Adieu
our great Doctor, a great woman, a true human, a true Nigerian. When the headline filtered in yesterday, my
heart sank; grief enveloped me. I do not
know her, never met her even remotely. But I did not need to; her deed and
heroics speaks loud and this was all I needed to truly admire her and the noble
profession she represents. In her death,
the words in the Holy Book “There is no greater love than that a man should lay
down his life for his friends” comes alive and sink really home in me. She did not have to die; she should not have.
It was all too easy to have simply
buckled under pressure and allowed the Liberian-American to go away, carrying
death to the greater populace in the land; hundreds or may be thousands in the
long run. But she would not, she stood
her ground and saved many of us and stopped many more tears from flowing
through the land.
In
many other different settings and sectors in the land, it would have been a
different story; we would have been battling a real national disaster. Patrick Sawyer, with some little offers of
porridge; would have easily waltzed his way across the border, through
checkpoints; through relevant clearing points.
He would have easily subverted necessary paperwork, by-passed laid down
protocol; blatantly short-changed the system; just name, it and gotten
away. But not so with this great woman
and daughter of the land – a land that in many instances have failed her own;
unable to give away even a finger for her own.
Her laws and precepts are mighty when her lowly ones are involved; but
powerless and lame where her high and mighty is involved.
Adieu
great Doctor, you died the death of many.
Only a momentary loss of the Physician’s instincts; a lowering of your
conviction and the ethics of your profession, and we all would have been in a
national pandemonium today. You thought
of us all – your children, family and the good people of Nigeria. You thought of our present struggles as a
nation, where we are still unable to resolve a lot of the fundamental things
that make us good humans and country people.
You knew that a disaster, such as the Ebola Virus Diseases is capable of
unleashing, would be too much for us to handle.
You fought to shield us, unfazed by the harassments from top quarters to
let “that VIP” go; that harbinger of death; that weapon of mass destruction who
was well aware of the lethal armoury he was carrying.
I
do not know how much we did for you during your suffering and labour of death. I do not know how disappointed you were with
all of us; from the leadership to each and every one of us. We read that you were given the best care
possible; that our leaders were not sparing anything to support you in coming
around and back to us. We believed,
prayed and hoped. How true this was, we
shall find out, may be on judgement day.
But I am sure you forgave us as you expired. I have no doubt that a woman of your stature
and heroics would have no difficulty in forgiving us all.
It
is really painful that you had to go home this early. When the news broke of your other great colleagues,
who made it back from ‘death’, we rejoiced, prayed and hoped the more. We trusted that you will come through; but
alas it was not to be.
In
this period of our national life, meeting any member of my generation who
exudes virtue, consistent with what is required for nation building, lights me
up with great hope for mother land.
There is great paucity of such men and women in my time; and may be for
much longer. I hope not so anyway. It does not take much to be true Nigerian, a
nation builder. It only requires that
each one of us discharges his or her small responsibilities diligently and in
strict accordance with the laws and precepts of the land on the one hand; and
the ethics of our specialisations on the other.
It is not in rhetoric, it is in walking the talk. It is in putting our nation, her people today
and the generations of tomorrow in consideration at all times.
Dr
Ameyo Stella Adadevoh and her heroics lighted me up. She was that typical member of my
generation. But she exited almost
immediately, painfully. Adieu great daughter of beloved motherland.
