Growing up, I was taught many principles and values by which to live. Not to tell lies, not to steal and so on and so forth. Another one was to ‘do the right thing’! Africa is a continent deeply steeped in culture and tradition and what is generally common across the continent is that our various cultures and tradition almost always place a high emphasis on morality, honesty and generally doing the right things.
However, of recent no one seems to do the right thing anymore. From all the way up the pyramid to the bottom, the peoples of this country all seem to thrive on doing the wrong thing. In fact, it usually seems you make no progress in this country if you do the right things. Driving against traffic, corruption, prostitution, cheating (even in the church), bearing false witness, lying, forgery etc are simple examples of the wrong things we do so easily in this nation. There are way too many of such vices to mention here. Funny enough, it would appear as though the few who still tend to do more of the right things are the people who reside in the villages, who do not have a proper education. There, they still trade in the market honestly, there is not much stealing and cheating, and there is still respect. On the other hand, in the cities, where we are supposed to be more educated, the opposite is the case.
Doing the right thing no longer seems to matter. Or has the psyche of the Nigerian been so brutalised that we no longer even know what is right? Or do we just deny the truth for the quick conveniences of doing the wrong thing? Whatever the answer,this country needs to return to a situation where the generality of the people do the right thing, not vice versa!
