"Patriotism" or the English word "patriot" comes from the Greek word "patriōtēs" which means a "countryman" or a "fatherland". The question of that surrounds the true meaning of a Nigerian patriot or nationalist is divisive and controversial in nature. The Greek philosopher Socrates once said, “Patriotism does not require one to agree with everything that his country does, and would actually promote analytical questioning in a quest to make the country the best it possibly can be.”
Are Nigerian corrupt leaders who openly looted our treasury dry in order to become super-rich men and women overnight as public officials truly patriotic to the Nigerian nation in all truth, honesty and reality? Are those politicians and the government officials who set up one-sided economic policies that primarily benefit the foreign business interests and their few selected or anointed Nigerian businessmen instead of the entire Nigerian nation patriotic? Are those Nigerian public officials who are intentionally mismanaging our state resources, destroying our future and then forces our nation into economic mess, penury, debts and international borrowing truly patriotic?
Are those popular Nigerian pastors and religious leaders with large followers and organizations behind them who use their influential positions and personal connections with those Nigerians in the corridor of power to diabolically evade import duties and the weight of the law really patriotic? Are those Nigerian popular pastors or religious organizations who receive donations as tithes and personal gifts that run into the tens of millions of the Nigerian Naira from those corrupt public and government officials who are never paid in the same tens of million of the Nigerian Naira as their salaries and allowances our genuine patriots today in Nigeria? Are those Nigerian popular pastors who intentionally endorsed the candidacy of those mediocre and corrupt politicians for public offices really patriotic to the nation?
Are those Nigerian public officials who intentionally reduced the monetary values of the government owned and failing corporations, government houses and government valuable properties to be sold to their friends and family members at those ridiculous or giveaway prices really patriotic to Nigeria? In conclusion, many of our so called leaders in both the secular and the religious worlds in Nigeria today are simply our true traitors or real enemies in Nigeria. The true patriots and the genuine nationalists in Nigeria today are the men and women who never went alongside with our government decisions, choices and policies on those important national issues that affect the future of the Nigerian nation primarily and the welfare of the 160 million ordinary Nigerians in general
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