meet up with the vast challenges of today’s world; however, the word of wisdom from God should take the center stage in every child’s upbringing.

It’s a matter of upbringing. Talk to a prostitute today, and if she breaks down enough to open up, you are sure to hear of the failure of her parents in her upbringing. Leave this group and move on to the robbers and kidnappers we have everywhere in Nigeria today, if they are drunk enough to open up, you will be shocked to hear that they were ignored by their fathers or parents. Leave these groups of “brought-up” children and go to the militants; you surely will not mistake the culpability of their parents’ silence cushioned by whoever they have resolved to lay the blame on. It should be noted, also, that the highly callous leaders we have in the society today were once children, and at the bottom of their wickedness lays the fault of wrong parenting. Man, in many ways, is like a field for crops – take “proper” care of it and you are sure to stand as the proud owner of “that filed; but, let it grow as it pleases, and you will not mistake the imprint of your neglects on it. Even if you move forward a bit to look at our children in different unlawful and disgraceful activities today, you will not mistake the role of the parents and how they have goaded them on in the wrong paths. And you can be sure today that those in Nigeria bombing and killing innocent people all over the country in the name of religion had some roots of their convictions traced down to their parents.

It’s a matter of upbringing. As a country, Nigeria, though forced on all, has played the role of the first parent to all presently tied to its name. This therefore implies that, with all the responsibilities allocated to parents at their children’s birth, the country’s root has a greater role to play in the upbringing of its children (citizens). Therefore, rightly, a country may be referred to as “the mother of all her citizens;” that tells, in a long way, why a country may be referred to with a feminine gender; she plays the role of a mother to her children. But looking around today and having seen the failures of parenthood in many families in Nigeria, one should not also forget that the burden of parenthood was made heavier and near impossible by the society which the amalgamation of Nigeria compelled on all. In Nigeria, children are raised to follow their fancy- not their dreams. Many who wanted to be medical doctors ended up as petrochemical engineers, some who wanted to become musicians saw themselves as politicians, while some Nigerian musicians today still have holes in their hearts or have not met their innermost desires. Others started out as Imams and holy preachers but ended up with bombs and explosives around their waists. This is the story of failed parenting. The foundation of Nigeria was built under British insatiable desire for wealth, compulsion and extortion. This very spirit which drove them into Nigeria and necessitated their compulsion of ever-diverging nations under one name for their selfish end is the very spirit which has ruled Nigeria since independence. As a result, this very spirit of selfishness, depravity and darkness has now become the very spirit which runs and drives the lives of our children.

Today, children rival themselves in acts of immorality and crime – doing this in a competitive way because that is what “Mother Nigeria” has not only taught, but compelled on all to do. A little girl who has not been properly schooled on matters of the heart, and on the feelings and implications of likeness and love, is been hailed for growing from the wrong environment. While the country has been taken over by crimes, corruption and terrorism, the children are fast growing to contribute their quota for a diseased society filled with conscientious participators and nonchalant observers. As a result, while the young girls are praised for practicing home prostitution from their elementary age, the young boys dream of having “sugar daddies’.” It’s a matter of upbringing; it’s a matter of the foundation. Nigeria is founded on a faulty ground and should never be expected to produce anything good. While it’s not only manly but decent and right for every man to “beat and enslave his body” to his wills, the children (especially females) of yesterdays who have grown into girls and women of today in Nigeria ought to know that every wrong upbringing has its high price. Every act of indecency, both in dressing and character, has its corresponding repercussions. It surely will not be right in itself, but the consequences will certainly be commensurate with their looseness and faulty upbringing. And for the boys, such lifestyle will become a life-burden.

Finally, while each of us came from parents, and while Nigeria has been forced on us for this long as a parent, it behooves us to always remember that the father of all is the God of the universe; He is called the God of justice and recompense. It’s not far-to-seek why Nigeria has been a terrible parent: those whom she claims motherhood over were never her biological children. Every true mother protects her own, but most foster parents cannot truthfully claim to have a thorough mother-child connections with their ward; it’s mostly either that they are plagued by their desires and wish that the child is miraculously, biologically theirs, or they are filled with furry that the child they actually thought was going to replace the one they never had has now grown up to be a full, rounded and beautiful woman, or a handsome, strong young man. Sometimes, especially when mismanaged, foster-parenting can create worse mental diseases for the child that living with the realization of being orphaned could be far better for such a child in the way he/she relates with whoever is fostering. These reasons are why Nigerian parents must come together and revisit the effects of Nigeria on mothering Nigerians.

These effects are not hidden in any sense, however, the wrong parenting in question has, somehow, succeeded in hiding the need to ask Nigeria, “Are you truly my mother?” Even when the lying spirit which has held people against their wish in Nigeria will continue to claim parenthood, this question will nevertheless unmask the veil of lies, treachery and deceits which consequences have eaten deep into the very marrow of those still referred to as Nigerians. And, finally, this discovery will reveal the life-threatening danger of living under a continued One-Nigeria. For a healthy society in this part of the African continent, Nigeria must break up into sovereign states. Delaying this will amount to a worst and unthinkable society – worse than what we abhor in the lives of the Americans and the Europeans. As Rev. Chris Oyakhilome may have described the inevitable consequence of such a society: “it may come to a time when a child could be demanding payments from his father to bear his name;” I pray, for the sake of the few good ones, that it does not have to get that far before Nigerians wake up and pull down this abomination called One-Nigeria. For a better and healthier society, Nigeria will have to break down and up since the children she has fostered have grown up to be carnivores. And it surely will. For the desired adults and society of tomorrow, every so-called Nigerian must be allowed to return to his/her true parents for proper upbringing. Whichever way you look at Nigeria’s failure, you won’t mistake that it’s all a matter of upbringing.

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