On Peace and Unity 🏳
A Note for Independence Day
Public Service Announcement: This article was originally written in 2020. Some details may no longer be up to date, but the core message and insights remain relevant today.
The popular saying about a cog in a machine is all that comes to mind as I pen this article. Every little cog, though small and seemingly insignificant, is vital. So is the need for peaceful coexistence and unity in our great country. However, small and seemingly unnecessary, peace and unity are very important needs in our society.
Sayings like a nation divided against itself cannot stand, united we stand and divided we fall, are not popular for no reason. These sayings, though cliché, are all facts. If we don’t strive to live in peace and unity, the very cogs that hold the machine together, that help it function, will begin to unravel until finally the machine stops working. Nigeria is one giant machine, and we, the people and by extension, our government, have the responsibility of keeping our country united.
The place of peace and unity is so important to the well-being of our country that those very words are placed in our former national anthem. We sing it at functions with so much reverence and respect, but we don’t do all that it asks us to do. It is one thing to sing the words, but another thing entirely to do it. We need to start doing, start taking action instead of just singing.
If we need reasons why we should foster a state of peace and unity, look no further than the civil war of 1967 – 1970. A few of us might not have lived it, but we heard and still hear stories. It was a time of unrest; people were scared to leave their houses, and some houses weren’t even safe, but people had nowhere else to go. Is that what we want? Do we want to return to that time?
We don’t need to be time travellers to know what would happen. The saying experience is the best teacher, doesn’t apply in this case. Let the history, the stories, and the pain of the survivors be our teachers. Because if we have to experience unrest like that again, the frayed fabric of our country may very well divide into three.
Life is very dynamic; things are always changing, whether we want them to or not. We would rather the world, our country and our publication stayed as is, even though we know the impossibility of that desire, it doesn’t stop us from wanting it.
One may very well say, civil war is a thing of the past. It will never visit us again. Then, how about recent follies, the ENDSARS protest that stole lives, the resulting looting and societal unrest? We could not leave our houses for days after the shooting. We were scared for our lives as we watched the lives of our youths snatched from us in a round of hurried bullets. All we could do was pray to be unaffected.
Yet we claim that peace and unity are not a priority or a situation of concern. Never should we be concerned about our coexistence, as right now. We learnt recently that the protest may resume because of the government’s blatant disregard for the lives we lost that day. The day that will forever be imprinted in our memory, unable to be wiped away. A few families pray for amnesia without fail. But we must not forget, and as a result, we must not allow our government to forget.
We at The Hope believe that peaceful coexistence and unity among fellows are important, and as a result, we ask that everyone who reads this publication realize this too. A country divided against itself cannot stand. We call on the government and every member of our society to take a stand for peace and unity. No, we are not asking you to go to the upcoming protest. That is something you have to decide. We are rather hoping that in any way we can, we as a country will begin to take a stand for peace and begin to hold out for unity. Anything less than that will not be accepted. Peace and unity or nothing else.
The current state of affairs of this country is all the evidence that we need to strive for peace and clamour for unity. Otherwise, we may not like the result of our nonchalance when we encounter it in the future. But if we, both people and government, begin “to build a nation where peace and justice shall reign”, as we sing in our anthem, then there is still hope yet. We at The Hope always say a little act of kindness can start a chain reaction.
In a world where you can be anything, be the person who fosters peace and encourages unity.
Well-written piece. God bless Nigeria 🇳🇬.