RESPECT

It was the master story teller himself, Proffessor Chinua Achebe who once said something to the effect that "Those who wipe their dirty bottoms on a tree, should check every so often if the tree has not grown thorns overnight."

The point, I see, in this simple yet power proverb is that it isn't about the tree, cos the "waste" could even serve as nutrients for it to grow and produce, but it is about those shameless ones who think in their pride that the tree could never harm them in return for their needless show of power and imagined superiority.

We must treat all men, regardless of race, tribe, age, social or economic status with the utmost respect reserved for royalty for each of us is a unique work of art with a mind, like that tree in Achebe's proverb, which if nurtured and cultivated could produce fruits beyond our wildest imagination.