I Emailed A U.S Senator, Dianne Feinstein & Here Was Her Epic Reply (see Photos)

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Now I know #Change is truly far away from Nigeria’s shores but we are getting there.

Okk some days back, I was privy to learn about the Newly proposed Bill before Congress aiming to weaken U.S patent laws on SaveTheInventor.com. Note that am a NIGERIAN so It’s none of my business but since am a tech guy, i decided to lend my voice to the issue.

So I went on the SaveTheInventor site to send an email to congress. I was asked to input my U.S zip code but since I am from Naija, I googled zip codes for Palo Alto, California and settled with 94305 (seen in the pic below):

after that, i was prompted to this interface to send a message:

and a further option to contact other senators with their contact nos.

…

This exchange happened some days back.

Now imagine my surprise today when on opening my Inbox today, I saw a message with the title “senator”. Na so I say make i open am and I was shocked to see a reply by the U.S Senator Representing California - Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

Now for perspective, California is bigger and richer than Lagos, Abuja, Ibadan, Port-Harcourt and Onitsha combined so she must be pretty busy but she took the time out to respond to me, her supposedly constituent member

After this, I quickly took a detour to our own http://nass.gov.ng and there was no contact number or email for anybody at all not even the common website administrator.

Who cares about your opinion in Nigeria?

There is a reason why developed countries keep on marching forward. When people elect you in and you don’t take their input, most of the laws we will be seeing are as ridiculous as the ones before the NASS today like “Allowing old men marry under-aged teens” supported by Sen. Yerima and his ilks.

Why am I saying all these? It doesn’t matter whether you are a foreigner or not, The U.S congress listens e.g. Recently, we’ve got the U.S Congress to pass a bill to look into and help the Nigerian (Sub-Saharan) Power sector achieve power goals. See proof here- http://borgenproject.org/electrify-africa-act-bill/#/8

This goes to show that we as citizens can change the world in our own little ways and through the work we are doing at #RepCommend.com, hopefully, such results could be produced in Nigeria through your help.

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Note: This was a Research, is not illegal and constitutes “Fair Use”.

TL;DR - Nigeria is f**ked

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Many Nigerians are very proud. They have the “I am better than you” mentality and want it to remain that way forever.

The senator probably has “email support” staff.
Same way Nigerian political parties have “internet warriors” and other “paid to defend the government online” staff.

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That escalated some.

You know Nigerians are fed up when it takes less than 400 words to go from hope to the middle finger.

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Sai Buhari

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Elected officers in our darling country Nigeria are like demigods, they do not roll with the “common man” who voted their black asses into office. I am quite sure that it is easier to see Obama than to see your ward councillor or your course adviser or the HOD of your department in the university. Common tweet (that’s if they have one), they will not reply (Senator Ben Bruce is quite an exception).

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America is bottom up, Nigeria is top down. No prizes for why Nigeria crawls while America flies. If Nigeria is serious it would quit sharing oil money to government and dump it in an investment fund only for education and public works. Let government get workinv and fund their operations from tax.

When people get taxed they will start learning how to read budgets and care about who their rep is like the Americans and not follow convoys at election time or lodge in hotels for ashawo bizness.

But will Nigeria restructure with the crooks in the national Assembly? Doubt it. They get 150 billion straight from the CBN no questions asked. Nobody asks them how it is spent. So Nigeria is screwed until the youth grow some balls and demand for change by marching on the assembly and not insulting each other on Twitter and nairaland. The Egyptians showed balls when they occupied tahrir square and faced their military. Egyptian youth took out mubarak the same way they took out the wack eagles from the nation cup.

But the Nigerian youth? All talk no action. All Nigerian youth occupy is gossip space on linda ikeji, whatsapp or at those EPL viewing centers.

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If California were a country, it would be the 9th richest in the world.

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Making @hienyimba 's quote, a terrible understatement!

:open_mouth:

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It’s good you shared this experience @hienyimba . If the NASS website is devoid of contact information of representatives, I’ll recommend you get them via www.shineyoureye.org.

Together, we will make Nigeria better, and have our own version of Governance2.0.

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