- The version used since 1978 is titled: ‘Arise, O Compatriots’.
- Recall that President Bola Tinubu signed the bill on the reintroduction of the old national anthem yesterday.
Victor Umeh, senator representing Anambra central in the upper legislative chamber, has said the new national anthem, would help build a just nation.
He said this on ‘The Morning Show’, an Arise TV programme, on Thursday.
The lawmaker said reverting to the old national anthem would not hurt any Nigerian.
He said the new national anthem is a prayer to God to help build a nation where nobody will be oppressed.
“Reverting to the old National Anthem is not hurting anybody; we can’t leave things that are not important and begin to debate things about a molehill,” he said.
“We have had our national anthem for 46 years “Arise O Compatriots,” so that we are going back to the one that is critical to the life of our nation is not bad.
“Stanza three of the new anthem which spoke about helping those oppressed is very critical to our nation today, those who made the old National Anthem knew over time that there must be the tendency of people dominating others and oppress them along the line, so we put it as a prayer to God to help us build a just nation where no man is oppressed, many people, minorities are oppressed in Nigeria today.”
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