A PROFESSION CALLED BEGGING

A constant struggle for survival, severe hardship everywhere, poor infrastructures, limited good health care facilities, crashed educational sector, stark unemployment, chronic poverty enabled, evenly distributed accursed political leaders nationwide, epileptic power supply, gross insecurity activated, zero self-esteem highlighted and the list of farce goes on and on. What the heck is wrong with our government? Who the heck is responsible for fixing this shit? What the heck do they do with the money looted from our national treasury? These and many more have been the questions born out of our national quandary with no one available to provide the answer or better-still lead the way.

Unfortunately, that isn't what I intend to address in this piece though I know its day is going to come soon where I will have to dissect and lambast the government while questioning their sickle-cell style of leadership. But while we wait for that day, let me introduce you to the latest business which is making headway in Nigeria especially in her commercial capital Lagos; it's called Begging.

When I first got pissed in an encounter on August 29, 2011 at Ojuelegba a suburb in Lagos by these begging practitioners, I can remember posting this comment on my Facebook wall “It is more honourable to work than to beg no matter how nice the excuse for begging is. Working gives pride while begging makes you a slave. So, all ya corporate beggars go and look for a job and stop begging in suits. Gosh!” believe me I was really pissed on that fateful day. Now what's special about this profession and why did I get pissed at all? Chill, I'll share with you.

These days, people have used all sorts of excuses like being handicapped, disabled, stranded and even the list of our national disorders listed in the first paragraph above as their reason for becoming beggars. All over the streets of Lagos, you find men with good body build, well dressed in suits, good looking with sugar coated tongue, fluent in English and educated begging. Hear their lines “Good morning sir, sorry to perturb you. I was on my way to the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) on the island when I realized I had run out of cash. Please can you kindly assist me with transportation fare to aid facilitate my movement? I sure will be very grateful.” I bet after listening to this guy talk you'll conclude he is very literate and too responsible to play the begging game and so you reach out for your wallet and give him a reasonable amount that can take him to and fro his movement. Now, what's surprising is the fact that as soon as you walk pass him and he says thank you, he goes off to another gullible client and repeats the same poem you listened to and before you know it, he has made a daily return that far surpasses your daily earning. So I ask who is fooling who? Take it or leave it, the client is the fool!

I use to be a client until it dawned on me that I was being a fool working so hard to make money and surrendering it to a lazy dude with ease. I was a real fool. So, I decided never to be a fool again and ever since I have continually discovered reasons why I should never give my money to beggars. Yes beggars. Please call me wicked and I will wave at you with a smile because financial prosperity starts with good financial management and hey, who said drops of water can't make up an ocean? So spare me that Mr. Nice Guy crap because every naira counts. Please tell me why I should give my money to a young man or woman who has two hands, two legs, two eyes, two ears, I mean a complete human like me yet takes delight in begging? Or can you tell me why I should give my money to a man with one leg when people like him still play football and make money? Listen, it's not about the disability, it's about the mind. We have so many shameless people with ill minds.

The fact that Mr. President or any other leader is not doing a good job cannot reduce me into becoming a beggar because my purpose in life is not dependent on them. There is no relationship! You can read my friends healthy piece on the need for us to discover our purpose in life from his blog http://dextermoses.blogspot.com/2011/09/no-fewer-than-hundred-authors-have.html  for details on purpose. Now back to the issue of begging. For crying out loud, Lagos-Nigeria was recently rated the world's fourth most unsafe place to live in yet it’s the home of Nigeria’s greatest billionaires. True Nigeria is under-developed yet, she has a representation in person of Aliko Dangote on the list of The 100 Richest Men in the world as released by Forbes http://www.therichest.org/world/forbes-rich-list-2011/  . So, it's not the society that wrecks us but we wreck ourselves. I am tired of pitying people when I should pity myself for all the stress I go through daily to make progress. I hate lazy people and trust me I really do. They suck and annoy. The old saying says “there is no free lunch” and that hasn't changed. 

Please don't get me wrong, I give supports and assistance in diverse degrees both financially and otherwise to people in need but wait, only to those people whom I know are making progress and just have a temporary barricade facing them. I give to people who reproduce and not to wasters. Think of those aged men and women who are beggars and you'll want to give them money out of pity because of their age but always ask yourself this question before you give out your money, what was this man or woman doing while he/she was young? I bet you would realize they were past-timing doing nothing other than probably partying or constituting nuisance to their parents and society so, at old age you expect me to now claim responsibility for their predetermined life of misery? The answer is no I won't and can't. They can go ahead and look for a trade and I might patronize them but certainly not a free lunch. 

 

As a peroration, I will say let's make good use of our youthful age so that at old age we will not reduce ourselves to beggars. And for those young folks currently profiting from the begging business, I advise you to quit and look for a biz to do cause no man ever became the richest man begging and guess what, it's only a matter of time and all Nigerians will belong to my school of thought and then you will be out of business because it means no more free lunch.

EE