By Tonye Preghafi
There is a particular brand of resilience often attributed to the Nigerian spirit. We are praised for our “ruggedness,” our ability to “find a way,” and our talent for “suffering and smiling.” But somewhere along the line, resilience stopped being a virtue and became a trap. What we are witnessing today is not strength; it is a dangerous acclimatisation to dysfunction. Nigeria is no longer just struggling with systemic failure – we are normalising abnormalities.
This normalisation is perhaps the most corrosive threat to national progress. It dulls outrage, weakens accountability, and conditions citizens to accept conditions that should provoke national alarm.
Take power supply. In any functioning society, a nationwide outage is a crisis. In Nigeria, “grid collapse” has become routine. Electricity tariffs rise steadily, yet supply remains erratic. Power surges destroy household appliances. Small businesses lose equipment, productivity, and capital. Families budget for generators, fuel, inverters, stabilisers, and repairs as if these were public utilities.
There is no sustained national pushback. We simply adapt and move on. We have normalised paying more for darkness in a country rich in energy resources – and in doing so, normalised the slow suffocation of productivity.
Our roads tell a similar story of quiet resignation. Major highways resemble cratered landscapes. Vehicles are damaged faster than normal wear and tear would ever justify. Transport costs rise, logistics inefficiencies feed inflation, and prices of goods climb in an economy where the minimum wage already lags reality.
In any rational system, the cost of bad roads would be recognised as a hidden tax on citizens. In Nigeria, it is treated as fate. We have normalised infrastructure failure and absorbed its economic punishment in silence.
The most chilling abnormality we have normalised, however, is insecurity. Bandits and terrorists kill, kidnap, and displace citizens with frightening regularity. Recently, over 160 people were reportedly killed in Kwara State. Not long ago, such an incident would have triggered national mourning, emergency security reforms, and relentless public pressure.
Today, it barely disrupts the news cycle. We scroll past mass killings to check football scores or trending topics. Not because we are heartless, but because we have become statistically numb. Human life has been quietly devalued.
Less dramatic, but equally destructive, is the housing crisis. Rents across major Nigerian cities have surged sharply, consuming disproportionate shares of household income. Families are pushed into overcrowded housing or forced to live farther from economic centers, increasing transport costs and reducing productivity.
What makes this abnormality more troubling is how casually it is explained away as “market forces.” Incomes stagnate, inflation rises, yet rent escalates unchecked. We have normalised unaffordable housing in a country already battling unemployment and declining purchasing power.
Beyond these lie other familiar dysfunctions: inflation that erodes income monthly; a healthcare system that forces citizens to crowdfund survival; education costs rising while public schools deteriorate; unemployment treated as individual failure rather than systemic breakdown. Individually troubling, collectively alarming.
Normalisation is not harmless. When abnormalities persist long enough to feel normal, leaders face less pressure to act, institutions escape scrutiny, and citizens lower expectations. This is normalcy bias – a survival mechanism that becomes a national liability. By adapting to dysfunction, we remove the urgency for reform.
The way forward begins with discomfort
First, Nigerians must reject the glorification of suffering. Endurance is not a badge of honor; it is evidence of governance failure.
Second, accountability must become specific and relentless. Power supply, security, roads, housing—these are policy responsibilities, not acts of God. Timelines, performance metrics, and consequences must matter.
Third, we must humanise our losses. Every victim of insecurity had a name, a family, and a future. We must refuse to let mass death dissolve into “business as usual.”
Fourth, civil society, professionals, and the private sector must speak consistently, not episodically. Silence—especially from those with platforms—reinforces normalisation.
Darkness should not be normal. Unsafe roads should not be normal. Mass killings should not be normal. Unaffordable housing should not be normal.
The greatest threat to Nigeria today is not the power outage, the bad road, or even the bandit. It is the silence of over 200 million people who have decided that the abnormal is finally “normal enough.”
It is time to get uncomfortable again.
Preghafi, a logistics expert, wrote from
Lagos.
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