CELEBRATING THE WRONG DAY

To a Nigerian, the first day of October is a day everyone joys for what they don’t know. Everyone gets happier, probably because it is a holiday and a day they stay out of the troubles of Nigeria’s work force.

From juvenile, a Nigerian was told to revere 1st October much more than their birthdays because if was on that day, Nigeria got freedom from British colonialism. It was a day Nigerian bureaucrats were granted the ease to hoist Nigerian flag on the four poles of Nigeria without snubs from high powers.

EMMANUEL SHEBBS

All over the nation, voices are screaming loud more like the stormy wind. There is celebration all over with strong connection to the event of independence. Can we pull out our minds a little from the noisy Nigeria and think about the essence of the event in reality? We will then realize the shady deals which clouded the independence of Nigeria which shall make us discount the celebration as being done at the worst of all wrong times.

Celebrating independence on the first day of October is quite unfair to the cause of events. It contradicts the essence, reason and meaning of independence itself from a more literal perspective.

The literality of independence means a time of freedom. It is a time when one’s values, likes and aspirations which were been constricted are unequivocally restored to them. In our context, independence is symptomatic of decolonization of a once-colonized state. This time, the colonialists hand-off and back-off from the affairs of the colony.

First October 1960 formalistic independence of Nigeria was a mere act of derision, mockery and travesty to the Nigerian Nationalists who sniffed so much dust into the nostrils of the colonialists the time before. No wonder Nigeria was hurled into the blistering heat of Civil War just 7 years after.

At the time Nigeria was freed by the colonialists, it lacked everything there was to have to be a sovereign state. The London office of the British government had the last say over whatever issue Nigeria council sat to decide. The sovereignty of Nigeria in the period of 1^st October 1960 was tied to the whims and caprices of the Queen at London whose mind was defeatist and incontrovertibly fiendish against Nigeria.

As at 1960, the Supreme Court was not yet established, thus every matter of legal consequence (the truth is that every matter was) was taken to London for final decision. The Parliament of Tafawa Belewa was a mockery to democracy. It lacked legislative will over its decisions. Their operations and wills were tactically stifled by the London office.

Can a county without its own court be independent? Can a country with a toothless legislature be said to be independent? So was Nigeria in a period far back as 1^st October 1960 which purpose we are celebrating today.

In 1^st October 1960, Nigeria lacked the true content of an independent state. It only possessed a framework of a state structure which was indigenously peopled and that was it all. It only had the fiat and behest over issues of domestic relevance. Other issues which could be economic, political etc were machinated by British far away London.

We are celebrating the wrong day. A day which history has only given a robe of identity which served no cause for its christened name. We can summarily say that the struggle for independence received a green beam of light in 1^st October 1960 then we could be right. This is because the British formally pulled-off from Nigeria government and politics on that day.

The day to celebrate real independence is 3^rd October. It was on that day in 1963 that Nigeria was actually billed for a sovereign state that it is today. It was the day when Nigeria assumed full potential to express her rights and territorial identity. The perceived independence of Nigeria was worth nothing until 3^rd October 1963.

It was also on that day that Nigeria owned the highest legal institution-the Supreme Court-which was not in existence prior to that time.

Obviously, the mad throng of celebration witnessed this day will scarcely let us think deep on the essence of the day. Celebrating Independence on the 1^st day of October is the worst of all patriotic wrongs. If we deeply ponder on these realities we shall undoubtedly be up with thoughts that we are celebrating the wrong day.