Collateral damage, a poem by Professor Yusuf M. Adamu
Confusion, frustration and exhaustion,
Anger enveloping our emotions,
Ensuring ordinary Nigerians become helpless,
Because of someone’s desire for revenge.
A health facility would only accept cash,
A woman had to die, there is no cash,
A dead person could not be buried,
A white shroud required, also need cash.
A marriage could not be solemnized,
Dowry must be paid in cash,
There is no cash, old or newly designed,
What a tragedy for the couple and family?
Small businesses have closed,
People have to walk for lack of cash,
even with money at bank, one is cashless,
One cannot withdraw one’s own money.
Don’t talk about our relatives in rural areas,
Life is made unbearable and maddening,
The political leaders don’t care about us,
Yet they want us to give them our votes.
Ordinary Nigerians have all become collaterals,
Because the old shark want to punish his enemies,
At the expense of all of us who have not offended him,
Today, we are the collateral damage of the old shark.
Yusuf M. Adamu is a Nigerian writer, researcher and university researcher who currently works at the Department of Geography, Bayero University, Kano.
