VITAL OBITER®
The Diary of a Roving Counsel
“May Nigeria not happen to you!”
I have heard this expression countless times. In conversations. In comment sections. In response to one Nigerian tragedy after another.
But recently, it struck a different chord.
Following my commentary on the death of 41-year-old gospel singer Toluwanisings, who reportedly sought emergency medical assistance at EIGHT hospitals in Ibadan, I read the reactions.
Again and again:
“May Nigeria not happen to you!”
And I began to wonder:
How does the name of a nation become a prayer against calamity?
How does a country’s name, which should evoke belonging, dignity, security and hope, become shorthand for suffering, helplessness and institutional abandonment?
A person is kidnapped. Nigeria has happened to them.
A patient desperately searches for emergency care. Nigeria has happened to them.
A family is pushed into destitution. Nigeria has happened to them.
A child is denied meaningful education. Nigeria has happened to that child.
When did citizenship become something from which citizens pray to be delivered?
The statistics are frightening.
According to SBM Intelligence, at least 7,825 people were abducted between July 2025 and June 2026, with approximately ₦7.78 billion recorded in ransom payments.
The National Bureau of Statistics reported that 133 million Nigerians were multidimensionally poor in 2022.
World Bank-derived estimates place Nigeria among the countries with the largest populations living in extreme poverty.
UNICEF reports that one in every five out-of-school children worldwide is Nigerian.
And then comes another revelation.
In February 2026, Nigeria’s Minister of Health disclosed that, out of the ₦218 billion allocated to the Federal Ministry of Health’s capital projects in 2025, only ₦36 million had been released.
₦36 MILLION OUT OF ₦218 BILLION!
A country confronting enormous healthcare challenges could not make even one per cent of that capital allocation available.
What are our priorities?
For years, we celebrated Nigeria as Africa’s largest economy. We once held that position.
But what does the size of an economy mean when its people cannot reliably access healthcare, education, security and the basic conditions of a dignified life?
An economy is not an end in itself. It must serve the people.
And therein lies my deepest concern.
Nigeria is becoming more than a geographical expression in the vocabulary of suffering.
Its very name is becoming a warning.
A nation should represent a promise of belonging and protection.
What happens when that promise becomes so fractured that citizens invoke their country’s name to describe the calamities they fear?
I understand why Nigerians pray, “May Nigeria not happen to you.”
But am I comfortable with that prayer?
No!
Can I condemn those who pray it?
Never!
To condemn the expression without confronting the experiences that produced it would be to dismiss the suffering of those who have found in those words a language for their pain.
People do not necessarily speak this way because they hate their country. Sometimes, they speak this way because their country has failed them.
The expression has become a prayer, a warning, a lament and a form of collective testimony.
And that is the tragedy.
Institutional failure has entered our national vocabulary.
How do we reverse it?
Certainly not through another slogan.
We must build institutions that protect lives, deliver services and uphold accountability.
We must measure governance by the dignity it preserves, the opportunities it creates and the confidence it inspires.
Above all, we must refuse to normalise suffering as the inevitable price of being Nigerian.
A nation should happen to its people as a blessing, not as a calamity.
I long for the day when someone says, “Nigeria happened to me,” and what follows is a story of a life saved, a child protected, a family supported or justice delivered.
Until then, this prayer will continue to trouble me.
Not because I fail to understand those who pray it.
But precisely because I do.
May Nigeria become a nation from which its citizens draw hope, rather than a calamity from which they pray to be delivered.
Enlightenment is Superior to Enforcement®
Do have an INSPIRED rest of the week with the family.
VitalObiter #Nigeria
Follower of Christ. Husband. Father. Egalitarian. Goodwill Investor. Change Agent. Rebel with a Cause. Attorney.Author. Thriver. Culture-Led Family Strengthening and Child Safeguarding Pioneer, Innovator and Practitioner. Value-Based Parenting Ideologue. Three Decades in the Saddle.
