Nigeria: Our Culture Of Bottling Up (Suffering And Smiling) By Didi Nwala

 

Nigerians suffer in silence, and we are proud. May be we are ‘prouder’ in folding our hands and watching things slip by. We are proud because behind our ‘sincere’ smiles are broken pieces of our lives. In fact, bottling up is one right we know how best to exercise. We have inherited this right from people who had and have continued to exercise it. They say Nigerians are the happiest; we nod in accord. At least they recognize one thing Nigerians are good at. So we are happy that they said we suffer and smile? So we are happy they call us cowards? But then, they take pride too in exploiting this cowardly attribute they found in us.

We have continued to rot away behind this cowardly mask of suffering and smiling. Who are we deceiving? The people who fan our wounded egos; wounds inflicted by them? The people who are scared that on realizing our capabilities and uniting would pose a gargantuan threat to them? This attribute has eaten its way deep into us. We can’t even tell ourselves the truth. We have holistically concluded that long life is for those with this attribute of bottling up. In fact, ‘standing up’ has become a synonym for ‘untimely death’. We would rather join them in that business of ‘suffering and smiling’ than stand up.

But have you ever seen a Nigerian being challenged by another Nigerian below his equal? Have you watched the drama unfold as they truly deal with this very Nigerian below their ‘standard’? We use our best tools against ourselves. We constantly depress and burke our unity.

Nigeria is weighed down by people who stay back and suffer and smile. By people who are scared to their souls of untimely death that standing up ‘may’ cause. People who hide it in the pit of their hearts the truth that would set Nigeria on a solid pedestal. People who are too weak to demand what truly is theirs, but feebly raise their ailing hands to beg for it. They would rather stay in the ‘comfort’ of the embrace of suffering and smiling. They are only heroes to people of their kind; the suffering and smiling ones.

Again, Nigeria has soldiers who are willing to stand up and fight but are weighed down by the suffering and smiling ones. They are weighed down because there are not a lot who would join them and stay the course. Some will stay through for only half of the journey or team up with the oppressors and beat the crap out of anyone who dares to say what we’re all thinking- that we’re poor, unclad, hungry and hopeless but deserve better.

When evil becomes normal, good has no space to thrive; ‘weakness’ becomes the ‘strength’ people survive by, ‘foolishness’ becomes the ‘wisdom’ people thread through life with. Then we have bunch of people living unfulfilled, vile and colorless lives. This attribute sips its way into all our activities and saps our strength to truly be fulfilled by them.

So if you are wondering how things became so bad in Nigeria; how we do not even grasp a handful of what going on in the political sphere of the country, how questionable characters and activities go on unquestioned, read this from the beginning again.