Map of Nigeria
Across
every stratum of our national life, there seems to be boiling silence
of grudge, vendetta and a desire to spill blood. There is this new
psyche of over-consciousness that has been launched on our being. We
used to be one group of people with a care-free attitude, accommodating
and loving. But in the last three years, an average Nigerian has
developed this scanner-like attitude, everybody is perceived as a
potential bomber, kidnapper, ritualist or rapist. We have lost our
freedom to ourselves and our lives are now in a complete state of
danger! Sincerely, in the mind of many, insecurity is now a norm.
Protect yourself or blame yourself. The citizens are fast getting immune
to shocks of deadly bomb attacks and ricocheting sounds of “unknown”
gunmen’s bullets. What, however, jostles me to disbelief, is the ease
the Nigeria’s leaders and its state apparatuses decide to move on,
without any modicum of sympathy for lives lost other than the rhetoric
of being in charge.
We are a nation at risk, at the brisk of
collapse and God forbid, at the verge of repeating the unfortunate event
1967-70; the three years of avoidable carnage that has refused to heal
even though Nigerians in their characteristic manner try to gloss over
the topic of the civil war to assume there is true amity in the land.
And the minute a few like the late literary icon, Prof. Chinua Achebe,
who had exponentially tried to give a victim-witness account, have been
castigated for keeping age-long grudge, thereby not allowing sleeping
dogs to lie. But if the truth needs be told, all isn’t well with this
nation. We aren’t at ease, the centre isn’t holding, the leaders aren’t
our people and soon enough, if remedies aren’t provided, the nation
might fall apart.
War is one thing every nation tries to
avoid, either civil, religious, ethnic, cold or world war; the
consequence is usually a collateral damage that can’t be measured in
naira. The photographic representation of the nation as it is presently
situated is not short of a nation at war. With shattered remains of
bodies every now and then, gunmen/herdsmen chopping down humans, with
daily living shrouded in fear and uncertainty. The numeric ratio of
widows and orphans has been on a geometric increase, our education
sector remains comatose, rising insecurity and unemployment have became a
national adhesive.
War is the continuation of politics and
indeed ego and fanaticism by other means. It is over the years caused by
the irrational thinking, lack of diplomatic maneuvering and selfishness
of the parties involved. In order to prosecute a war, a nation halts
its progress and often times, steps into collateral depreciation. One
thing is certain, we must as a nation first admit we are in a
hydra-headed war. We are in a war of terror as represented by Boko
Haram, militancy and kidnapping all hiding under the cloak of fighting
for beliefs and resource control. We are in a war with leadership
ineptitude, unemployment, mediocrity, sycophancy, nepotism, favouritism,
insecurity, corruption and above all the ghosts in government!
In an interview with The Guardian
newspaper, UK, marking the late Prof. Chinua Achebe’s 80th birthday, the
literary icon was quoted as saying, “Nigeria is on the brink of a
precipice” and that “we urgently have to face up to our responsibilities
before it is too late”. What we presently run in Nigeria,
unfortunately, is disproportionate Duumvirate; a government of two high
ranking officers (Boko Haram and the Federal Government) acting together
and neither getting better edge. Between 2009 and date, over 3,000
lives, both military and civilian, have been lost in the purported
unholy “holy” crusade. Our security apparatuses have been paralysed as
the government move from the known to the unknown; from Boko Haram in
government to ghosts hacking us down. It is abysmally irritating and
smears of security collapse for President Goodluck Jonathan, the Chief
Security Officer of the nation, to openly admit he is up against ghosts
(Boko Haram), when he is not Merlin (a seasonal film where witches and
wizards operate against the rule of constituted authority)!
Despite soaring security budget,
insecurity still pervades the country. Budgetary allocation for security
for the year 2013 stands at a staggering figure of N1.055 trillion!If insecurity paralysed the country,
corruption buried it. “Corruption in Nigeria has passed the alarming and
entered the fatal stage, and Nigeria will die if we continue to pretend
that she is only slightly indisposed”.
Prof. Abubakar Momoh of the Department of
Political Science, Lagos State University, at a Lecture in January
opined that “the only Federal character that is obvious in Nigeria of
today is corruption. That is the only chapter of our national life where
everybody has a common communion”. Between 1999 and now, over $400bn
has been reportedly pilfered from the national treasury. Civil society
analysts have estimated that figure to be greater than the GDP of
Belgium and Sweden. Our kleptomaniac representatives have stolen more
than the entire economy of an European state! The Nigerian media in the
name of doing their job splash billions of naira scams mindlessly to our
faces everyday at the newsstands. And we the citizens in our docile,
forgiving and forgetful selves, just allow everything to pass! Only a
slight increase in the price of staple foods such as bread and sugar had
once triggered revolutions in France, Egypt and the Caribbean. Why
can’t we just get angry enough?
As much as our government has been
pilloried for inefficiency, the unemployment quake could have sent a
shiver of impending destruction down the spine of any sensible
government but not ours! Former President Olusegun Obasanjo at a recent
gathering in Lagos put our impending risk more succinctly, “Nigeria has
watered down her moral standards to the point where many of the youths
are confused, discouraged, in deep trouble and streets are full of
violence as a result of youth unemployment”. The report stating that
about 20.3 million Nigerians are currently jobless and not employed in
any form of job, by the Statistician-General of the Federation, Dr. Hemi
Kale, is being mild with realities when over 72 per cent of graduates
are unemployed. If secondary school drop-outs, those in the informal
sector and those grossly underemployed, are added to the statistics, we
sure have a risk of war at hand!
Every aspect of our national life is
shrouded in the dominant spirit of violence, corruption and indecency.
The government rubs it in with its Santa Clause attitude of pardon to
disgraceful elements who have chosen to smear the country’s name in mud.
No good-intentioned youth would witness such arrogance of presidential
pardon and remain resilient to that cause of a better Nigeria and indeed
good governance. A government that derives pleasure in “beggar and
settlement approach” to security and corruption only postpones the
doomsday. The mere fact that amnesty was used to tame Niger Delta
militancy, insurgent agents in the north are seeking their fair share.
It ends up being a rat race, nobody wins and what we spent so much to
curb becomes a time bomb. The peace such indecisive manipulation births
is that of a graveyard, it would erupt soon enough.
Our present predicament is a by-product
of misplaced priorities. The government must create an enduring platform
for dialogue. The dialogue I envisage is not that that hands citizens
loaves of bread, but that which establishes bakeries, creates credit
facilities to run them, puts infrastructure in place to enhance
distribution and social amenities in view of complications and working
hazards. After the unbundling and subsequent privatisation of the PHCN,
efforts should be made to actually make power available.
A success story
around power is enough to hand President Jonathan a second time ticket
(should he decide to run). Rather than share the proceeds from the
Subsidy Re-invest Programme amongst party loyalists, the funds should be
painstakingly invested in infrastructure and be seen to have been
invested to achieve palliative measures designed to cushion the effect
of the removal of subsidy.To get anything meaningful out of our
present predicament, the President needs to slough off corruption and
not adore it on the nation with state pardon for established criminals.
And ending on the words of Cardinal John Onaiyekan, “Anger is mounting
in the land, especially among the youths whose patience is running out”.
If care is not taken, Nigeria might be at risk.
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