Dear Chidi,
Look – the Igbo people in Nigeria were so good to me that for me to ever respond in a contrary manner to even the miscreants among them would be not- me. Perish the thought! It's as simple as that.
A personal note:
You know how people quote and twist lines of scripture to suit their own purpose/ agenda…
RE-"The change chant
Is entering into the yard of yesterday." (Opara) -
Still in gear (using the present continuous tense) as long as you didn't say that yesterday's chant has entered "the dustbin of history" (a terrible expression - which fittingly endorsed today, the day - 30th April - that Mr. Hitler officially entered the everlasting dungeon of hellfire)
If it's today's Nigeria that you're talking about or insinuating, then you know as well as everybody else that you ain't seen nothing yet and that Nigerians will chanting "change!" each and every day, just as Brother Obama thundered "Change has come to America!" on the first day and we all watched a tear roll down chased by another, rolling down the cheek of the Rt.Hon. The Rev Jesse Jackson as he was quite overcome with emotion to be witnessing this change - a Black Man elected President of the Mighty United States of America – "almost impossible to do" like the fulfillment of an almost impossible dream such as the Rev Dr. Martin Luther King's "I Have a dream" still being quoted and chanted worldwide on national and international TV, each and every day. You know that you're famous when people hear / read you and start quoting you!
"Yesterday's just a memory
Tomorrow's never what it's supposed to be" (Dylan)
If it's Nigeria you're talking about I know this
It's not a time for being skeptical or cynical. WE ought not sabotage change. We've got to be positive about the change we're talking about. I hope that the Nigerian Civil Service will be more of a meritocracy…
The Holy Quran says in Surah ar ra'd ayat 11: "Indeed, Allah will not change the condition of a people until they change what is in themselves."
Mahatma Gandhi said:" 'Be the change that you wish to see in the world" or indeed, in others
Since change is your theme, inevitably you echo not Brother Buhari but the Buddha
Nor can Chidi take a dip in the same Imo or Aba River, twice…
In Zimbabwe: Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)
In Sierra Leone – not too long ago: The People's Movement for Democratic Change (PMDC)
The opposite of change is static stagnation, some kinda standing still at half-mast, watching the rivers flow by from your verandah, as your hair changes from black to the colour that Chinweizu so heavily critiqued when Brer Soyinka wrote "To my First White Hairs"
Gotta update my blog about what happened yesterday and today…
Sincerely,
Cornelius
On Friday, 24 April 2015 09:33:34 UTC+2, Chidi Anthony Opara wrote:
By Chidi Anthony Opara
The chant
Of change is fading,
The chorus
Too is fading.
The change chant
Is entering into the yard of yesterday.(Poem presented as social service, all rights reserved.)
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue+subscribe@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
No comments:
Post a Comment