WE had all looked forward to a great golden jubilee celebration. We had put the issues that rankle us aside for awhile.  Nigerians were in the streets in the national colours celebrating in the belief that there was something to mark in 50 years of Nigerian.

The festive air was gone in a moment. All it took was a blast, actually two blasts that have become the issue rather than the celebrations of 50 years of Nigeria. Nobody had planned things this way, except the bombers.

What was their point? They claimed that Nigeria was not being run well. Were they right in the claim? Yes, to a very large extent. There is the broad admission that the country could have done better in certain areas since independence.

Anger at the insufficient progress that was made, the neglect of the Niger Delta, and the seemingly endless tangles to agree on the priorities of the development paradigms in the region are often cited as good reason to act in whatever way some consider normal.

Pace of addressing the issue has remained contentious. But would any of these justify the bombing of the national celebrations? Can these grievances approximate the lives lost, all innocent lives that had no hand in the despoliation of the Niger Delta? Where would all these lead in terms of resolving the challenges that the Niger Delta still poses?

We condemn the attack, in the same way that we have always condemned government’s insensitivity to the well being of Nigerians, not just in the Niger Delta alone.

What worsens the matter, in the case of the Niger Delta is that the billions of Naira wasted mostly comes from the devastation of the environment of the region with minimal efforts to temper the consequences.

The fears have always been that if the government cannot dip into the resources that it gets from oil and gas to repair the region, now that the wells are running, how would the region be developed when the oil wells run dry?

Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, chose its moment well. It could have got the maximum attention but we are wondering how it could account for the lost lives. It may be said that the dead would just add to the long list of the losses in the struggle.

It is not that simple. There are many groups that are sympathetic to the causes that MEND is pursuing. The major area of disagreement is the manner of achieving the results.

This has led to the fragmentation of the struggle in the Niger Delta with many groups seeking different ways of getting attention to the region.

Some groups have surrendered their arms and joined the amnesty programme. MEND backed out of the programme with its major disagreement being with the facts that the amnesty was not far-reaching enough and that the pace of the implementation of the various programmes initiated in the Niger Delta was slow.

We do not support the return to violence or its promotion as a platform for resolving the issues of the Niger Delta. The MEND move would tend to change attitudes to the Niger Delta again.

However, it is important for Nigerians to admit that their country can do with some mending. The independence celebrations were going on without some sensibility to the state of the average Nigerian. The MEND blast was a sad reminder of the reality of the Nigerian situation.

On our golden jubilee we have added the notorious landmark of a bomb blast to our celebrations. The rude awakening is that Nigerians, if they are not permitted to air their views or their welfare taken into consideration in formulating policies that affect their lives could react in the manner they deem fit.

MEND has not spoken for all Nigerians, but it has made a point about ignoring issues, to move the country forward, as we keep saying.

At 50, Nigerians want to see their country improve on its acceptance of the plurality of the challenges it faces. The more we ignore these challenges, the longer it would take us to come to a conviction about doing something about them.

There are two possible attitudes to MEND – punish those who bombed the celebrations (if we find them) or to punish them, in addition to quickening the processes of repairing the damages that have been done in the Niger Delta.

We have started the next 50 years of nationhood with bomb blasts; it is not too late to make conscious efforts to see that the things that occasioned the bomb blasts in Abuja do not remain a part of us into the new future we promise ourselves in lofty speeches.