Anything Goes

It doesn’t take much to be happy, but we fail to see it; the sky has such beautiful colours that quickly brighten your day. The green leaves off branches of different trees just make you come alive, even the brown barks of the trees remind you of steak. When the leaves dry up and fall in the dry season, they are still beautiful; only that in Nigeria, they fall on an environment filled with trash from newspaper used for suya, empty sachets of pure water, empty cans, biscuits/food wraps and even leftover food.

I really wish there was a penalty for littering the environment, and then a lot of Nigerians would be behind bars. An adult eats bananas, drops the banana skins on the road – a tarred road at that and also throws large pieces of trash from the car onto the highway and thinks it is okay?

A walk along the sea shores or a river bank will get your mind off the deepest worries and the sound of the waters, whether it’s from a waterfall or the ocean waves or running through the tap, is so soothing that you just want to fall asleep.

How else can we see that God made our world so beautiful? Nothing feels better than waking up to the sound of the bird chirping near your window early in the morning. This particular bird, called “belekwukwu” in my language after the sound it makes is to me one of God’s most beautiful creatures. Belekwukwu is almost extinct now because the little village boys wouldn’t keep their catapults to themselves. A certain young man used his own catapult on a giant, why won’t these boys look for someone their own size?

I came across this quote which says; life is like a beautiful melody only the lyrics are messed up. I quite agree with the author, life is meant to be beautiful but we screw it all up. My dear beautiful country Nigeria has a PhD in screwing up the environment. We are blessed with rich natural resources that lay wasted or abused.

Our parks are left unkempt, the beautiful grasses not tended and the parks taken over by hoodlums; they become a den for drug users, pickpockets and the homeless, they bathe there and also use them as restrooms. What is more disturbing is when you see the Nigerian Police who should protect our environment just stand by the corner, watch these people and do absolutely nothing.

I recall years back while visiting the Lagos Bar beach, it was such a beautiful day to play in the waters, I met a little girl who was there all by herself and we hit it off right away and played together like we had known each other all our lives, I was like a five year old girl though I was twenty one.

Our fun in the water was cut short when a group of a religious sect stormed the beach, some other people ignored, but being inquisitive, I left the water and watched them, their leader had a bucket and after he made some incantations, he poured out the contents of the bucket into the ocean. That part of the water turned red from that substance, though it quickly spread through and gradually disappeared; they were also white substances that looked like animal fat. That was the most disgusting thing to see and to think that some water had gone into my mouth earlier on, of course I didn’t go near the water again and my little friend was disappointed.

That was a mild occurrence that afternoon compared to my discovery that the beaches were ritual havens for certain worshippers, they often threw all sorts of substances into the water, little wonder certain sea animals are washed out dead on the sea shores sometimes, like the waters say “here, you killed it, you can have it” I am not an environmentalist but I don’t need an academic degree to know that we need to keep our environment friendly.

Going to work in the mornings some years back, I dreaded two spots; the first spot was where several people stood on planks placed on the waters and pooped away. These people live in the water areas and do not have toilets; the waters provide a natural space for human waste disposal. Do I blame them? No, I blame the government that has failed them, if you do not provide toilets for your citizens; they will definitely make do with what they find.

The second one is a bridge under which a lot of homeless people live, the stench that comes from there penetrates your tightly wound up windows and sips through your car air conditioners, you can never escape it.  My colleagues and I often joked that it was a proper spot to fart, because the smell of your fart would mean nothing at that moment.

 Nigeria is an oil producing country, and most of us are aware of the hardships caused to the people of those oil producing regions and their environment. Their waters and air are massively polluted and so there are no fishes, portable waters and even clean air to breathe. The soils which are created to produce food are destroyed by oil waste that they can no longer grow anything, this must be sinful really.

I lived in the eastern part of Nigeria and I saw people who threw their trash in the gutters whenever it rained heavily, so that the rain would wash them away; this action causes blockage which further causes flooding. Until a very few years back, everything was rocket science in Nigeria including trash disposal. When the government fails, a better way to dispose trash should be by burning; although this may cause air pollution but the risks could be minimal since it takes more just burning of trash to cause serious air pollution.

When I moved to Lagos I realised that the same thing happened, people also threw trash in the gutters during heavy downpours. 

A man stopped his car on 3rd mainland bridge the other day just to pee, he peed right into the water; that was oh so wrong, another one peed right there on the bridge.  Why do men often act like urinating in the outdoors saves the world?

According to an anonymous quote; Beauty is all around if you just open your heart to see it, we should look beyond the tragedies of a failed system and see the beauty our Maker intended for our environment. Though the government fail us, we should not fail ourselves; there must be a fundamental change in the mindset of the people. The decision to keep the environment safe and friendly should first begin with the individual before the sanctions are applied.

We have industries that pollute our environment on a daily basis, but due to lack of proper regulation they get away with murder. Those in charge have been compromised and so they sit in their offices while these industry owners pollute the air that we breathe. 

There are vehicles which are no longer road worthy, they discharge carbon monoxide which is quite dangerous to humans but they are on our roads every day, the smoke from such vehicles is so black that you lose visibility when you drive behind one. Where are the authorities?

There are regulations to protect our environment in Nigeria but they are hardly enforced because “anything goes” in Nigeria; offenders always get themselves out of trouble.

In summary, a friendly environment breeds good citizens and all hands must be on deck to create the environment we are proud of. All parks must be refurbished, our beaches better protected and prevention of felling of trees strictly adhered to. A strong campaign should be launched to create the awareness in every citizen’s mind,

I have also come to realise that poverty and illiteracy have played a huge role in the environmental issues that we face now. How do tell the woman selling in the market not to clean her baby up and then dump the poop in the open market walk way? She does not know about your environment. Seh!

If we had a lot of animals in our country, I am almost certain that they would have all been hunted down even by the very people asked to protect them. Lol 

Our country is so beautiful but with our bare hands, we destroy it every day.