A lot has been happening…but then again, a lot is always happening in Nigeria. One minute there appears to be a flicker of hope that we just might be beginning to get things right…you know, news such as the emergence of ex-CBN Governor, Charles Soludo as the winner at the Anambra State polls, and most recently, the Lagos judicial panel report on the End SARS protests that finally lent credence to the assertions that harmless youths were killed on that fateful day. In the case of the latter, it’s a big miracle that a government-instituted panel would give a damning verdict on an issue that would indict the same body that commissioned it to investigate the matter.

So yes, there’s progress in that regard, even though we all what would be a real shift from the norm would be the implementation of the recommendations of the panel.

My hunch is that as usual, the clamour for government to do the right thing will attract promises and assurances that something will be done, and the report findings will not go the way of others, only for things to die down after a while. An ensuing silence will follow, and before we know it, the 20th of October 2020 will be yet another June 12 that turned out to be a recurrent day of ‘weeping and gnashing’ of teeth before the Buhari-led government opted to soothe fraying nerves by declaring the day the rightful Democracy Day. But I’ll leave room for some optimism again and hope that government listens to many voices in the wilderness without further ado.

In other news, the prices of foodstuff and essential commodities continue to soar such that even people who are seemingly well-paid compared to the rest of the populace now spend a significant portion of their income on food. To say this is worrisome is an understatement. To think that the penurious are still somehow fashioning out a way to feed is the eighth wonder of the world at this point; I practically get palpitations each time I go grocery shopping.

Then again, I am a Nigerian. We have learnt to be thankful for the things people in other climes do not even think about. If I hit a bad pot-hole on my way to work one day, I’ll thank the heavens if it’s been fixed when I get there the next day. When PHCN restores power after an outage, I am so thankful that sometimes, I literally burst into a little ‘victory’ dance. Yet another day of escaping traffic robbers, scraping together a good meal or staying out of debt is reason enough to give a testimony in church on Sunday.

Surely, being a Nigerian is one of the most interesting sports in the world. For one, the fact that there’s always something to yap about: whether it is a feuding couple who cannot keep their shenanigans off social media or a celebrated artistes misadventure or yet another tiktok challenge, we cannot be accused of not keeping things interesting despite the flurry of challenges strewn along our path.

This piece may be a little all over the place, but when you have been not just swamped but submerged in a sea of work and other sundry concerns of a troubled world, this is what you do to get your writing mojo back. You just write and hope it makes sense to somebody or at least helps you to get your groove back.