The 63rd Independence anniversary of Nigeria has come and gone but not the memories of those who stylised the anniversary with imaginative Green-White-Green designs.
From New York city comes a stylish scripting of Nigeria in a Green-White-Green mixture of the alphabets. It is not just nationalist sentiments. Any independence anniversary of Nigeria will be an inviting one in a mega city such as New York because Nigeria itself is huge, complex mega polity.
At the Nigerian mission in Cuba, some Nigerian students in the country were at a function where they appeared in a picture with obviously a senior mission staff. Although Google did not capture the name of the official, the issue in question is his Green-White-Green presence of mind. What the first picture lack in the Green compliance is more than compensated in the second in which everyone was compliant. It merges well with the spirit of it.
The picture out there in Cuba
From New York city in North America to Cuba in Latin America, we land in nearby African country, Senegal where Ambassador Ella who currently heads the mission merges with mission staff, other Nigerians and well wishers to cut an anniversary cake, almost all the appearances compliant with the Green-White-Green independence anniversary mood. Again, Google did not indicate the name of the other faces in the second picture with Amb. Ella, it is an inviting picture of Nigerianity. Connoisseurs of style may want to take a closer look at Amb Ella’s outfit. It is not the traditional babanriga but still a 3- piece stuff.
As it played out in Senegal
Right there in Abuja is a group on a sporting outing but which did not miss the Green-White-Green fiesta. It is a particularly interesting group in that it took note of the fiesta but while also reflecting the African diversity of the group. The internet caption for the photo runs as follows: “Nigerian golfers with their counterparts from Ghana, Cameroon and Uganda, on Friday, teed off on the green course of the IBB International Golf and Country”
This story was about to go online when an avid reader of Intervention sent in a picture of a bright girl-child, provoking a debate about which would be more appropriate cover picture: the extraordinarily cool Nigerian flag or the picture of an innocent girl-child symbolising the future of Nigeria?
The ultimate Green-White-Green!
Intervention decided to call the professor who sent the picture as a routine exchange of independence anniversary stuff, presenting the crease his picture has caused. He voted for the girl child. His argument predominated over Interventions where he said that everything we are doing should bear that child in mind. Whatever we are doing in Nigeria and about Nigeria now – from politics to business to diplomacy to name it – should be about the dignity of that girl-child. In another decade plus when she wants to go to the university, would she most likely reject an offer from Harvard or Oxford in favour of the University of Ibadan as her seniors did some 50 or so years ago. Her seniors could choose Ibadan over Harvard or anywhere else because there was no difference between the two, basically. Today, the story is not like that. Yet, that girl cannot internalise and transmit the Nigerian spirit without the quality of education that is inherently liberatory.
That is not to say that the Nigerian flag is not the unbeatable symbol of the Nigerian genius! Saying so is not just national chauvinism. The flag is simply cool. It is beautiful!
