Yesterday, I wept—not because I lost something, but because something deeper than tears confronted my soul. I visited a friend whose father, a retired farmer, lies wasted on a frail mattress, not in a hospital bed but in his own house—dying slowly, painfully, waiting for either death or a miracle. The family couldn’t afford the city hospital bill after referral from a clinic; not even the transport fare. My friend, a private school teacher, sat helplessly beside his father, head bowed in regret—asking if it was worth it to stay honest in a land that rewards scammers. “Had I done Yahoo,” he whispered, “I would have at least saved him.” This is Nigeria—the land where truth breaks your heart and lies buy you ICU tickets.
No elderly person in the U.K. or U.S. is left to rot in this manner. Their systems are not perfect, but their aged do not die begging for paracetamol. In Nigeria, even a Primary Health Care Center/ Clinic turns indigent people away, mocking their sickness because they came without money. If an old woman limps into the health center asking for malaria drugs, she’s told to go home, or worse—wait to die. Yet our politicians fly abroad to treat headaches, while the poor treat cancer with prayer and pap. You say prostitution is evil, but have you asked what pushed her to the street? A girl gets pregnant with twins while trying to feed her mother and siblings—another elder dumped on her because there is no support system.
In Idah, Kogi State, just like like any other part of Nigeria, you will see madness dressed in wrinkles. Old women, forgotten mothers of the land, now roam the streets naked like cursed spirits. Many of them were once song leaders in churches, mothers at the altar, givers of salt, maggi and oil to neighbours. Now, they eat from dustbins and sleep in abandoned stalls. The Igala say, “If the old one is lost, the drum of wisdom is silenced.” We are silencing wisdom by our neglect. Our elders are now burdens, not blessings. They are no longer gifts to their children but debts—heavy, bleeding debts that grandchildren must now carry like crosses.
Why has no one in Aso Rock thought of a national aged care fund? Not a policy for campaign noise, but a functioning, life-saving intervention—stipends, healthcare, and safe homes for those who carried this country on their backs. It’s shameful that we build bridges but cannot build retirement dignity. Even churches, drunk on tithes, forget the widows that scrubbed their altars. Mosques feed thousands during Ramadan but forget the aged muezzin whose legs can no longer walk to prayer. If the rich truly feared God, they would see Him in the eyes of a crying grandmother asking for detergent or salt.
Bishop David Oyedepo once said, “If you cannot remember who laboured for your rising, your fall is closer than you imagine.” This nation is falling—not because of oil theft or tribalism—but because we have lost the moral compass that honoured age. We talk about legacy but treat our aged like expired bread. These same elders harvested cocoa, fought civil wars, built bridges with bare hands—and now, they lie on raffia mats, uncared for, unremembered, unloved. Nigeria has become a land where goats are fed more than grandfathers.
Social justice is not just about ending corruption—it’s about honuoring sacrifice. When we ignore the cries of the old, we create rage in the young. That’s why Yahoo boys multiply, why prostitution thrives, why crime becomes a necessity. No one wakes up and chooses sin—they are pushed. Every nation that has succeeded did so on the foundation of intergenerational justice. As Dr Paul Enenche once thundered, “Any system that rewards evil and punishes honesty will produce monsters.” And Nigeria is raising monsters.
Scripture says, “Do not cast me away when I am old; do not forsake me when my strength is gone.” (Psalm 71:9). But we have done just that. We have turned wrinkles into wounds. We have forsaken the ones who gave us their strength. We have broken the covenant of honour. And unless we return—unless we feed, clothe, and protect our elders—we will remain a nation at war with its soul. A country that forgets its aged has already signed its own obituary.
– Inah Boniface Ocholi writes from Ayah – Igalamela/Odolu LGA, Kogi state.
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