Addressing Natural And Man-Made Disasters

We should not at all blame the omnipotent and omniscient of God, the Almighty for the several natural calamities and adversities like; earthquakes, Tsunamis, Tremors Wild Fires, severe cold and heat, that are associated with every given season each year. Neither do we blame the Supreme One for the vicissitude of life that we do find our selves enmeshed in from time-to-time.
However, as living mortals and human beings endowed with high intelligence quotient (IQ), and sense of rationality, common sense and abundant wisdom, we need to ponder, reflect and contemplate on how best to make our lives worth living and to improve on our general climatic and other conditions with a view to have good health and improved lives. These perhaps, necessitate the several climatic sensitization and awareness campaigns, programes and activities like Conferences, Seminars, Lectures, Symposia etc. in order to create awareness and arouse consciousness to educate and caution society and governments on how to avert, control or manage such natural disasters or calamities from either happening or cushioning their excruciating effects, whenever they happen anywhere in the world.
We can easily reflect on how the world is trying to manage climatic changes and environmental degradations and their harmful effects on humanity and environments in any part of the world. The various conferences, like Copenhagen 2009 by leaders of the advanced countries under these reasons remain instructive and relevant, because of the tremendous goodwill, concerns and financial assistance usually rendered to affected areas with a view to cushioning the adverse effects of air, water and environmental pollution that are emanated from various human activities and industries found mainly  in the  highly industrialized and developed countries which  directly affect developing countries.
It is in this regard that we find it imperative to draw attention of our leaders in Nigeria, Africa and the developing world at large about the excruciating heat and hot climate being witnessed  this year in Northern Nigeria in particular, and other  parts of Africa  in general. For instance, temperature in Borno State this year had sometimes reached 48o Celsius, leading to suffocation, diseases, hardships, low human activities and deaths. In Maiduguri Gwange central cemetery this year, it was reported that 150 people were buried there in a day, not to talk of other cemeteries in the city. This is unprecedented in the history of Gwange cemetery according to the people working there.
The only reason for the preponderance of deaths this year in Maiduguri and environs according to the people was the severe heat associated with hot climate this year. Agencies that deal with environmental issues  like; NIMET, FEMA, NESREA, etc. always come up with figures and pronouncements to compound peoples' fears, only for the exceedingly difficult hardship s under the prevailing hot climatic conditions to persist with harmful effects on the people and their livestock.
Sadly, the government at all levels has failed to intervene favourably. The people are grumbling, suffocating, persevering and slowly dying in the midst of severe subjection to extreme hot weather conditions which are said to be unprecedented in the state. In more serious countries with effective social welfare packages and political will to do the needful things for the health of their citizens, there could have been some positive subsidies and palliatives for the people to considerably look after their lives.
With epileptic and erratic electricity supply for the people from the prostrate Power Holdings Company of Nigeria (PHCH), this outfit has been turned into a  gold mine for those who work in it, albeit, through criminal collaboration with some unscrupulous elements in society to sabotage, vandalize and steal cables, transmitter wires, mercury, etc. The condition has been worsened and beyond all of us, who can only murmur and lament on the frustrating conditions brought on us by parochial and apathetic leadership across the levels of government. The greed, corruption and non-performance by PHCN are well-known and acknowledged.
Although successive governments had made endless promises and given insincere assurances over the past years that electricity in Nigeria would improve, despite sinking billions of Naira into the power sector, the results are yet to be seen or felt by most Nigerians.
The power sub sector in Nigeria, as most social factors or objectives, has become a nest for corrupt public officers and government bureaucrats in the executive and legislative arms of government. We easily recall the Elumelu House Committee on power which did a poor and corrupt mess out of their probe of the Independent Power Project (IPP) assignment that did not produce any positive results. Indeed Nigerians are a very resilient, docile, gullible and God-fearing and religious people who always take recourse in destiny and predestination for whatever befalls them  including avoidable non-made malfeasance like corruption and bad governance. Instead of rising up against these imposed and deliberate acts of wickedness and brutality of man against humanity, they simply recoil to their cocoons, holding to their religious beliefs and destinies erroneously, due to their misunderstood perception of religion which doest not prelude one from insisting on justice, fairness and equity. Religion enjoins probity, accountability and transparency by those who preside over our   public affairs. Unfortunately, our citizens do not generally know and insist on performances and accountability, and they are the ones that brought leaders to positions of authority in the first place.
It is disheartening to note that electricity which is under the concurrent list in our constitution, hence the collective responsibility of both states and federal government to provide it to the citizenry, most state governments have been found wanting on the partnership. They would rather corner the enormous statutory allocations from federation accounts meant for development of all, for their selfish and rapacious enrichment. Consequently, with the non-performance and lack of   compliance to service delivery by PHCN, through SERVICOM, the situations have been aggravated to our dismay. While Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Dubai UAE, Bahrain, Syria, etc have remained models and quintessence of what oil money can do their peoples' welfare and development through provisions of good asphalt roads, uninterrupted electricity supply, subsidy for food, shelter etc, Nigeria, which is even richer than any of these countries remain backward, poor and  despondent. We cannot get electricity enough let alone subsidy fro Air Conditioners to reduce the excruciating effects of hot climate and heat that are adversely affecting our citizens in the North-east in particular. Our leaders have sadly ignored our plight and tribulations. They hardly speak about them, like the severe heat witnessed early in the year. They rather appropriate our money and keep for themselves, doling out handouts before elections to compromise the electorate only. Their welfare, security and well being are not their targets or issues to be addressed. Yet, they want to be called democrats! No way, this is not how democrats act and behave. Democracy      entails good governance, selflessness, positive and dynamic leadership, the will to serve diligently and altruistically. Ironically, most of our brand of democrats behave and act as anti-democrats; they appear aristocratic. They identify with the conservative capitalists in Nigeria who only care about class stratifications, distinctions and discriminations on family backgrounds,   royalty or social backgrounds. They treat the down-trodden with contempt and malice. How can such leaders be called democrats? They are more fascists than democrats. They are feudal lords who regard all of us as their slaves, despite our rights and freedom from servitude and forced labour.
Most of our leaders do take advantage of our ignorance of our fundamental rights as enshrined in the constitution to cheat on us and downplay our sensibilities as people. Probably that also informs their negative attitude towards the education of majority of our people by voting the minimum UN standard of 26% in the national or state budgets. Consequently, about 53% of our citizens are illiterate according to figures by UNICEF.
The solutions to our social, political and economic regression and under-development are among others, lack of will and ability by the leadership to develop our human capital. This also led to poor interactions, which also give way to frustration, anger, aggression and confrontations resulting into anti-social upheavals.
The solutions are not far-fetched if our leaders have the political will to abide by their oaths of office, allegiance and respect all our laws, pursue our fundamental objectives squarely, have the fear of God, love their people and have unreserved and unequivocal empathy, sympathy, compassion and attention for, especially, the less privileged members of our society  who  form the greatest numbers in our total population and therefore more adversely affected and vulnerable to the impact of misgovernance in general. It is unkind that some of our people in the rural areas in the north-east still fetch water from wells using camels and donkeys. This is very sad.