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Opinions of Wednesday, 1 August 2018

Columnist: Abdulrahim Newton

God forgives, I don't

Abdulrahim Newton Abdulrahim Newton

God forgives; I don’t, can sound a bit blasphemous to the devout religious man, and might induce a frown on his face. Anyway, the motive of this piece is not to irritate you, but to propose to you a means to relieve ourselves of the ‘let’s – leave – all – to – God disease.’

You should be tired of watching your sons, wife, daughters, husband, family and friends suffer and die in the hands of medical practitioners due to negligence. You should be mad at the rate at which your love ones are being brutalized and/or murdered in cold blood by mediocre security personnel.

I know it irks you, the frequency at which your parents’ and/or your reputation is being marred by any tom dick and harry.

You are displeased by the intensity of domestic violence in your home. I see how scared you are to drive or take a walk along the road due to the countless number of relatives you’ve lost to road accident.

It shouldn’t be forgotten that humans were not created to live life freely else there will be no divine laws governing us. I suppose it’s all because He wants orderliness to prevail to enable us to worship Him in peace and harmony. I predict it’s the same reason that necessitated man to establish the law court system, so it could help us to live and function in society.

To say it is heart-stopping, how some drivers turn their backs on regulations when driving, won’t be an exaggeration. They change lanes anyhow like an American rapper whose music has just gone platinum. To these drivers, any colour of the traffic light is green, and the terrifying part is that some of them drive under the influence of drugs. Yet, when such a driver smashes his vehicle into yours, kills your relative, or destroys your property with his vehicle, he expects you to adapt the heart of Father Christmas.

Lamentably, some of the affected persons do, inadvertently, endorse this behavior (of the drivers) by contracting the ‘let’s – leave – all – to – God disease’ instead of inviting the police to take up the matter. They (affected persons) fail to realize that they are only promoting indiscipline and, again, plunging people into the abyss of addiction.

That notwithstanding, next time you find yourself in this situation, remember of ‘God forgives, I don’t!’

There is no iota of doubt that our medical practitioners are putting blood, sweat and tears to meet our health needs upon the unyielding challenges that the health sector has endlessly been confronted with. Nonetheless, these frantic efforts are being damaged by few of them, the health professionals, who out of negligence, unprofessionalism, loss of interest in the profession, have caused the untimely deaths of many.

This irresponsible behaviour has also left many patients with evitable body deformities.

However, the most depressing part of the story is that whenever such a case occurs instead of the families of the affected persons following laid down procedures to redress it, more often, the only clause that often comes from them is, ‘let’s leave all to God’.

The ‘let’s – leave – all – to – God disease’ has only emboldened the distasteful conduct of such professionals. Possibly, redress of such matters would have helped to tame its recurrence. Remember of God forgives, I don’t, next time you find yourself under this condition!

‘Ok! I apologize’, is now the order of the day. Dragging people through the mud has warmly been received and accommodated, especially in our political settings. The only price to pay for denigrating someone’s hard-earned reputation is just to issue a non-apology apology —fauxpology.

Turn on the radio or television set, and what you hear is, ‘he has to apologize to me!’ Don’t you think it’s time we start flooding our courtrooms with lawsuits on defamation rather than seeking apologies on the media which only put wrong-doers in the lime light? Not to fake as a clairvoyant, soon people found guilty of heinous crimes will be acquitted if they are able to put out a fauxpology since deceitful words are so pleasing to our ears and dear to our hearts. However, next time you think of defaming my Aunt, just remember God forgives, I don’t!

Sure! It is puzzling whether some of our security personnel are now followers of Al Capone, the American gangster, who said, “much is get done with a kind word and a gun than a kind a word alone.” No wonder the unjustifiable police brutality has spread throughout the country like the Prairie Fire.

This pestilence keeps feeding on us (civilians) because we relent on seeking justice from the appropriate institutions whenever the need arises. We are stuck in the rut—let’s leave all to God.

It looks like someone deceived us to believing that the security has the carte blanche to commit crime. Just imagine what life would be like without any rules. What if anyone was allowed to do anything they wanted?—Things could get chaotic and dangerous. The next time you witness any form of brutality and/or murder, remember of God forgives, I don’t!

This piece will be deficient if it fails to acknowledge the presence of domestic violence in our society. Our women and children are tired of being abused by fathers.

It makes me scratch my head the manner in which we incessantly hammer on how ordaining it is, religiously, for women and children to kowtow to fathers, but tone down on how ungodly it is for fathers to abuse mothers. We maltreat our ladies, yet when they are compelled to seek help from government agencies mandated to deal with domestic violence, we communicate to them, the ‘lets – leave – all – to – God disease’ by reminding them of how, culturally, it is demeaning and repugnant for a mother to haul the husband to such agencies. Just that we don’t deem it disgraceful when we beat and bruise our wives and children in front of the whole world—Patriarchal world indeed!

Grass can only be greener at where we water it; the above-catalogued difficulties keep hovering in our society because we have refused to seek redress through the legal way—judicial system. A fortune teller is not needed to tell us that the ‘let’s – leave – all – to – God disease’ champions indiscipline, which is inimical to orderliness and development.

It also augments crime rate in the country. Why leave to God something that we can handle ourselves?

Holding one another responsible for our individual actions and inactions will aid instil discipline into us, and discipline will manifest its ripple effect by filling our hearts with the character of ‘love your neighbor as yourself’, which is the bedrock of every religion and development.

Until then, God forgives, I don’t!