The Nigerian Habit of Suffering and Smiling: A Love Letter, a Complaint and a Plate of Jollof

You know that look. The generator has just died, the bank app is “temporarily unavailable,” the fuel queue is wrapping round the block like a danfo that has lost its way, and the man next to you in traffic turns, smiles, and says, “It is well.”

It is not well. Everyone in that car knows it is not well. But we smile anyway. That is the Nigerian habit: suffering and smiling.

The phrase is so old and so loved that it has its own songs, its own opinion columns, and now its own research. A 2024 working paper on APSA Preprints, “Suffering and smiling: What determines happiness among Nigerians?” by Daniel Tuki, looked at World Values Survey data. Its findings are not peer-reviewed yet, but they are interesting. Exposure to violent conflict lowers the chance that a person reports being happy. Better socioeconomic conditions and better health are linked to higher happiness. And praying more often had no detectable effect on happiness. So the smile, it seems, does not come free with the prayer, and it also does not survive violence.

Which tells you the truth about the smile. It is not a sign that everything is fine. It is a skill. It is something we do like we do jollof: from scratch, under pressure, with too little tomato.

Look at what we have trained ourselves to smile through. We smile at the electricity bill for a light that was not on. We smile at the price of rice, and then smile again at the price of the pepper that goes with the rice. We smile at the “your call cannot be completed” message. We smile at the politician who says “the economy is growing” while our salary is sitting in the corner, shrinking. We have a degree in smiling. A master’s, in fact, since we also do “God will provide” while somehow providing it ourselves.

And yes, this is also our superpower. Nobody throws a better party in the middle of a crisis. Nobody turns a blackout into a rooftop party faster. Nobody can make you laugh while borrowing your charger.

But here is where the joke gets sharp. A smile that has to cover everything becomes an excuse. If we are always fine, the people who run things can always say, “See, they are coping.” If we always laugh, nobody has to fix the road.

So here is my humble proposal. Keep the smile. It’s beautiful. It has carried us through things that would flatten other people. But next time, let the smile come with a receipt. Smile, and then ask the question. Smile, and then vote. Smile, and then follow up on the contractor.

Suffering and smiling are a survival method. It should never be a development plan.

Now pass the zobo. And please, say it with me: “It is well.” Then fix it.