pristinegist 
I arrived in Morocco for the African Cup of Nations with a Nigerian passport, a Nigerian accent, and the usual Nigerian muscle memory for disappointment, but not with the preparedness for the kind of public affection that meets you here, loud, unfiltered, and confidently generous. “Okocha! Okocha!” a cab driver yelled before I could finish fastening my seat belt in Fes, while another volunteered “Kanu! Babangida!” as if calling out the names of beloved cousins. On matchdays, the streets throb with chants of “Osimhen! Lookman!” and in markets and on street corners, strangers greet you with a knowing smile and a single word , “Nigeria.” Our former footballers are not retired here; they are immortal, preserved in memory and spoken of with a reverence that suggests Nigeria once meant something carefully constructed and deliberately exported.
This, clearly, is the Nigerian brand abroad, big, admired, and deeply loved. At home, however, it remains unmanaged, underdeveloped, and perpetually shocked by its own potential. Morocco, with about 40 million people and a far smaller land mass, is hosting AFCON in nine different stadia across the country, with a record four in Rabat alone. All grassed. Not the familiar Nigerian synthetic apology marketed as modernity, but real, maintained grass. One is compelled to ask, quietly, to avoid emotional damage—do we have such capacity at the moment? From Casablanca to Fes, a four-hour journey unfolds on smooth roads without potholes negotiating your survival or police roadblocks improvising revenue collection. Movement here is fluid, predictable, and respectful of the citizen.
Then comes the rail system, that most un-Nigerian of experiences. If your ticket says 9am, the train leaves at 9am—not Nigerian 9am, which is a philosophical idea, but actual time. Time here is not a suggestion, it is a contract. And in all my movement across cities, hotels, media centers, and streets, I have not witnessed a single power outage. Not even the ceremonial flicker that warns you to prepare for darkness. Electricity in Morocco is constant, boring, dependable, the kind that does not need praise because it simply works. The contrast is loud. In Nigeria, light comes and goes like a visiting relative; in Morocco, it stays because policy demands it.
This is where the satire becomes painful, because Nigeria is not poor in brand, talent, population, or global relevance. Nigeria is poor in seriousness. We have refused to develop, not because we lack capacity, but because we have perfected the culture of postponement. From sporting infrastructure to road networks, from power supply to the basic ethics of timeliness, Nigeria has mastered the art of doing important things eventually. Morocco, on the other hand, plans. It plans sports, transport, cities, and reputation. AFCON here does not feel like an emergency project; it feels like an extension of a national strategy. Stadia are not built because AFCON is coming rather AFCON comes because the stadia already exist.
And this is where the beauty hurts. Not because Morocco is doing well, but because Nigeria should be here. Nigeria can be here. The pain is recognition. Abroad, Nigeria is excellence waiting to be organized; at home, Nigeria is chaos waiting to be excused. We are a big brand that does not know how to manage itself, a vibrant identity with no strategic plan, a country celebrated passionately by strangers while neglected casually by its own custodians. Until we move from slogans to systems and from potential to planning, Nigeria will remain what it painfully is today—a global brand admired everywhere, except where it matters most.
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