By Anie Sunny Udo
Curiosity is the fuel for discovery, inquiry, and learning.’
Man and the apple fruit have a long history. Not entirely pleasant. The Biblical account of
the early encounter of man (woman I should say) with the apple fruit leaves a sour taste.
The eventual downfall of mankind – from a Godly tended Garden to the austere terrain of
plain and bare earth – is traced to the fact of man’s disobedience to his Creator. The first
man, Adam, ate the apple fruit following a sneaky encounter between Eve (Adam’s
helpmate) and the deceptive serpent. Eve was tricked to eat the apple in utter disregard to
God’s command forbidding the very act. She passed it on to Adam who followed suit in an
epic letdown moment. The consequence of that indiscretion led to the eviction of Adam
and Eve from the Garden of Eden and a life of relative ease. They were banished from the
comfort of the Garden and set forth to the outer part of the Earth to wander in toil and pain.
This unpleasant outcome from the Bible story remains an eternal albatross for man with
much regret. The woman, the serpent, and the apple are often viewed with suspicion,
trepidation and anger. Examined in this Scriptural context, some extremists refuse to make
a decent distinction between the woman and the beguiling enemy the serpent, perhaps till
this day. We shall proceed no further on that path riddled with potential heated controversy.
I have no interest in igniting a furnace that could be fanned by the descendants of Eve.
Despite the mis-steps of Adam and Eve, and a rather displeasing outcome, man still keeps
tasting and eating the apple. Some accord the fruit a premium status. It has featured
prominently in many folklores and mythologies. As the apple falls, not far from the tree as
the saying goes, man continues to find uses for it. The tainted and tragic role of the apple
in the fall of mankind makes it difficult to imagine a redeeming feature for an otherwise
appealing fruit. In the year 1666, the dim perception of the apple brightened when curiosity
got the better part of Isaac Newton (1642-1727). Newton was a British mathematician and physicist famous for his formulation of the three laws of gravity and motion – the basic
principles of modern physics. As reported in the Memoirs of Sir Isaac Newton’s
Life written by William Stukeley and published in 1752, “the notion of gravitation came
into his mind…occasioned by the fall of an apple, as he sat in a contemplative mood.”
Newton was curious to know “why the apple always descends perpendicular to the
ground.” His curiosity eventually birthed his famous laws of gravity and motion to give
mankind tremendous lift in many areas of modern science. That is the essence of science:
an impertinent question births a pertinent answer. Think of a fully loaded airplane taking
to the sky with ease and cruising to various destinations across the globe. Contrast with a
man that leaps into the air or an object thrown skywards that is suddenly forced back to
earth by gravitational force. Knowing that the origin of that scientific breakthrough, to defy
gravitational force, was sparked by an innocuous falling apple must be a redeeming and
uplifting moment for the otherwise despised apple fruit. Newton’s curiosity in a falling
apple changed the way we understand the Universe, for good.
This brings us to our subject of interest: curiosity! It’s been established that ‘curiosity is
the essence of human existence.’ I should revise that to read, ‘curiosity is a critical driver
and enabler in human development.’ But for curiosity, man will still be limited to a cave
existence. Curiosity caused the caveman to ignite fire from stone, which inspired
other discoveries, inquiries, and learning. The trajectory of human existence and
development continues to maintain a progressive curve and is still rising. In Nigeria, we
seem to be carrying on with a low propensity for curiosity in our national development matrix. The culture of curiosity seems to be dormant or dying. We have stopped asking
questions. Such questions that pricks the conscience, probes the mind and sparks the
intellect.
There was a time Nigerians were keen at asking questions. Indeed, provoking questions to
gear the citizens to possible remedial actions to salvage the menacing ills in our society. A
prominent citizen once berated the cowardly docility among us at the eve of General Sani
Abacha’s demise with some rasping and touchy questions. Hear him: “Nigeria is full of
paradoxes. While individual Nigerians may provide the best specimen of the most strongly
willed persons around, we nonetheless display unbelievable passiveness in the face of
injustice. Society displays little opposition against wrong policies. Why is this? What is the
reason for this apparent docility? What has happened to the social and political conscience
of the people of this country? What has happened to our people’s sense of justice and desire
for choice?”
Wait for it! Those were questions from General Muhammadu Buhari then. A fitting follow
up question would be what happened to him, between then and now? The answer is loudly
blowing across a harassed and suppressed country with people gone mute. As a society, we are receding back in time. We seem set on a gradual descent into the Stone Age with life
in Nigeria sliding into the Hobbesian state of “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” It’s
a certain outcome for a society that stops questioning particularly the absurd, the bad, and
the ugly. That this bizarre turn of events is happening under the watch of President
Muhammadu Buhari is a truly baffling paradox.
The instinct and challenge for survival provokes curiosity. Such as Vijay Mahajan, an
Indian scholar and author in his book, AFRICA RISING provides compelling reasons for
the driving force for the curious minds. According to him, “There will soon be a billion
consumers on the continent of Africa…Every day, they need to eat. They need shelter. They
want education for their children. They would like to have soaps to wash their clothes.
They desire cell phones, metal roofs for their homes, televisions, music, computers, movies,
bicycles, cosmetics, medicines, cars, and loans to start businesses. They celebrate
marriages, births, and religious holidays and commemorate death.” When one
contemplates these life essentials, the spark to get curious on how to deliver in our
individual capacities and stations becomes eager, urgent and real. It should get one up and
out from bed. It should drive one to find work for productive engagement as a means of
acquiring the building blocks for critical “stomach infrastructure.” Every human needs this
to survive and stay healthy and alive. Mahajan compilation constitutes a robust assortment
of opportunities for thought provoking tasks and missions to accomplish.
Considering the fact that Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa, about 200 million
people (one of five Africans), then our task is cut out for us. We may pretend all we can
and try to shirk our seemingly manifest responsibilities to ourselves, our people, Nigeria
and Africa. We may in ignorance and disguised laziness “pray for things God had given us
the capacity to do,” hence neglect doing them. One thing is certain, like the late radical
nationalist Mallam Aminu Kano rightly warned that “Nigeria will know no peace until the
child of nobody can become somebody without knowing anybody.” Simply put, until
Nigeria takes up her manifest role and responsibility to her citizens, Africans and the black
race, the country will not rise and shine. Prof Tunji Olaopa, puzzled by the perennial under
performance of the country, once posed a self-probing question: “when will Nigeria help
itself or be successfully helped, to take itself sufficiently seriously to stem the tide of these
disturbing and dismal generational wastages and desecration?” Nigeria can sanitize her
soiled reputation and shade her battered image. We can transform our country to a
redeeming, responsible and glittering nation. Yes, we can! If only we can recognize and
act on our Newton moment. Recall the falling apple and Newton’s curiosity.
The leadership recruitment exercise in the year 2023 is such an auspicious moment for
Nigeria. We ought to be reminded that the highest calling of leadership is to challenge the status quo and unlock the potential of others. Nigeria needs leaders who will lead the
resurgence of this great nation to unlock and unleash its potentials to become the true giant
she ought to be. The riskiest thing we can do is to miss this moment of transition and
maintain the status quo, which has inherent combustive materials for self-destruction.
Martin Luther King, (Jr.), the late American civil right king had cautioned that “Every
society has its protectors of status quo and its fraternities of indifferent who are notorious
for sleeping through revolutions. Today, our very survival depends on our ability to stay
awake, to adjust to new ideas, to remain vigilant and to face the challenge of change.”
Curiosity may have killed the cat. The lack of ennobling curiosity is equally fatal for a
people, a society and a country that continues to wobble and fumble. It risks sliding into
irrelevance and extinction. A stitch in time saves nine. A word to the wise, they say, is
sufficient. “He, who has ears, let him hear.”
