LAI MOHAMMED, CLEANINESS AND PARADISE

Asignificant segment of Nigerians hopes to go Paradise when they die. They are told every passing day that the streets of this Paradise are paved with gold and that there are plethora of luxury items to be enjoyed at will just by the dint of sheer desire. The conclusion that can be drawn here is that Paradise is one extremely neat and very, very clean abode. Disappointingly, those residents here on Earth who strongly desire to go to Paradise are not doing enough preparation in terms of personal hygiene and general cleanliness; how can anyone desire to go to a place paved with gold macadam whilst they do open defecation with carefree abandon? Other than open defecation on roadways and backyards, they do not properly dispose of their refuse and raw sewage, and they are constantly beset by fly and vermin infestations. There is obviously a big contradiction here, no doubt about it. Without telling anyone to quit believing in the promises of their religion, the federal government through the Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed, could initiate a win-win public awareness campaign whereby Mr. Lai Mohammed would constantly remind his compatriots that it does make a iota of common sense to do even a modicum of preparation for Paradise and to even experiment with enjoying some of the promised luxuries (good food, especially) while still on Earth so that the shock of transiting from abject wretchedness to absolute luxury would not cause the new entrant of Paradise awkward moments. Taken seriously, this campaign would promote good hygiene across Nigeria and ultimately improve quality of life and save the federal government vast sums of money in emergency healthcare response (the recent meningitis crisis is just but a case in point).

Sunday Adole Jonah, Department of Physics, Federal University of Technology, Minna