OPINION: Aftermath Of February 25th, What Is My Prayer?

By Etinosa Onaiwu / Posted March 1, 2023

Some years ago, when Bellview Airline went belly up, my return ticket to Lagos from London was endorsed to fly with Egypt Air along with many others who had come into London with Bellview.

We arrived in Cairo with hours of transit time to spare and were asked if we wanted a hotel stay or a tour and there was unanimous agreement that we do a tour.

In a very effective manner, our passports were collected and an immigration gate was opened for us to file through to a luxury bus that was already waiting for us outside the airport terminal where our journey to the Pyramids and other sites started.

About an hour into the journey, I started hearing fellow Nigerians in their chatter saying “better cars non even dey this country” and the usually quiet me could not help but ask if it mattered to them that after one hour of travelling on the road that the street lights were all on and every which way you looked in the city was brightly lit.

That is an example of the sense of values and priorities that we have become accustomed to as a people where the things that matter to our collective well-being take a back seat to the things that guarantee our personal comfort.

The election has been won and lost and many were wishing that the institutions and their personnel will perform magic in ensuring a free and fair election when many of us as individual citizens of Nigeria cannot boast of the personal sacrifices and changes we have made to our own lives that can be part of that foundation for change.

After voting and hoping for change many of us will return to our wicked and selfish ways of breaking the rules and compromising the institutions while hoping things change in another four years.

For me, the country has made a choice and it is time to obey the scripture and pray for those in authority(1 Timothy 2:1-4) and ask God to bless the President-Elect with a compassionate heart and that all decisions be for the benefit of all Nigerians and not for a few for the scripture tells us that the heart of the King is in the hands of God. (Proverbs 21:1). This is regardless of who the President is, for nothing is impossible with God as anyone can be used by Him regardless of our opinion of the person.

President Tinubu when sworn in will be Nigeria and Nigeria will be President Tinubu. We have now inherited all his imperfections and all his assets as there is a bit of him in every one of us and for him to succeed, we as Nigerians must aspire to be the best of the good things we see in him and reject the imperfections we see in him even in our own lives.

He wasn’t my choice, but I earnestly wish that he becomes to me and many others who did not vote for him the rejected stone who is now the head of the corner by exceeding expectations and confounding us doubters with policies that will better us collectively.

That is my Prayer.

Etinosa Onaiwu, a Director of a Design, Build and Furnish company writes from Abuja.

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