Saturday, December 13, 2008

BLOODBATH IN JOS

Your natural landscapes are painted red again
Your cool and fresh weather heated by hatred
Your once open hands of brotherhood amputated
Your loving heart for love mutilated
Only hatred is sprouting from your once green soil
You have massacred women and children
As your leaders shamelessly watch with an approval nod
Their hands are full of blood of the innocents
Oh Jos! Oh Jos!! What befell you?

I heard that you hate settlers
But if I may ask the older settlers of the Plateau
Where were they when the settlers came?
Where were they when they settled?
Where were they when the settled toiled robustly at the mines?
Where were they when they built your so-called capital?
Were indigenes on the hills busy drinking burkutu?

I heard that you are becoming puritanical
I heard that what you want is a purely Christian State
Where no other creed or belief shall flourish
Could you be self sufficient in a nation of multiple faiths?
Can you afford to be isolated by other Nigerians who share other faiths?

The nation is sensing the shadow of puritanical paganism looming
The professed faith is loosing its clasp of your hearts
The love preached by Christ is gradually being battered by hatred

Oh Jos! You cannot go on like this
Those heartless butchers must be brought to book
And the spirit of those murdered shall keep them awake for eternity
Never again! The settlers have spoken!

December 13, 2008