VOTER'S CARD PALAVA

If you are like me, Sunday is the most busy and productive day of the week and is usually packed full, with every meeting almost as important as the other and attendance mandatory. So I took out what I thought was going to be a few minutes from my very tight Sunday schedule to pick up my permanent voters card, all I can say is thank God for favour.

The first group of people I approached to enquire about what the process was, all had a look of agitation and pent up anger on their faces, so I threaded carefully as I approached them. “this thing is not rocket science” one of them kept repeating, “for crying out loud, I have been here since 11.30 and this people are making it seem like there is no better way to handle this voters card ****”.

In situations like this, I have learnt to step back, observe and respond only when comments are passed my way. But as I stood there and a few minutes turned into a couple of hours, I began to feel the frustration of the crowd, anger began to well up within me… I pause for a second and thought about it again, this nonsense is happening because people like you and I have refused to take responsibility for our governance and wellbeing. We have abdicated power to old greedy men that should be in retirement homes waiting for their great grand-children to come visiting and the few young ones that have been privileged to walk that corridor of power, have been blinded by the corruption of office and like he-cocks in pursuit of a hen, have lost all sense of direction and common sense with focus on only one thing; grab, grab and grab some more before the oil dries up.

I have a few questions:

1.      Why did it take FOUR years for a voter’s card that I registered for to be produced?

2.      After the eventual production of the card, why did INEC have to cut it so close to election-day to “eventually” share the voter’s card?

3.      The passport photograph that is being collected from people who registered for a card FOUR years ago, whose faces also appear on the permanent card, who have come in person to pick up their cards, what is it going to be used for?

4.      If you tell me it is for record purposes as I assume some of you might be thinking, what happened to the biometrics data that was obtained from me FOUR years ago? Or is that one history now?

5.      Why were those INEC officials taking records on sheets of paper in this 21^st century? Isn’t there a database with the information of everyone that registered for this exercise FOUR years ago that the officials could refer to online and verify the details of citizens?

6.      What stops us from doing like an online pre-verification exercise and make the collection process a walk-in exercise?

Okay, let me stop ranting and let’s talk solutions.

I think it is time we start taking actions, we need credible leaders, that fact is no longer up for debate. And like someone clearly pointed out yesterday, I don’t know how many of you reading this right now that know the name of their constituency councilor. Posters are already flying around of people we do not have a clue what their credibility is, some of these contestants don’t have a track record from anywhere be it private or public enterprise but their pictures keep popping up every other four years. We need to hold someone accountable for their words and take responsibility of following through to ensure that they meet their obligation to the populace.

I have decided that I will start with my constituency(I don't even have a clue yet which constituency I belong to lol, but I will find out), then move on to my local government. I will find out what the four year agenda of the contestants are, listen to their manifestos, make my choice and VOTE. After the elections, I will also follow up to ensure that the person in office (whether or not he/she is the individual I voted for) will keep to the dictates of his/her manifesto. We will use all legal means possible to follow through on our demands; it is high time we hold our office holders responsible for their actions.

You will hear more from me on this matter, trust me on that. But I implore you to take responsibility of the welfare of this nation, if not for yourself, for the sake of generation after you. Let us all go out and vote come 2015, and make our votes count.

I remain @IamOluwaObinna, I am committed to your Peak Performance.

PAUSE.... THEN RESPOND

It’s been a long while I posted a blog on this page and I sincerely apologize for that. between my last post and now, the “She” that I referred to in a few of my previous posts has become my wife *smiley* and God has given us the great task of leading an amazing set of people in Treasure Place. I can indeed say that out of the race of a group of believers, God has raised a group of men and women that the world will get to meet in no too distant a time. Needless to say that God has indeed been faithful.

As a preacher, I have over time, found out that it is easier to preach the word to others than to practice the contents of what we preach. I have had cause to counsel so many people on various life issues and when I find myself in that same place, I tend to forget the words from scriptures that I so easily shared with others.

This last week was one of the worst weeks I have had to endure in a very long time, a lot happened that had me angry and frustrated and just when I was about to lash out, a calm voice said ‘healer, heal thyself’.

That was what I needed to reset my brain. I began to drill down to the root cause of the anger and ask myself salient questions like; why are you angry? Is this anger directed at a person or a situation? What does scripture say about anger? How have you complied with what scripture says about anger? Based on the things you have told people in this situation before, how can you rate your response now compared to their response? Is there anything you can do to remedy the situation? When are you going to take action?

The moment I completed this self-evaluation, and began to take actions, it was like a burden lifted off my shoulders.

When scripture says that laughter does good like medicine, I can completely relate with that. I wear a smile all the time, it is not necessarily because all is well at all times, no. I smile because though all may not be well, the enemy is expecting me to wear a frown and it tickles me to know that my smile frustrates him.

Some events occur in our lives and we respond in certain ways to those events. Though we are Christians, it is understandable that we are first humans and most times our tendency is to respond to incidents in our human nature. However, the ultimate response to life’s events will be the “Christ-like” response and this requires some conscious effort on our own part as believers.

Decide today to respond to every matter in a way that is befitting a child of God. Like the popular saying goes, you can always ask yourself before responding to any matter; “What would Jesus do?” and if you are not so sure what Jesus would do or in doubt how He would have reacted, you can always tow my Pastor’s line and ask from scriptures; “What did Jesus Say?”

It’s a new month that the Lord has made that we should rejoice and be glad in it, do have a great week ahead.

@IamOluwaObinna and I am committed to your Peak Performance