Learning to honour our own: A reflection on national self-respect — by Folabi Ogunleye

“There is a profound difference between demanding better of one’s country and refusing to acknowledge anything good in it. The former builds a nation; the latter slowly convinces its people that there is nothing worth building.”

I DID NOT make it up. I encountered the remark myself this very morning on my social media timeline.

The comment came in the aftermath of the recent rescue of the abducted schoolchildren in Oyo State through the widely acknowledged bravery and professionalism of members of our Nigerian security services.

In response to my submission that celebrity songstar Davido should follow up his efforts to draw attention to the abduction with a public recognition of the servicemembers who risked their lives to free the children, this adult lady showed up to ask why they needed any such recognition simply for doing their duty.

“They should be honored for doing their damn jobs?” she asked, her words dripping with genuine incredulity, unbelievable as it seemed.

I am quite aware of how terribly misplaced our value system can often be these days in Nigeria. We are witnesses to a generation of Nigerians whose perspectives and thought processes are so off the mark. Just when you think you’ve seen it all, “another banger” comes along, to borrow the phrasing of that Afrobeat entertainer.

It represents a new low in thoughtlessness to hold the view that the men and women of our armed forces and security services, who risk their lives so that the rest of us can enjoy relative peace in our communities, do not deserve to be honored simply because it is their job.

Not too long ago, I penned an essay titled “Nigeria’s Greatest Obstacle May Be Its Opinion of Itself: It explored the deeper consequences of how we Nigerians see ourselves and think of ourselves relative to the world around us. I argued that even more consequential than poor leadership is our often unfair view of ourselves and our country.

Too few Nigerians have a healthy regard for things Nigerian. It is why Nigerians who are generally diligent, civil and law-abiding when they find themselves living, working or visiting abroad too often abandon those same standards once they return home, showing little regard for the rule of law or for common decency.

It is why you might easily find Nigerians who happily rise to join in applauding an American veteran in public, or admire everything about, say, Buckingham Palace or the United States Marines or Hillary Clinton, imperfect as these institutions and personalities are, but who have little respect or sympathy for the Nigerian equivalent.

None of this is to suggest that our institutions are beyond criticism. On the contrary, criticism is often an act of patriotism. We should demand accountability from our leaders and our institutions, and we should never settle for mediocrity. But there is a profound difference between demanding better of one’s country and refusing to acknowledge anything good in it. The former builds a nation; the latter slowly convinces its people that there is nothing worth building.

It feels very much like self-hate – or, at the very least, an inferiority complex of the worst kind. Whatever happened to the expression, “Monkey nor fine but ein mama like am?” We are badly in need of critical reorientation in our country. We need to restore trust in ourselves and rethink how we project ourselves to the world around us.

The greatest damage to the Nigerian brand often lies in the choices we make in relation to how we see ourselves. Very few of us seem to care about the bigger picture. Too many simply want to have their share of Nigeria and flee with it, without caring to contribute to the common bowl that nourishes us all. We pay too little heed to the Yoruba expression, “Àgbájọ ọwọ́ ni a fi ń s’ọ̀yà.”

Until we begin to treat our collective possessions with the same care and nurturing that the people in those places we so admire accord theirs, the natural greatness embedded in our collective DNA will continue to face undeserved struggles.

We can do better than reserving the least for ourselves. We can do better than instinctively dismissing our own while romanticizing everyone else’s. We are, in no small measure, the solution to our own challenges.

After all, as we Nigerians would say: Wetin we dey find go Sokoto, e dey for inside our ṣòkòtò.