By ToyinboOlumide
In this land of ours, nothing is without dream, so, they say. Even in animal kingdom, when a higher animal targets a prey, the first thing is to have that dream. Then, it works towards getting it to itself. Whether it gets it or not is not the point, the point is that it has a dream. Coming to the human kingdom too so it is! Our lives revolve round a dream that fuels and drives our actions.
Dream in this context can be narrowed to a visionary scheme, a hope or a wish. Already declared that we have a dream in Nigeria. But is that dream defined in our country, Nigeria? No, it is not but can be perceived by every well-meaning Nigerians.
Well, pondering on the Nigerian’s dream and dreamers in these times. I went to the world of reality, where fooling is not an option. It is always truth and only truth whether hurting or interesting. Then, I was asked by my realistic thoughts and now I will be asking you with this block from the world of analogy. It goes thus; Mr. A and Mr. B have the same level of opportunities and dreams. Mr.A held that dream strongly and worked towards it but Mr. B never worked towards it but strongly believe in the dream. At the long run, Mr. A achieved that dream but Mr. B wasn’t able to. Kindly, honest readers, who ought to be redefined between Mr. B, the dreamer and his dream? Obviously, it is Mr. B, the dreamer himself that needs redefinition.
Just like Mr. B, nothing is wrong with our dream in Nigeria, we strongly believe our dream will come through. We all believe Nigeria will be great. Yes! We are blessed abundantly. Opportunities flow in our land, honey is what encapsulates our rand, yet, we have no dream achievement at hand. What is wrong? It is only a bad workman that blames his tool. We, the dreamers are all wrong. It is the dreamers that need redefinition and not the dream. USA, Britain, Germany and other developed countries too never developed in a day. Rome was never built in a day. They also had dreams too which they followed desperately, personally and passionately with works to the realisation of it. Yet, they never stopped dreaming they continue to achieve, dream, achieve and that is how the sequence goes but in Nigeria, we dream, re-dream and re-dream, from vision 2020 to vision 2030. Very soon, I hope not that we will be hearing vision 2040. Collectively, we are not an achiever but a dreamer ever since independence, and if this redefinition of the dreamers is not executed the dream will always be dream till eternity.
At this point let’s talk about the major dreamers; those are the people who we entrusted with the dream actualisation through our popular votes. These people are first from a family before rising to national persons. First, family should see to character redefinition of their members. Parents should work hard towards raising a societal developer and not societal nuisance whose aim is not to actualise our national dream but to actualise their personal dream of selfishness. Most of these top politicians at the helms of affairs are chips from the old blocks and those are the ones foiling our dreams.
More so, we, citizens, who are the delegators of dream actualisation should also be wise in the choosing our leaders. We should redefine the criteria in making our choices of leaders. The money they give us to vote them in is the agony they tend to give us later. Do not vote anyone in because of a bag of rice that will not last for a night and in turn deny us of our right. There is need to redefine that towards the actualisation of our defined dream.
Come to think of it, even the Nigeria dream team that is claimed to be constituted by our developing players being trained to win the African Cup of Nations or perhaps, the World cup left us in dream still as we are yet to actualise the dream of winning those cups ever since they were established. They still left us gallantly in our dreamland. How do you expect an actualised dream when players are not treated well? When our leaders see no need for their adequate and time-meeting remunerations? When they fail to immortalize the fallen heroes who pressed towards achieving those dreams of ours? They will continue to leave us in our dreamland if something is not done with the dreamers!
How will we dream of a corruption-free nation when even the bosses at the top are the national coordinators of the corruption society of Nigeria? The problem is not with the dream, what we need is dreamers’ redefinition.
How will we dream of a hundred per cent literacy level, when the educational system is starving because those entrusted with that dream do not really care about that dream but only care about themselves, they left the sector underfunded and even some of the populace are nonchalant about it? Not the dream but the dreamer needs redefinition!
Finally, I will say again and again that what we need in Nigeria is redefining the Nigerian dreamers in these times and not the dreams in these times. Let this be done if those dreams will not turn to a reality.
