We celebrate, yet we
mourn. We mourn the children who had died of hunger in years behind. We mourn
the demise of children who died in riots, public uprisings, community disputes
and terrorism in/around Nigeria. We are also pained, yet happy that we have made
a hero out of our children. We are thankful that we still have one like Leah
Sharibu who could sustain integrity and stand by her words to remain a
Christian in the midst of fierce looking gunmen and notorious bombers. We
celebrate, yet we mourn.
I want to use this
opportunity to wish every lover of children a happy Children’s Day in Nigeria.
We salute the courage of as many children and young adults who are on the
street battling with the scourge of hunger, maltreatment, inequality, among
others. It is my earnest desire that you are taken off the street in no distant
time. We are working and we have not stopped; we are sure you all will find a
rescue through our vision and commitment to it.
As we celebrate this Day,
it is expedient that we all look beyond the smiles we assume ooze out of every
pore of our children’s faces. We should look deeper and set our minds at them.
We should see the pains and the agonies of children who have been victims of a
social menace, injustice and violence at some points in life. It is essential
for us to account for our common share of the blames for the pains we have
consciously or ignorantly caused kids and young adults. We should reminisce on
what we ought to have done to better the lots of our children that we have overlooked.
We should, as a matter of urgency, rise to action as individuals who wish for a
peaceful Nigeria and a better future for the country.
This Day calls our
consciousness to the challenges of children who have been variously received as
helpless, if not hopeless, as a result of the comeuppance of privileged members
of the society. Children in Nigeria have been victims of the whims of elderly
folks who have inadvertently made them helpless in the face of the wider
terrain of governance and social construction. Many children have had no other
choice than to drop out of school for reasons which are not unconnected to
poverty. Many others have had to resort to begging after school hours to keep
themselves going in school. A good number of children in almost all cities in
Nigeria have become contract beggars who are in the service of a lord who
neither cares for them nor want their growth. All these problems are caused by
the ineptitudes of all of us and the attitude we show to the plights of
children in Nigeria.
I am pulled by these
circumstances to admonish every Nigerian this reaches to place the rights of
kids and young adults at the core of their daily activities. We should rise up
to the call of a society measured not by the I-don’t-care attitude shown to children
but by the level of equality and rights children enjoy at every level and in
all areas of life. We cannot afford to fold our arms and have our children
become eternal victims of problems they have not created or a war they know
nothing about. If there is a time to wake up, fellow Nigerians, this is the
time!
The government of any
nation is saddled with the responsibility of securing the lives and properties
of its citizenry. The moment there is a shortfall in the government’s
commitment to this task, it is certain that lives would be under threat and
there would be general unrest. Any of these effects are usually felt by all but
more deeply by children. This is the situation many children in Nigeria have
found themselves today. They are victims of rape, violence, kidnap, illicit
abduction and hunger. All of these, one must emphasize, found their roots in
the government’s inability to secure both the economy and policies of the
government in favour of the entire populace which, of course, does not leave
the children out.
Not neglecting the
violence caused by faceless sects, terrorist groups and aggrieved quarters in
Nigeria, many children have been abducted, forcefully kidnapped, raped and,
most viciously, killed for reasons that are far beyond their making. With these
children not having the loud voice to reach the leadership at the center, many
of them have become victims of a silence they do not know when or how to break.
That leaves us as at Global Support for Kids Initiative to help project their voices
and their plights; to amplify their desires and ensure that they have the
attention of appropriate quarters. We cannot for any reason allow silence to
prevail when the children that are central to our dream are suffering. We
cannot fold our arms and feign ‘all-is-well’ when in reality all is rotten. We
cannot continue where those of the years behind stopped. Hence, we need a new
attention, a new spirit and good policies that will better the lots of our
children and take many of them off the streets. We need the government to
secure the lives of her citizens, especially children against the grievous
menace of cultism, terrorism and mass killings from aggrieved quarters.
Children aren’t political tools with which political scores have to be settled;
they must be given a positive perspective of their nation.
It brings a lot of
sorrows that the Chibok girl’s abduction is still left hovering in the deluge
of unfathomable scenarios and disjointed media reports. Worsening the sorrows
is the kidnap of Dapchi girls which, long after the rescue of majority of the
victims, still has Leah Sharibu in the hands of the Boko Haram men. The
incessant killings of both the young and old at Benue state also speak volume
on the level of impunity that has eaten up the structure of the Nigerian
system. The killings have left a scar on our national consciousness till date
that we struggle hard to erase the memories off the collective psyche of
children in Nigeria. It is painful that these serial failures have made many
children victims of psychological traumas propelled by fear, uncertainty and
lack of faith in anybody.
It is against this
background that we charge the Nigerian government to improve the social welfare
of children and ensure a secured life for both privileged and less-privileged
children. Government should put more efforts into its drive to ensure that
captives are free and terrorists are brought to book. We need all security
agencies connected with the government and non-government agencies to have all
hands on deck to save Nigerians from the scourge of Boko Haram and their
herdsmen counterpart. We cannot afford to have our dreams shattered and vision
blurred for the reason of a grievance held by a group that would not seek
redress at appropriate quarters. Children in Benue are suffering, elderly ones
are mourning different losses and every Nigerian is feeling this hurt that
follows news report every day. We have to save Benue, we need the release of
Leah. We want our government to be more responsive to the yearnings of
children. We want our children to become the best they desire. We want a change
in the system. These have to be achieved and its achievement should start now.
Once again, I felicitate
with every child in Nigeria and hope for more successful days for all of them.
Keep safe, and keep faith. Your dreams shall come true!
Thank you.
Mr. Opeyemi O. Olowookere
President,
Global Support for Kids
Initiative.
www.gskinitiative.org
