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What If There’s No Hell? By Rudolf Ogoo Okonkwo

 
Chances are that every blessed day in Nigeria, a young girl accused of stealing a BlackBerry phone is accosted by a group of men. As it is often the case, these voyeurs surround the poor lady like famished vultures around a decaying corpse. They take delight in tearing off her dresses, starting from her breasts down to her waist area. They take turns to molest her, touching and twisting and tingling. She goes down on her knees, hands up in the air pleading for forgiveness. The men sigh uniformly and murmur something about ‘showing her pepper today’. It does not cross the mind of any of the men to allow God to punish the girl. Instead with their tongues hanging out, they flip open their phone cameras to record a video of the half-naked girl for their Facebook page.
On the same day, in another part of another town, a petty thief who overreaches, is caught by another group of men. Like an irate herd of hyenas, they kick, punch and spit at him. With the same hand they use to receive the Holy Communion on Sundays, they pick up hefty stones by the roadside, throw them at him and smile as pieces of flesh spatter on red soil. Some grab broken legs of a wooden table and smash them on his head. Blood gushes out as another man goes for some tires and another for a gallon of petrol. With the same hand he uses to flip through the pages of the Bible, one man scratches a match and throws the fire on the thief’s body now drenched with petrol. As his flesh burns, the men surround the bonfire, eyes popping out, teeth clinching, and their Clifford Orji-like nostrils taking in the smell of his roasting flesh. It does not cross the mind of any of the men to allow God to punish the thief.
On the same day, in yet another part of another town, a big politician and his entourage pull into town in a convoy of exotic vehicles led by expert police riders. Young men with fists up in the air and heads bowed surround the biggest of the cars in which the politician sits. “We’re loyal,” they yell by the window, as everyone waits for police escorts to come and open the back door for the politician to climb down. Only one older man notices the blood of a pedestrian on the tires of the politician’s Sport Utility Vehicle. The politician’s convoy knocked down an old woman crossing a road a few miles away and moved on. “God will punish him,” the older man says and walks away.
The other young men dance and chant the numerous titles of the politician as he climbs out. His protruding stomach comes out first. And then, his empty head emerges, titled cap fixed on top of the fast balding head. He steps out and begins to address the young men. He makes promises. The same promises he made the last election season, which was the time he came around. He lists accomplishments that none of the young men around him can attest to. He does not mention the millions he gets paid for being in government neither does he mention the millions he gets in kickbacks for contracts that won’t be executed. His millions in security votes, millions in constituency project allocations, millions in Et cetera allowances are all siphoned abroad. Meanwhile, all these young men, many unemployed, many dying in installment, suffer the consequences of poor infrastructures, lack of medical facilities, and general impunity inspired by men like him. But they dance and dance until loaves of bread, with naira notes embedded in the middle, get to their hands.
There must be a reason why young men molest girls accused of stealing BlackBerry phones and burn up petty thieves but hail the greatest thieves of them all- politicians. There must be something that our public officials know that we ordinary mortals do not know. It must be something very key to their survival. These men and women, supposedly religious people, know something very deep that have eluded us. My suspicion is that they know that there is no hell.
What if there is no hell? Maybe that is their secret. Maybe they know there is no hell while the rest of us don’t. So they let us go to church, mosques and shrines, where we are asked to look away, to focus on the pineapple in the sky and to give all we have. When we walk away, the pastors, imams and priests laugh their heads off. Mumu, they call us.
I am a long time observer of the Nigerian malady. But in recent time, it has been a lot difficult to retain my sanity. To hold on to what remains of my humanity, I find myself turning into a philosopher.
Since when I was a child, Hell has been marketed as a life transmitted disease that one catches for engaging in inappropriate behavior without any good cause. It is the prize of sin -the payment for stealing from public coffer -the compensation for inflating contracts -the gift for abandoning developmental projects -the reward for ordering assassinations of political opponents - the remuneration for importing fake drugs and fake juice -the return for stealing a poor widow’s land – the reimbursement for defying the mandate of the people.
If Nigerian politicians, raised as children to fear hell act this way, imagine how they will act if they know that there is no hell? Ah! There must not be hell. If there is hell the way there is STD, these men and women won’t indulge in behaviors like these.
Think of it. What else could be the reason why your pastor is using the money you give each Sunday to send his children to top schools abroad while your children are stuck in that poor public school? And your pastors are not even leading a march to force the government to fund and fix the schools where your children go to school. Why else would your pastors be buying new jets while deadly smoke is spurting out of your car’s gear box? What other reasons would make your pastors to collect stolen money from corrupt politicians if not the assurance that there is no hell?
Please consider my question again: what if there is no hell? What if there is no STD? What if there is no AIDS? What if there is no gonorrhea? What if there is no syphilis? I bet it is the same thing. Some folks act as if there is no STD even when they see their consequences. Imagine if they cannot see any sign of STD, how will they behave?
The young men who molest girls accused of stealing BlackBerry, burn up petty thieves but hail the greatest thieves of them all – the politicians, cannot possibly see any sign of hell. Are you surprised at how they act? Why do they think the politician is any different from the BlackBerry stealing girl or the petty thief? Why do those who think otherwise leave the punishment of the politician to God?
So, I ask you again; what if there is no hell? Would it be reason enough for our young men to hold our public servants accountable - even if it is not the same way they hold the BlackBerry girl or the petty thief accountable?

 

Chances are that every blessed day in Nigeria, a young girl accused of stealing a BlackBerry phone is accosted by a group of men. As it is often the case, these voyeurs surround the poor lady like famished vultures around a decaying corpse. They take delight in tearing off her dresses, starting from her breasts down to her waist area. They take turns to molest her, touching and twisting and tingling. She goes down on her knees, hands up in the air pleading for forgiveness. The men sigh uniformly and murmur something about ‘showing her pepper today’. It does not cross the mind of any of the men to allow God to punish the girl. Instead with their tongues hanging out, they flip open their phone cameras to record a video of the half-naked girl for their Facebook page.

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On the same day, in another part of another town, a petty thief who overreaches, is caught by another group of men. Like an irate herd of hyenas, they kick, punch and spit at him. With the same hand they use to receive the Holy Communion on Sundays, they pick up hefty stones by the roadside, throw them at him and smile as pieces of flesh spatter on red soil. Some grab broken legs of a wooden table and smash them on his head. Blood gushes out as another man goes for some tires and another for a gallon of petrol. With the same hand he uses to flip through the pages of the Bible, one man scratches a match and throws the fire on the thief’s body now drenched with petrol. As his flesh burns, the men surround the bonfire, eyes popping out, teeth clinching, and their Clifford Orji-like nostrils taking in the smell of his roasting flesh. It does not cross the mind of any of the men to allow God to punish the thief.

On the same day, in yet another part of another town, a big politician and his entourage pull into town in a convoy of exotic vehicles led by expert police riders. Young men with fists up in the air and heads bowed surround the biggest of the cars in which the politician sits. “We’re loyal,” they yell by the window, as everyone waits for police escorts to come and open the back door for the politician to climb down. Only one older man notices the blood of a pedestrian on the tires of the politician’s Sport Utility Vehicle. The politician’s convoy knocked down an old woman crossing a road a few miles away and moved on. “God will punish him,” the older man says and walks away.

The other young men dance and chant the numerous titles of the politician as he climbs out. His protruding stomach comes out first. And then, his empty head emerges, titled cap fixed on top of the fast balding head. He steps out and begins to address the young men. He makes promises. The same promises he made the last election season, which was the time he came around. He lists accomplishments that none of the young men around him can attest to. He does not mention the millions he gets paid for being in government neither does he mention the millions he gets in kickbacks for contracts that won’t be executed. His millions in security votes, millions in constituency project allocations, millions in Et cetera allowances are all siphoned abroad. Meanwhile, all these young men, many unemployed, many dying in installment, suffer the consequences of poor infrastructures, lack of medical facilities, and general impunity inspired by men like him. But they dance and dance until loaves of bread, with naira notes embedded in the middle, get to their hands.

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('content2'); });

There must be a reason why young men molest girls accused of stealing BlackBerry phones and burn up petty thieves but hail the greatest thieves of them all- politicians. There must be something that our public officials know that we ordinary mortals do not know. It must be something very key to their survival. These men and women, supposedly religious people, know something very deep that have eluded us. My suspicion is that they know that there is no hell.

What if there is no hell? Maybe that is their secret. Maybe they know there is no hell while the rest of us don’t. So they let us go to church, mosques and shrines, where we are asked to look away, to focus on the pineapple in the sky and to give all we have. When we walk away, the pastors, imams and priests laugh their heads off. Mumu, they call us.

I am a long time observer of the Nigerian malady. But in recent time, it has been a lot difficult to retain my sanity. To hold on to what remains of my humanity, I find myself turning into a philosopher.

Since when I was a child, Hell has been marketed as a life transmitted disease that one catches for engaging in inappropriate behavior without any good cause. It is the prize of sin -the payment for stealing from public coffer -the compensation for inflating contracts -the gift for abandoning developmental projects -the reward for ordering assassinations of political opponents - the remuneration for importing fake drugs and fake juice -the return for stealing a poor widow’s land – the reimbursement for defying the mandate of the people.

If Nigerian politicians, raised as children to fear hell act this way, imagine how they will act if they know that there is no hell? Ah! There must not be hell. If there is hell the way there is STD, these men and women won’t indulge in behaviors like these.

Think of it. What else could be the reason why your pastor is using the money you give each Sunday to send his children to top schools abroad while your children are stuck in that poor public school? And your pastors are not even leading a march to force the government to fund and fix the schools where your children go to school. Why else would your pastors be buying new jets while deadly smoke is spurting out of your car’s gear box? What other reasons would make your pastors to collect stolen money from corrupt politicians if not the assurance that there is no hell?

Please consider my question again: what if there is no hell? What if there is no STD? What if there is no AIDS? What if there is no gonorrhea? What if there is no syphilis? I bet it is the same thing. Some folks act as if there is no STD even when they see their consequences. Imagine if they cannot see any sign of STD, how will they behave?

The young men who molest girls accused of stealing BlackBerry, burn up petty thieves but hail the greatest thieves of them all – the politicians, cannot possibly see any sign of hell. Are you surprised at how they act? Why do they think the politician is any different from the BlackBerry stealing girl or the petty thief? Why do those who think otherwise leave the punishment of the politician to God?

So, I ask you again; what if there is no hell? Would it be reason enough for our young men to hold our public servants accountable - even if it is not the same way they hold the BlackBerry girl or the petty thief accountable?

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