It is with the heaviest of hearts, the strongest anger and deepest feelings I pen this letter as images of the things I see have refused to leave my memory and all I hear from my radio are songs of sorrow so much so that I am tempted to ask why we were born to this part of the world, why we were even born at all and how it all started.

It is disheartening that my friend Femi is scared to visit Kaduna and it seems we can’t guarantee Ali’s safety in Enugu; some sons of anarchy are making life uneasy for travellers on the highway while entire families are being wiped out up North, and yes!…there is the new trend: clashes between herders and host communities; all these happening for reasons best known to only the perpetrators of this evil.

Forgive me but maybe I wasn’t paying attention when government made it legal to engage in kidnap and trafficking or when nature made it right to set humans ablaze for what ever reason but I don’t think this was EVER a part of us neither was it part of the plan to value animals more than humans.

Back in my formative years in the ever busy Ifo town, we didn’t know who was not Yoruba or who didn’t have the most appealing outlook; the message was peace and we were taught to never deviate from the doctrine of unity; I doubt we’re still on that page.

My good people, it is hateful, distasteful and disgraceful that we’ll rather our streets are painted with blood instead of love, that we now have flagrant disregard for the next person’s emotion and we literally threw life and its value away; let’s remember it is UNITY before Faith, peace and whatever kind of progress.

I’m sure our elder statesmen are deeply worried for where we’re headed and the bodies of our heroes are turning in their graves…oddly enough, for what reason? Why these endless massacre and Genocide in our land?

Brethren If there’s any time to feed ourselves the truth, it is now; we seem to be off-track on issues of national development and our eyes are closing out on the vision of our founding fathers; slowly and painfully we’re losing human, material, financial and time resources and we seem to be a joke to the international community; but I have good news for bad people, slowly and assuredly we will return to track.

I understand that evil will try to fight back in any way it can and some unfortunate fellows have offered themselves as vessels for destruction; we shall overcome them.

My heart bleeds every second I remember that some of my sisters are still missing from a school in Borno state, it goes weaker when I hear Benue and it bleeds even more when I hear a civil servant in the confluence region lost his daughter because he couldn’t afford basic medical care…he (and many other colleagues) were being owed salaries for a time running into months as some children of the devil decided to squander what belonged to others…they’re receiving their rewards already and very soon they shall be phased out.

We should take note however that things will not work out by magic as Napoleon Hill says “strength and growth come only through continuous effort and struggle”; good enough we have a lot of people who will literally give an eye for Nigeria and unity is our weapon against malicious intents.

IPOB, TRIPOB, MASSOB, Niger Delta Avengers, Christian herdsmen in Kano, Muslim Lawyers in Abia and other divisions too numerous to mention have not helped our progress as a people; at the moment we might have to put our heads together and put on our thinking cap else we’ll have ourselves to blame.

We should also be prepared just in case some persons have to be shown the way out of government when the time comes.

Slowly and steadily we shall win again if we hold fast to each other..no grudges, no gangs, just peace…perfect peace.

Ayobami Ladipo (Mr Porsche)

Lagos,

Nigeria.