How Did We Get Here? (Part 2)

By Imam Malik Mahmoud

Nigerians, How Did We Get Here? Who Did This to Us?

Every day, the drums of war are beaten—not by foreign invaders, but by our own leaders. Ironically, these are the same individuals who once enjoyed the best that Nigeria had to offer:

• Free education and transportation to school
• Monthly student allowances
• Free meals, hostel accommodations, and reading materials
• Cars, houses, and guaranteed jobs after graduation
• Scholarships to study abroad

They were the beneficiaries of foundations laid by colonial structures and our founding fathers. A time when names like Chinedu, Musa, Wale, Nnamdi, Ponjul, Akwara, and Dokubo were not judged by ethnicity, religion, or region, but were symbols of unity beneath the green-white-green flag.

Today, that Nigeria is a distant memory. So again, I ask: “How did we get here? Who did this to us?”

---

The Drums of Division

Another drum beats—the drum of division—and it is growing louder each day. Yet many still fail to see the danger.

Some are busy carving new nations from an already fragile one. But we never stop to ask:

• Who are these people beating the drums?
• Why not use that same energy to educate their followers?
• To promote quality education, self-reliance, effective communication, and religious tolerance?
• To foster understanding among our youth, teach health education, celebrate cultural diversity, encourage unity, and mobilize against the very leaders who have held us hostage?

Instead, all we hear is: “Divide! Divide!! Divide!!!”

The North blames the South, the South blames the North—all in the name of defending corrupt leaders who loot our treasury with impunity, simply because they belong to our tribe, region, or religion.

We are conditioned to protect our thieves.
“Yes, he is a thief, but he is from our tribe, so he is our thief,” we say.
“Therefore, he is a saint.”

Meanwhile, the poor across all regions can barely afford three meals a week—forgetting that hunger knows no tribe, region, or religion.

Let me ask you:
When was the last time your state governor conducted a free, fair, and credible local government election? Can you remember? Or is it just selection?

So, who is truly marginalizing us?

They tell us that Nnamdi and Nneka from the East are our enemies, yet we’ve never met them.
They say Musa and Ali from the North are our enemies—or Wale and Segun from the South—people we’ve never spoken to, worked with, or done business with.
Yet somehow, we buy into this madness.

We allow ourselves to become enemies of one another, while the real enemies divide us using religion, ethnicity, and the age-old tactic of divide and conquer.

The fight that my father had with his opponents from the East or anywhere else in the country is their fight. I was not there when it started. It is their fight. The son of his rival is my friend, and together we will build a better Nigeria—the Nigeria our parents refused to build for us.

The fights of our mothers are not ours. It’s high time we understood this.

What they told us is a version of their lies—designed to make us hate one another.
It is time we write our own version of the story—together.

Because if we don’t, we will become worse than those before us, and one day our children and grandchildren will ask,
“How did we get here? Who did this to us?”

---

The Drum of Religious Exploitation

Now, there is another drum beating—the drum of religious exploitation.

We have given bad elements among us the power to rule and marginalize us in the name of faith.

Every religious institution is now building an army. For what? What are they planning?

While they disguise themselves as men of God, they morph into warlords.

Our lawmakers in Abuja, political elites, traditional rulers, and civil organizations—they all watch in silence or, worse, participate.

Who cursed us? How did we get here?

It’s not that we don’t know the truth.
We just lack the understanding of what reality truly demands.
Our problem is no longer ignorance—it is tolerance.

---

The Tragedy of Tolerance

We tolerate—and even celebrate:

• Lawmakers who sleep through plenaries but wake up to collect salaries that a professor can’t earn in five years.
• Governors who commission roads that wash away after the first rainfall.
• Presidents who vanish during crises, only to return for photo ops and condolence tours.
• Injustice as if it were our national heritage.
• Criminals, and call them “honourables.”
• Whistleblowers, and label them “troublemakers.”
• Qualified people, and sideline them due to “zoning” or “separatism.”

But the worst of all?

We tolerate hunger in a land so rich, it could feed all of West Africa.

In Zamfara, Katsina, Borno, Ebonyi, Benue, Kano, Sokoto, Enugu, Calabar, and Ekiti—children eat only four times a week, if they are lucky.

Farmers are afraid to farm.
Markets are empty.
Prices are outrageous.

The government responds with palliatives and policies that make things worse.

Yet, our religious leaders still go to mosques and churches to shout:
“Let’s pray for our leaders.”

---

Let Us Talk About Nigerian Youth

They call us lazy.
But we run the tech space.
We dominate music, fashion, sports, medicine globally.
Abroad, we shine.
At home, we suffer.

Who did this to us?

They fear us.
They fear our voices.
They fear our unity.
They fear our numbers.

So, they distract us:

• Tribe vs. Tribe
• Faith vs. Faith
• APC vs. PDP. LP vs. others
• North vs. South
• South East vs. South West. North East vs. North Central, North West

Divide and rule—that is the real Nigerian Constitution.

And in this chaos, our women and youth suffer the most.

They lead homes, build businesses from scratch, and raise families with grit and grace.

What do they get in return?

• Sexual violence
• Exclusion
• Suppression

Any nation that fails to invest in its women and youth has already signed its death certificate.

---

Let me tell you what they really fear.
It’s not a military coup.
It’s not a revolution.

They fear that we will remember who we are.
Because when we do—it is over.

When North and South stop shouting and start asking questions—the game changes.

When Christians and Muslims refuse to be used—the board flips.

When we understand that bad governance is not tribal, religious, or regional, but systemic, intentional, and bipartisan—then we stop defending and start challenging the status quo.

---

How did we get here?

• We trusted liars.
• We danced for crumbs.
• We chose silence over sacrifice.

But how do we get out?

• By unlearning their script.
• By tearing down their altars.
• By building a new Nigeria, brick by honest brick.

A Nigeria where:

• Every child eats and sleeps well
• No mother dies on a hospital floor
• No woman fears the police
• No youth fears the army
• Students don’t fear their future

That Nigeria is possible.
But only if we stop tolerating the version we have now.
Because it won’t save us.

We must save ourselves.

So I ask again:
How did we get here? Now you know.

The real question is:
How angry are you?
And what are you willing to do about it?

---

Imam Malik Mahmoud
imammalik.mahmoud@gmail.com