by Alkasim Abdulkadir

Some of the phrases on the lips of even the most pessimistic of us ranged from “God bless Nigeria”, “I am proud to be a Nigerian” and “We are the champions”. Some were even gracious to President Goodluck Jonathan government by saying –the transformation in sports was working.

The nation stood at a standstill, transfixed to television screens all across the country from posh viewing centers to dinghy pay for view, viewing centers ones in the deep recesses of slummed neighbourhoods. The mission of Nigerians was one, to witness the cruising to victory of Nigeria’s U-17 squaring up against Mexico in the FIFA U-17. Aside the aforementioned, Nigeria also gave the world some new records, first it was the record of the most goals scored in an Under 17  FIFA World Cup, the other being we won the cup for a record 4 times in 1985, 1993, 2007 and 2013.

For the 91 minutes the game lasted Nigerians forgot their worries, forgot our graft prone public servants, and forgot the dilapidating infrastructure from bad roads, to obsolesced and collapsing buildings. We forgot about the poor service deliveries –from poor mobile phone networks, to poor medical care and the perennial epileptic power supply.

Most importantly we forgot differences, heightened by an increasing class barrier. We forgot about our jaundiced rising perception of Islam as a vehicle of violence, we didn’t even care when the Muhammed Musa, the team’s captain rushed to the sidelines to perform the Sujudu Shukran the prostration of gratitude to Allah. All we cared about as a country was that Musa had scored a scintillating goal – a free kick that curved and entered the topmost left corner of the net, packing behind it so much power.  The goal had insured our victory against the Mexicans; in fact it got some Mexican fans to start sobbing.

Nigerian Muslims too, equally had no qualms with Kelechi Iheanacho anytime the young man went on his knees to thank God. No one called him “Arne” the Hausa word for infidel that some are quick to call an offending non-Muslim. We were all one, that night, united in victory, united by football.

Some of the phrases on the lips of even the most pessimistic of us ranged from “God bless Nigeria”, “I am proud to be a Nigerian” and “We are the champions”. Some were even gracious to President Goodluck Jonathan government by saying –the transformation in sports was working.

There are several lessons for Nigeria from this victory, it means when we are ready we can win at anything, it means we can be methodical and strategic and rise above the mediocrity that has kept for instance the Ajaokuta Steel complex in the doldrums of ineffectuality for the past decades. The lads taught us that we can rise above our bigotry, either as Christians or Muslims that we can break the walls of our tribal enclaves and soar. When the players passed the ball to one another they careless about the tribe or ethnic colouration of the next player; this seemingly simple act has been a recurring decimal in Nigeria’s beleaguered history. Several times Nigerian public officials and politicians have refused to pass the ball to the next player because he is coloured in a different hue of ethnic shade.

We also have a lot to learn from the cohesiveness and team play of the team, a lot will fall into place if our entity is cohesive without the malicious rancor we bring to bear in the polity. The team was able to register several goals because they cared less about whose name was on the score sheets.

Dele Alampasu has a lesson for our leaders, sacrifice, perseverance and leadership. Alampasu all through the tournament kept dishing instruction to the last men, in order to refortify the defense; all the times they had failed he was on hand to keep the ball out of the net.

The greatest lesson from the UAE is the discipline the Garba Manu led boys displayed. If only as citizens of Nigeria we can imbibe this culture of discipline, no doubt we will experience less graft in our public and political lives, fewer accidents on our roads, less chaos at our bus stops, markets and other aspects of our lives.

Like author Tom Bodett  once said “In school, you’re taught a lesson and then given a test. In life, you’re given a test that teaches you a lesson”. Indeed the Golden Eaglets have given us a test to learn lessons from. If only…

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Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.