This morning, a story reached me that captured the silent, crushing despair spreading across Nigeria. It is a story that should shake every Nigerian to their core and serve as the final, damning indictment of a system that has TOTALLY failed its most vulnerable (our children).
A friend at a police station in Abuja for a routine police report, witnessed a scene that is becoming tragically very common. A young father, his spirit seemingly lost and broken, was there to formally relinquish his two young daughters ages four and six to an orphanage. The reason was not a lack of love. The mother had vanished, and he, under-employed and totally overwhelmed, had reached his breaking point. His only crime was poverty; his only option, an unthinkable sacrifice of giving up the most precious things he ever had in his life.
I ask every parent reading this to please pause and imagine the depth of that pain. Imagine the flood of emotions love, despair, shame, and hopelessness that would lead a father to make such a choice. Then, I ask you to imagine the terror of those two little girls. Think back to your own childhood and picture the primal fear of being left behind by the very people who are your entire world, those who have been your provider and protector all your young life. What does that do to a child’s soul? They have to endure this life long torture only because of their crime of being born in Nigeria and being born to very poor parents.
This single event is a microcosm of a national emergency. The Nigerian child, especially one born into poverty, has become the primary victim of our nation’s governance failure. We are not just talking about abstract poverty. We are talking about a whole slew of things namely:
Children dying from hunger and easily curable diseases because their parents cannot afford a meal, let alone medicine.
A generation for whom education is a “bad dream,” a privilege they watch other children enjoy from the sidelines of their own deprivation.
A situation brutally compounded for the girl child, who, from birth, is often passed over in favor of male siblings, her brilliance dimmed by old traditions and economic desperation.
The father in that police station is not a villain in my opinion. In a society where hopelessness is the national currency, his decision to choose an orphanage over a more tragic, desperate act is a testament to a love that was crushed by an unforgiving economy. He represents millions of parents watching their families fracture and break under the weight of a cost of living that strangles dreams and severs family bonds.
This is the true legacy of the current reality. It is a reality where families are pushed into full-blown hopelessness, leaving the most vulnerable, the children to bear the brunt of the un-imaginable life long suffering. This is not merely an economic downturn; it is a systemic collapse of dignity, hope, and the very fabric of our society as we know it. The Nigerian dream is fast becoming that, a dream that will never come true for must of its citizenry.
We must stop normalizing this suffering. We must stop blaming the victims of failed policies. That father and his two daughters are not statistics; they are a screaming alarm. They are the human face of a crisis manufactured by poor governance, corruption, and a blatant disregard for the welfare of the citizenry, this MUST change soon.
Their story is a challenge to our collective conscience. How many more children must be surrendered to orphanages, How many more must be raised in broken homes and abject poorvbrty, how many more must die of hunger or preventable diseases, before we acknowledge that this is a deliberate failure caused by the adults in the house of governance? The Nigerian child is waiting for a sign that their country sees them, values them, and will fight for them.
We owe them more than thoughts and prayers. We owe them action, accountability, and a future where no father is ever forced to make that walk to a police station again. The children are the future of any nation, Nigeria MUST prioritize that as a matter of emergency.
- MS-High Chief Christopher I.D. Wenegieme
September, 10th 2025
