Namaste to you all.
I am glad to be here again after a long while. In life, there are things one loves to do, out of these many things, one particular one stands out. For me, I am an outdoor person. I do not want to be held to a particular spot. This is why I love to travel. From a very tender age, I chose to go around with my late father. Every weekend, we would visit one family member or the other.
My journey and love for traveling started on that note. Some of the people we visited least expected that we would come from a far distance to check on them but they cherished the character we displayed. So, I would say, this is one big attitude my father taught me.
Today, I could tell you that I have traveled the length and breadth of Nigeria and I have had the opportunity to travel out of Nigeria on two different occasions that were sponsored by the organization I worked for and by the government.
First, when I was at the University, I traveled to Niger state, Federal University of Technology, Minna. It was a journey that was bewildered by confusion and the struggle to free Nigerian Universities from the bad policies of the government. We drove all the way from Ondo state to Osun state to join delegates from all the universities there. The National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) used to be a strong agitator for a better Nigeria then.
We set off on the journey at night and got to Lokoja in Kogi state where we had a stop over. Their food was similar to what is served in most restaurants in the west. We arrived at Niger state and had a peaceful time and elected new leaders for the organization.
At another time, I led a group of tourists who came from the Netherlands, from Lagos to Plateau state in the north. We travelled by road for over twelve hours but it was worth the while. Jos in Nigeria is the only place where snow falls like in California. Food is cheap because it is an agrarian society. The people in Plateau state were of different ethnic groups and lived in peaceful coexistence.
Ebonyi state is quite an experience for me. With a different kind of landscape, the people were cultivators of rice, yam, okra and many other crops. The rice farms are very large and immeasurable. Despite the large concentration of rice farms around the state, there was only very little rice milk to help the farmers polish the rice and make it a huge demand in the market. Nigeria is a blessed country as all the states have one natural resource that breaks the chains of poverty but due to greed, bad government policies and misplaced priority, the people still live in abject poverty.
My first trip outside Nigeria was in 2007. I had just gained admission into the university when the opportunity came to visit the Hague in the Netherlands. The Hague is the headquarters of the International Court of Justice, a subsidiary of the United Nations. Thankfully, the university had declared a holiday for three weeks. I went away with the Nigerian delegation to the Hague on recommendation by one Nigerian direction at the ICJ, Bayo Olowo-ake. I took a week diploma course in Civilian Peacekeeping and Humanitarian Diplomacy in Lagos before my admission into the University and Bayo Olowo-ake was the resource person. Having emerged as the best student from the programme, I was given a slot to see how the ICJ runs. It was a week-long programme and I enjoyed every bit of my stay.
Travelling around Nigeria today is not totally safe. First, there is the issue of bad roads. For example, the federal road between Sagamu and Ore in Ondo state is a death trap. This has made travelling very difficult and caused fatal accidents that have claimed a lot of lives.
There is also the issue of kidnappers and armed robbers on the highways despite the heavy presence of police and military personnel on the highway. The armed robbers would always target travelers who may be with some cash to rob. While the kidnappers would storm the highway and takeaway unsuspecting travelers into the forest to demand for ransome. It appears that kidnapping is the biggest and well paying crime in Nigeria currently.
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