On Zuckerberg’s visit to Nigeria

FOR Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of popular social media site, Facebook, to have visited Nigeria shows the potentials we have as Africa’s biggest nation. Zuckerberg’s visit was not humanitarian; he knew the value of Nigerian internet users to the growth of his site, Facebook. And that only a tiny percentage of Nigerians still have access to the internet shows what will happen when about half our population of 182million people have internet access.

Apart from Nigeria, Zuckerberg also visited Kenya, but the Nigerian trip was more significant, as he made two trips to the country, with the second being after he had visited Kenya, then returning to meet President Muhammadu Buhari and other top government functionaries.

Previously, Zuckerberg had made similar visits to China and India, and the trip to Nigeria shows that there is something about our country which we have not realised, but which the Facebook founder is seeing.

It is as a result of this that I want to urge Nigerian youths to unite for the future; we shouldn’t allow our political leaders, who have failed us with bad leadership succeed in making some sections of the country secede.

Our population is one of our greatest strengths, but it is unfortunate that our leaders have failed to realise this, and over the years, they have failed to invest in the future of the country.

The future of Nigeria belongs to the youth; we can bring about a new Nigeria with our knowledge of technology. The only thing left is just for us to believe in ourselves, and then work towards bringing political stability to the country. We should learn to see ourselves as Nigerians first before our ethnicities.

I want to appreciate Zuckerberg for sharing his insights with Nigerian youths, and with his visit, I know that many youths are now inspired to aim for the top. I believe we can use technology to develop our country, and this is what Zuckerberg came to share with us.

In fact, with Facebook, many Nigerian youths now have a platform to share their views on the political and economic trends in the country. Unlike in the past when we relied only on the print and broadcast media for information, through Facebook and other social media sites, we have been able to make our leaders more accountable to the people who elected them into public offices.

I believe it is just a matter of time before we begin to see the Nigeria of our dreams, but we should be able to prevent the break-up of the country before we experience the dawn of the era.

• Tolulope Ayeni,

Yaba, Lagos.