Dear Madam, I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.Yours, very sincerely and respectfully, A. Lincoln.'That was the text of Abraham Lincoln which former President George W. Bush read at the 10th anniversary memorial for the thousands of victims killed on September 11, 2001. Bush read the letter at the ceremony after joining President Barack Obama in reading the names of the 2,753 (three Nigerians inclusive) who died in the terrorist attacks. What is a memorial' Memorial is a commemorative event intended to remind people of somebody who has died or an event in which people died. Bush and Obama are from different political camps; yet they came together to honour the loved ones ' Americans and the rest of the world. Could same happen in Nigeria with an IBB and OBJ coming together to honour Nigerians who have lost their lives in various killings we have been experiencing in the country' Not with their recent unguarded and unbridled utterances against each other. Nigerians in their millions, I think, are fed up with all the rhetorics and grandiloquences of their leaders. When America was attacked by the Al Qaeda on September 11, 2001, their leaders promised to hack down all the evil perpetrators of the dastardly acts. Of course, a few years later, Obama got Osama and several other terrorists in the camp of the latter. That is the only way to placate those who lost their loved ones in the wicked attack on the World Trade Centre, and the Pentagon. Every year, the American government and the people come together to honour those innocent people who lost their lives in the bomb attack. They hold memorials and raise foundations in their honour; they engrave their names in the annals of their country. That is the least they could do to honour them. That is a country where people's welfare is taken seriously; that is a country where people are regarded as real human beings. A couple of days ago, short messages were circulated amongst Nigerian phone users warning their loved ones to beware of a 5-digit strange number calling people. This strange number was alleged to have killed about 10 people, who received calls from it in Adamawa State. I had never taken this kind of information seriously in the past; but with the spate of strange killings and bombings here and there, I had to give it a serious thought. Not too long ago, Nigerians in the Western part of the country were warned against buying and eating beans; as there are killer beans in the market. It had also happened with meats. It is amazing and shocking that there were actually hints and security reports warning those in charge of the Nigerian security that there would be serial attacks by the deadly Boko Haram in certain areas of the North; yet nothing concrete was done to actually forestall them until they eventually happened. Just recently at the University of Ibadan in Oyo State, whilst examinations were going on, members of the institution's Students' Union invaded several examination halls to stop the ongoing examinations. The reason was that there had been threats of bombing of the school by the Boko Haram sect and unfortunately the institution's Management had done nothing about it or even to sensitise the students to be cautious. If anything at all, that was the time, the university authority deemed it fit not to make water scarce and lights non-functional on the campus. Few weeks ago, when the United Nations building was bombed in Abuja, news circulated that the Third Mainland Bridge would in the same vein be bombed. This caused a lot of discomfort and panic to the users of that longest bridge in the sub-region of Africa; especially several thousands of Nigerians who daily ply the road to their places of work. When it is convenient for our so-called leaders, they are quick to compare Nigeria's democracy to America's; but when the premise is not favourable; they jettison America as reference point and say that it took the United States of America about 200 years to get to where it is today. After all, Nigeria is just 51 years old ' there is still plenty of time to catch up in terms of development and growth with countries like the United Kingdom, France and the US. What our leaders probably don't take cognizance of, is that, right from the days of the Great Depression of 1929 otherwise known as the World Economic Crisis, American leaders and other leaders of the West had started out good developmental plans to salvage their economic situations and rescue their nations from total economic bankruptcy. They introduced all kinds of measures called: state intervention by undertaking all public works and financing them by money creation; i.e. printing currency notes, also known as deficit financing. This step by the American leaders generated additional income and employment for their people. However, in Nigeria, there had been different economic programmes like Obasanjo's Operation Feed the Nation (OFN); and Babangida's Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP); Mass Mobilisation for Self-Reliance, Social Justice, and Economic Recovery (MAMSER); Directorate of Food Roads and Rural Infrastructure (DFFRI) and the rest. What have Nigerians gained from all of that economic semantics; if not to further pauperise the already poor Nigerians' Since the recent Global Economic Meltdown that crashed the share markets, what has Nigerian government done to salvage the situation and assist those average Nigerians who lost several millions of their investments' How 'giant' is Nigeria in Africa' With about 50 percent of Nigerian youths migration on a daily basis to foreign countries as a result of brain drain is a clear attestation that all may not be well. With the goings-on, it is becoming evident that Nigerian leaders may be preoccupied with how to elongate their terms in their respective political offices and daily go home with enormous monies that can last a generation of people. Has anything happened to the few suspects arrested in connection with the spate of assassinations and bombings being experienced in the country in the last few years' What has our government done to honour Dele Giwa, 39, a first class journalist, who was killed on a dark Sunday in 1986 through a letter bomb in front of his friend, wife and teenage children' If truly government is a continuum, then Giwa's killers should have been brought to book 25 years after. What a shame! How would the mumbo jumbo case of Major Al Mustapha, a story for another day, end
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