Welcome by Joy Ofili Yebovi

Welcome to my first ever piece on this blog that I specially created for you. I am so glad to have this opportunity to reach out to you. I almost did not want to write this piece because, health wise, I have been down for about three weeks. But the thought of not fulfilling my end of this bargain motivated me to type on my laptop.

Here, I will be more personal in sharing the basic things about interiors, either homes or offices. I will also share my view about life generally and of course beyond (not that I will be writing some science fiction stuff). And if there is any question you need me to answer, I will be here waiting to rescue you from your doubts.

Before we delve into interior issues, my heart goes out to the parents of the Chibok girls who were kidnapped in Borno four weeks ago. I pray the Almighty God will comfort the parents and guide the girls back home. But personally, I think the cliche phrase “Bring Back our Girls” should be “How do we bring back our girls?” This perhaps should get us thinking in a different direction. It should get us thinking why our country cannot boast of appropriate data or records. I am not talking about the Census that roughly estimated the population of Nigeria to be 166.2 million in 2012. Neither am I talking about the ineffective routine of the National Identity Cards. I am talking about data collection that can at least show us the mug-shots of the girls that were kidnapped. We have no idea what this girls look like; they could be leaving right next to any of us.

I believe it is time our government invests, seriously, on data collection. There is nothing wrong if a nation, like Nigeria, should have active CCTV installed on our roads and borders that lead in and out of our country. There is nothing wrong if we have photos of the Chibok girls splashed in the media. I think it is time we start thinking how do we stop this kind of ugly event from repeating itself? Maybe we should be thinking about our own personal security. Are we safe?