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Conversation with a Nigerian in Diaspora, About Nigeria

The excerpts below, are from an online conversation I had with a Nigerian in Diaspora. He works with an oil exploration firm. He gave a powerful example of his job search experience BEFORE and AFTER going abroad, which reveals the fact that Nigeria’s problems are compounded, NOT BY GOVERNMENT, but by average Nigerians who choose to do wrong.

The Conversation Transcript…

NB: I’ve chosen to call him "D" in the transcript…

[5:37:27 PM] Tayo Solagbade: How <developed coutnry name> now?
[5:37:48 PM] <D> <developed coutnry name> is cold…-29 today

[5:38:01 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Sorry O. Na heat wan kill us for here
[5:38:20 PM] <D> really?….such is life
[5:38:42 PM] <D> Maybe I should start import/export business…
[5:38:58 PM] <D> to export packaged snow to naija…

[5:39:41 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Ol boy…you go need to invent "storage" system and manufacture money to operate am. anyway, you be oil man now. Money dey flow…lol
[5:40:28 PM] <D> hmmm….money dey flow?…i beg to disagree….
[5:41:28 PM] <D> I should have been a politician…
[5:41:38 PM] <D> Nigerian Politician i mean

[5:42:10 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Really, you like money and power that makes it hard to walk around freely in daytime and impossible to sleep soundly at nite…Kai!
[5:42:34 PM] <D> Nigerian house members earn more than Barack Obamuyiwa
[5:43:53 PM] <D> whats the point in walking around freely when money no dey for pocket…and no one can sleep sound with empty belle either
[5:44:16 PM] Tayo Solagbade: We know. We remind them all the time. Yet they fail to work half as hard as the man. See how the guy has rapidly grown grey hairs!!
[5:44:39 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Person wey no get money for pocket wey ready to work, go see money, if he work smart and hard

[5:44:58 PM] Tayo Solagbade: By the way I hope say you know say na Benin Republic I dey since 1st April O!
[5:45:10 PM] Tayo Solagbade: And my family go soon join me
[5:45:14 PM] <D> Oh yeah?…good for u
[5:45:31 PM] <D> I always use you as case study here…example…
[5:45:40 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Interesting…
[5:45:49 PM] <D> ie…if u were in USA…you would’ve been a billionaire now….
[5:46:18 PM] <D> I say that iin response to your comment about ready to work hard and smart

[5:46:40 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Don’t worry..many roads lead to the market. Lots happening. The future is here in Africa. They’re going to wake up and smell MY coffee soon.
[5:47:12 PM] <D> How were you different from Mark Zukerberg or Bill Gates…ie someone going off the regular curve to do something that not been done before?
[5:47:14 PM] Tayo Solagbade: So many opportunities coming to me based on my work online – from outside Nigeria/Africa in the past 6 months.
[5:48:41 PM] <D> It’s painfull and insane…how we kill our talents and frustrate entrepreneurs

[5:49:50 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Good point. And that’s what I’m saying. It’s being said now – but like you rightly noted our funny people are fighting it. Luckily, some outside Naija are going out of their way to share my work with the world. Just finished a case study paper submitted to a Dutch organisation that accepted my proposal to write it. If they accept the fulll paper, they will pay me 2,500 Euros (Note to reader: I got paid – see http://tinyurl.com/psip119tks). And there are more like that. So, looks like the same story: recognition comes more from the outside…but they willl listen – when hunger gbab them!

[5:52:08 PM] <D> Tayo….trying to make Nigeria hear you…is like beating a dead dog…
[5:52:26 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Omo…should we give up?
[5:52:53 PM] <D> Mark my words….there is a huge difference between potential and opportunity…dynamic and static electricity…kinetic energy and potential energy
[5:53:05 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Looool!!!
[5:53:34 PM] <D> Nigeria has a lot of potential, static….the outside world have a lot of ooportunities
[5:54:06 PM] <D> when you make a product…you take is to the market place…you dont keep the product at home…
[5:55:06 PM] <D> Your skill and inventions are your products….you need to take your skill to the market place (opportunities)…you can be hiding it in your bedroom (naija)…if you get my drift
[5:55:18 PM] Tayo Solagbade: You’ve got a good point there. Just across the border here in Cotonou, o da bi ki eniyan ma fi iku we orun (Translation for reader: It’s like comparing sleep with death). The differece is so clear. So many people kept asking me why I moved. so I explained the MASSIVE benefits in this article (check out the food an average person can eat for next to nothing: Reader…Click to view
[5:56:50 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Actually, you should know most of my income comes from online work now – and it’s been amusing to see Nigerians pay N20,500 into my account in Nigeria, so I can email my software, handbook etc …Loool. The same one ti wan yin mu si when I was there…!!! (Translation: Same one they thumbed their nose at, when I was there.)
[5:57:12 PM] <D> I’m sure you know I studied and read the bible a great deal..and still do…there is a place in the bible that talks about a country(people) that eat there own offsprings…that is nigeria for you
[5:57:48 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Loool…don’t let your pastor hear you dey talk like this O!
[5:58:48 PM] <D> While in Nigeria…for 10 yrs after school…i applied/interviewed to Shell 3 times…but no response…after I reach here…within 2 years…Shell Nigeria came calling..offerred me a job…Oando came calling..Chevron came calling…
[5:59:36 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Na so dem dey do. Once you cross over, you’re suddenly good enough. Even if the only thing that changed is your LOCATION. Sick people.
[6:00:18 PM] <D> After all is said and done….during offer & negotiations…I show them my last pay slip…and they sighed that they can’t match it…and I told the HR pple…if they’d offerred me a job i would not have left naija
[6:00:32 PM] Tayo Solagbade: Imagine that!
[6:00:54 PM] <D> And at the time…i was still carrying my university Geology degree from Nigeria…
[6:01:51 PM] <D> It is still the same brain/knowledge I had…infact less smarter and agile than while in Naija

Final Words: Message from British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Mr. Andrew Lloyd

Below is a message I posted as my Facebook status earlier this month.

I believe it provides a fitting end to this article’s message, which is: BE THE CHANGE YOU WANT TO SEE IN NIGERIA!

Hi,

I thought this might make GOOD food for thought for us Nigerians living in Nigeria…
————————
"Corruption threatens your development, your democracy and stability, just as much as it does ours. It threatens our trade, our prosperity and our economic systems. It distorts free and fair competition and contributes to market failure. It kills talent, innovation and entrepreneurship" – The British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Mr. Andrew Lloyd…describing corruption as being inimical to the growth of any economy, at an anti-corruption seminar organised by the British High Commission, Abuja (Sunday Punch October 23, 2011 – back page)
————————–
My Comments:

Like I always say, let’s LOOK at OUR INDIVIDUAL SELVES before pointing fingers at the government…corruption happens when YOU fail to give the job to the best qualified candidate…when you vote or support based on tribal, religious or other sentiments INSTEAD of merit…when you fail to act with TRUE honesty and integrity in all your dealings with your fellow citizens…when you CHEAT to get awarded a certificate, a job, a contract etc…when you KNOWINGLY DO WRONG!

We can EACH choose, today, to become ACTIVE positive change agents towards making our country better. "Speaking good" about Nigeria will mean NOTHING, if we fail to "ACT GOOD" so that she progresses.

I AM the change I want to see in Nigeria. What about YOU?

===

NB: I wrote the above, in my Self-Development Digest Newsletter on Fri 10/28/2011 at 6:09 PM

I believe each person can choose to become an AGENT of POSITIVE change, and gradually "Make Nigeria Better" if s/he wants to…and REGARDLESS of what any naughty persons in public office may do!


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