Offside!!

The Offside rule in football (soccer in american) states that a player
should not be beyond the last defender 'before' the ball is passed to
him, irrespective of his intent, be it to score or to put his team
mate in a better position to score. The referee calls a foul and
restarts the game in favor of the other team. It is in fact an unfair
disadvantage. I get the vibe that a lot of things that could be
advantageous to the Nigerian person are considered unfair. I sense a
loud cry of Offside is screamed everytime things seem to go well for
us. Let's look at some situations that are common to the nigerian
public which are considered Offside by those who are in the position
of referee.
When PHCN bring power to a part of the city of Lagos like mine (where
generators work like their owner's lives depend on it,
air-conditioners have been reduced to ornaments, fans seem to be the
vogue, refridgerators, freezers & other compressor based electronic
goods are relegated to a near obsolete state of being) after a long
period of darkness, someone cries 'Offside'. The unseen referee blows
his whistle & power is taken.
When the traffic officials eg police, LASTMA etc, spot a vehicle, &
harass the occupants with phantom charges, no one cries 'Offside'.
When you get up very early in the morning, after you rushed your
sleep, your bath, your meal & your aim is to hit the road before
everyone else because you have an early appointment that might change
your life. Once you get to the junction leading to the main artery of
traffic, someone screams 'Offside', & you find out that over 3,000 had
the same idea. To make it worse, as you guys are making reasonable
progress, 5,000 other people, who got up late, join you with the sole
purpose of clogging the road with their brand of passive-resistant
road rage. They convert a 4 lane road into a 6 1/2 lane road (you need
to see it to believe it), turning a semi-orderly procession into a 2
dimensional school of fish.
When you're lining up at a bukateria (it's a nigerian thing), and
you're 2 turns away from getting your meal and rushing back to work,
there goes the cry 'Offside'. That's when someone jumps the queue with
a vengeance only rivaled by Lionel Messi's 4 goal reply to Arsenal's
only goal of the game.
I'm a philosopher who has chosen to see things in a humourous light,
because suicide isn't an option. The next moment might be very
brilliant.
The referee might be on your side, the opposition might slack in their
approach to ruin your day.
But still, the question is sought for alms, 'Why?'
I disagree with people who claim it is a nigerian thing. It is so very
human, it is not funny anymore. I think, I stand to be corrected, I
think the powers that be are worried that their positions are without
merit and so can be taken from them either by those with merit or by
those with less merit. Those on equal standing with them are with them
already, so they encounter minimised squabbling with their colleagues.
I feel nothing close to contempt for them. It is an understanding
bathed in lavender. They don't understand how to do good and do well
simultaneously. They can't. We don't help them. We can't. They don't
help us. The country can't move forward until someone with the lingo
of both sides attempts to unite us, instead of using a big stick to
defend himself from imagined slights and real dangers.
What else can I say? Join a party, form a party or be a dark horse
running things from the back of the curtain? Personally, I, my
mother's favorite baby, will not risk my life running for office. It
is a real risk. Real people have died real deaths from the hands of
real people sent by real people. I use the word, real, because they
too are flesh and blood. It is just sad that they don't realise that
an awareness of one's mortality helps one live better, changes one's
value-system and color one's view of life into something almost
saint-like.
I think. Sometimes, I believe the best politicians are the best liars.
Human error is inevitable, cruelty is born of weakness and cowardice,
& the best leaders make things work by glossing over the bad and
focusing on the good. I think.
Then again, you're free to scream 'Offside'. You're not the referee, are you?
But, if you are, could you please tell your linesman in charge of
Akoka to allow my part of Community road to have power? They say
something about a breaker in the Unilag station. I think it's just
'Offside' they cry. 3 babies have been born on this part in the last
month or so. Don't let this be how they understand the game of being a
nigerian. Thanks.

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Sent from my mobile device