8 Reasons Why you should be proud as a Nigerian

Boko Haram, 419-ers, Yahoo boy, Scam, chibok girls, Baga saga those are the words that stare at you see once you Google search Nigeria. But there is more to our country Nigeria . There are things we can say beating our chest. Even most Nigerian don’t even know some of them.

1.Yorubas have the highest number of twins in the world

According to the Wikipedia, about 1 in 90 human births (1.1%) results from a twin pregnancy. The rate of dizygotic twinning varies greatly among ethnic groups with Yorubas having the highest, 45 per 1000 births.

A study done by renowned Sierra Leonean gynecologist, Patrick Nylander shows that in a place called Igbo-Ora in the western part of Nigeria, 3 sets of twins were born in every 19 births. Some scientist carried out research study and suggested that a chemical found in Igbo-Ora women and the peelings of a widely consumed tuber (yams) could be responsible. Isn’t this something we should be proud of?

2.Most populous Black Country

Legend has it that one out of every five black people on Earth is a Nigerian. This might be an exaggeration but it can be far from the truth, Nigeria with a population estimated to be about around 180 million, is the 7th most populous country in the world. Like Coca cola, go to anywhere in the world and you will find us there, we are world citizen. If you’ve traveled abroad you know what I am talking about, the likelihood of the black man you just ran into at the airport being a Nigerian is relatively high.

3.The Walls of Benin City

The Walls of Benin City was the world’s largest man-made earth structure. Fred Pearce, a science writer wrote in New Scientist:

“They cover 6,500 square kilometers and were all dug by the Edo people. In all, they are four times longer than the Great Wall of China, and consumed a hundred times more material than the Great Pyramid of Cheops. They took an estimated 150 million hours of digging to construct, and are perhaps the largest single archaeological phenomenon on the planet”.

I am sure you never knew this before. Check Wikipedia to read more about it.

4.Nigeria has the 5th largest number of Goats in the world.

Well it sounds funny right? Our goats have something to be proud of too. Nigeria is home to 6.2% (53.8m) of the World’s Goat population. (FAOSTAT, 2008).

5.Nigeria is the World’s Largest Yam Producer.

If Nigeria stops to produce yam today, the global production of yam will reduce by 70%. Imagine the world with no yam, I had rather stop imagining 

6.Nigeria is the world’s largest producer of cassava

While Thailand is the largest exporter-77% of world export ‘05.2nd-Vietnam, 3rd-Indonesia.

7.The first African female writer published in English is Nigerian

Efuru is the 1st published book by a Nigerian woman and Africa’s 1st int’l published female novel in English. Flora Nwapa 1966. Have you read the book Efuru?

8.Longest Rap Free-Style

You think free styling is easy right? lets try it out. OK let’s go, yeah yeah yo, they call me mayo, I am the rap lion….hmm mm go get me my iron. I can’t even rhyme a complete sensible sentence talk more of free styling.

Anyway back to what we are discussing, in 2011, Chiddy Bang a Nigerian rappers born in America made it into the Guinness world record for the longest rap freestyle. He free styled for 9hrs, 18mins and 22secs at the 2011 MTV O Music Awards. You can check him here on YouTube.

Well these are the few I know, you can add yours too 

Thanks for reading!