It all started in the Wuhan community in faraway China as an endemic disease a day or two before the last Christmas. What an Xmas present to the whole world from a people that still hug paganism! And within a couple of days, the ailment graduated to an epidemic spreading beyond the community.
Initially christened Coronavirus, the killer disease was renamed Covid-19 to save you and I from twisting our tongues and before we could spell the word corona, the sickness marched across the globe to assume the status of a pandemic!
As at the time of writing, more than two million people have been sickened by the plague with close to 200,000 hurried to their early graves across the globe. Lord, have mercy! To think that about three Fridays ago when I first wrote about the outbreak, I erroneously put the statistics of infections at 500,000, whereas the statistics were just 300,000. And I felt very bad about the misinformation. However, little did I know that by now, the number of those infected would climb up to more than two million folks! Today, Nigeria’s shares stand at 442 cases, 13 deaths and about 152 discharged.
Nigeria recorded its index case on February 27, 2019, barely two months after the rampage began in Wuhan. The importer of the disease came from Italy. The Italian reminds us of the importation of the Ebola virus by one Sawyer from Liberia in 2014. We fought Ebola hammer and tongs for some months and in the end we triumphed. Using the Ebola experience, government at all levels has been throwing everything at the Covid-19 except the cure.
But Ebola did not induce as much fears as Covid-19 which appears to kill faster. Besides, Ebola was an epidemic disease while Covid-19 is an international figure!
To tackle the cruel disease, all manner of measures have been put in place to save Nigerians from themselves. Initially, the measures began with a partial lockdown. Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos state led the way when he banned any gathering of more than 50 people in worship centres at a time. Then he locked down all schools, and market places that were not selling consumables and even went the extra kilometre by setting up neighbourhood markets across the state.
Other states soon followed. Across the states, most government businesses have been tinkered with and workers on Level 12 and below were made to work from home… all in an attempt to put the scourge on the back foot since it cannot be transmitted without human conspiracy! When the ailment breathed down the neck of President Muhammadu Buhari, he came down heavily on Lagos, the epicentre of the scourge, and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja. Ogun state did not escape the clampdown. Its crime? Proximity to Lagos state! Remember that the first carrier from Italy navigated his way to Ogun state after landing in Lagos.
The initial lockdown in these three major locations was for two weeks in the first instance. And only those on essential services were allowed to step out of their homes. Those selling foodstuffs, provisions, etc., were also allowed to come out. Others were to work from home. What that meant was that they were to go on isolation and/or quarantine as the case may be. Technically, they were also under house arrest.
To cushion the harsh effects of the lockdown, government rolled out measures targeted at the dregs of the society. These included cash and consumables. Those who were neither rich nor poor have been left in the cold and at the mercy of hunger.
Exactly two weeks after the initial lockdown, President Buhari, on the advice of the Presidential Committee on Covid-19 led by Boss Mustapha, who is also the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), pressed down the lid of the ban for another two weeks. Season Two of the lockdown will stretch to April 27, 2020. Across the states, measures like total curfews have been introduced. The few states that have escaped the Covid-19 attacks so far are not taking chances. All manner of precautionary measures have been put in place. To strengthen Season Two in the FCT, the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) has introduced mobile courts to try those who flout the ‘house arrest’ order.
When I first commented on the phenomenon three weeks ago, I warned on the implications of the lockdown if the palliatives being put in place are not total. Hunger breeds anger. I was not surprised that some angry and hungry criminal elements are going about robbing for survival as reported in parts of Lagos and Ogun.
A day before the Season Two was served by President Buhari, a niece of mine who is an eye doctor based in London put a call to me. She wanted us to compare notes. She told me how the British Government and its partners were handling the crisis that hurled the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson into the ICU or intensive care unit for more than 72 hours, though he survived the attack.
The British social welfare safety net does not leave any eligible citizens out. She also mentioned the dimension the matter has taken in the Christendom especially the new generation churches pastored by Nigerians. She said Christians are now making demands on their pastors, bishops, general overseers or whatever titles they bear. Having paid tithes over a long period of time, they argue that it is time for the church to reciprocate their support for the system. According to a time-honoured wisecrack, “In prosperity, our friends know us; in adversity, we know our friends”. In other words, the church should support its members in their hour of need, especially the tithe slaves.
Here in Nigeria, most average Christians have been brainwashed to pay tithes. They are made to believe that their resources are not secure if they don’t pay tithes to the church.
Some are even coerced into surrendering their first salaries as first fruits upon securing employment or parting with their January salaries year in, year out. That is not all. Most church members have been indoctrinated into relegating their biological parents to obscurity while they feed fat on them as their spiritual fathers or mothers.
We both agreed that the church system is feeding fat from poverty. Nigeria is arguably the world’s headquarters of poverty. And poverty is one of the key factors driving most people to these prosperity churches where they are made to believe that solutions to their problems can be found! Those who are rich in the system are also made to engage in sciamachy… an instance of fighting an imaginary enemy. As I have always said, we live in a world where everyone is someone’s enemy. And these wealthy ones are made to believe that they do not only need spiritual protection from these unseen enemies but also must be under the fortification of their spiritual fathers/mothers at all times. The sources of wealth of these members are not even clean.
By the end of our conversation, we both came to the conclusions that the money-making arm of the church that originated from the United States also known as Pentecostal system is anti-poor. If they are not, this is the time to prove us wrong. Rather than donating huge sums of money to the governments to fight the scourge, they should organise palliatives for their vulnerable members. Hungervirus is deadlier than Covid-19.
