By Segun Gbadegesin

A nation is not a human being. But there’s basis for comparison. A nation is made up of human beings. Human drivers steer its wheels. Most importantly, like human beings with organs which interact to keep them alive, a nation has its own organs, including institutions and laws and mores, which, in their ebb and flow, give direction for individual conduct and social happiness or the opposite.

Now, no human being crawls at 61 unless they have health challenges. Therefore, we shouldn’t expect a nation to crawl at 61. Rather, we expect a serious nation, imbued with a sense of mission on behalf of its citizenry, to stand erect and walk, nay, run, while others walk, as Julius Nyerere famously charged newly independent African countries more than sixty years ago.

What has happened since the 60s to Africa in general, and Nigeria in particular is an incredible loss of opportunity. We started with a clear sense of what it would take for us to stand in brotherhood despite the diversity of “tribe and tongue”. We would have a federation that allows regions to experience development at their pace and enjoy the autonomy to excel. And it was working. Our development strategy was a success. With a laser focus on human development, regions reaped the rewards of their investment. Then, human nature set in with bickering and envy of success as agents. And conspiracy destroyed the progress.

Suddenly hell broke loose and we stopped running. As if hit by a thunder bolt, the nation suffered a terrible crippling disease and since then we haven’t grown out of crawling. You ask “how?”

A nation whose development indices are this abysmal, whose development strides lag behind its peers’, crawls at best or, at worst, is in an inexplicable sleep mode. This, unfortunately, has been our lot for a long time. Our Human Development Index is embarrassingly below even our resource-poor neighbors such as Ghana, talk less of little Botswana, a global star of development whose achievement in good governance and development have overshadowed its sleeping giant brother. Yet we, or rather, leaders who voluntarily take up the responsibility of leadership, don’t appear worried or embarrassed.

What has been most tragic of all our negatives is how we abandon our responsibility for the future of the children and youth of the republic. We have a reproduction rate that is way above global average but irresponsibly choose not to plan for their wellbeing. Millions are thrown into the world to beg for survival under the guise of religious ritual which, thankfully, the head of the Supreme Council on Islamic Affairs has pooh-poohed as unIslamic. Millions more are abandoned to the world to fend for themselves and, unsurprisingly, end up in cults and gangs. Yet we have leaders who themselves enjoyed the best education system growing up, now faking helplessness in the midst of a failing education system.

But none of this is new, and life goes on as individuals, out of a strong will to survive, trudge on, despite the intense hostility of the cards stacked against them. And leaders, across jurisdictions, both at the executive and legislative levels, rake in billions from the national coffers to support their lifestyles of vain and vanity. And they do it with a straight face and a warped conscience!

More damningly serious, however, a nation crawls when it is unsure of its identity. When it is shackled by pervasive mistrust and disaffection. When its multiple constituencies are alienated and unable to make consensus work on important matters of state survival. With regard to all these, Nigeria still crawls.

It remains true that the British colonizers did a lot of havoc sowing discordant distrust among us. They didn’t want a truly united country knowing what that meant for their continuing exploration of their erstwhile colony. It was in their self-interest to see us crawl in perpetuity and they worked towards that outcome. So, they left behind a lopsided federation, with half the population feeling unfairly cheated.

But if failure was the British wish for us, should we also wish failure for ourselves? Isn’t it contrary to self-interest to deliberately proceed on the same course that our detractors uncaringly set for us because they want us to fail? If we truly share a consensus on the urgency of the need for unity in diversity, can it be achieved if every section insists on having its way at the expense of others, using advantage of numbers to always get what it wants? And what should it expect of others? To roll over because, well, that’s what their lot is?

This is one of the reasons the Constitution provides for the principle of federal character in appointments and quota in admissions to federal institutions. But while this is the constitutional norm, and we have followed it to the letter since 1979, we do not shy away from flouting it when it suits us. Defense appointments have been made without attention to federal character and we justify this by appeal to merit and/or seniority which, in our thinking, must not be overridden in favor of quota. It is always a case of heads we win, tails you lose. Yet, we expect others to acquiesce in and roll over. Is that how it works?

A good-faith effort toward planting and sustaining the tree of unity in diversity and enjoying its sweet fruits would include a deliberate attempt on the part of all to create a sense of belonging. In some other climes with our demographics, this has been achieved through a constitutional provision for power sharing. It is easy to assert the frivolous claim that democracy is a game of numbers. Sure it is. But there is more to a working and successful democracy especially in the context of multiple ethnicities, nationalities and religions.

Beside the crucial need for true federal structures, there must be balancing of powers and interests. If you just had a federal structure with states and regions coinciding with ethnic and nationality lines, but the center had all the resources under its control, you wouldn’t have solved the problem without an adequate power sharing and power rotation formula. To think otherwise is to betray a telling lack of seriousness or hypocrisy about unity.

The back and forth between Southern and Northern Governors’ Forums on this matter is quite unfortunate. If our state chief executives can be so far apart in a matter that strikes at the core of our national unity, it is unclear to me what hope there is for ordinary citizens to have a meeting of minds. It is also true, of course, that citizen concerns filter directly to the Chief Executives and they in turn echo the concerns of their residents.

Our chief executives who should frontline efforts toward achieving unity in diversity are shirking the responsibility that fate places on them. One side insists on restructuring. The other side disagrees, objecting that there is no provision for restructuring in the constitution. One side says without power rotation there can be neither justice nor peace. The other says power rotation is unconstitutional. I expect, however, that they rise to the occasion as a group of serious thinkers and doers. Rather than shoot out arrows from their distant corners, let them deliberate on this matter of national concern in their common boardroom at the Nigerian Governors Forum.

Beyond the heightening of tension and the proverbial heating of the polity, is there any hope for a reconciliation of views? Where there is will, there is a way. It all boils down to whether or not we still share the dream of a united country which doesn’t just pay lip service to unity in diversity but also works hard to achieve it for the ultimate development of human and material resources. If we do, we would not insist on simple majority rule as the only defining mark of democracy. And we would come to a meeting of minds on what else to add, including restructuring and power sharing, to avoid a perpetually unhappy minority. It’s a no brainer.

Happy 61st Birthday, Nigeria! Arise and shine!

About a month ago on August 6, in the column titled “Different Strokes”, our focus was on the different attitudes to COVID-19 in God’s Own Country. As we observed, in the name of personal freedom, many were willing to die an unnecessary death. Even with the scientific breakthrough of a record-time vaccine success that a right-wing President facilitated, many right wingers still found vaccine mandate an objectionable intrusion into their private lives. And they won’t volunteer to get the shots because they are contemptuous of science.

Of course, a fourth wave emerged with a fury. Many anti-vaxxers end up intubated with ventilators in packed ICUs. Some express regret but it’s too late. And not unlike the regretful rich man roasting in hell, as they face impending death, some send desperate messages to their loved ones to get “the damned vaccine.” Among them are pastors, radio talk show hosts, three of whom have died in the last month alone, and ordinary folks led astray by leaders who should know better. Among those who are offered the grace of a second chance is a Baptist pastor who, fortunately, learnt his lesson and is now preaching the gospel of vaccination to his congregants.

That is in a country with enormous material and human resources to fight this pandemic to death. But, hey, freedom can intoxicate. We ended that column by pivoting to our own situation with the following words:

“Back to our clime where we don’t have the luxury of available vaccines. What should be our attitude to the escalating incidence of the virus? The elders advise the motherless to avoid sustaining injury to their back. That is because without a mother, they don’t have the certainty of nursing a back wound. That is our situation. With no adequate hospital facilities, with a dearth of medical professionals, and knowing well that rich nations would rather keep their surplus vaccines for their reluctant citizens, shouldn’t we wisely embrace preventive measures? Why do we go about as if there is no fire on our roof? Why tempt God? Why allow the vicious prediction of bodies on African streets to be self-fulfilling? Beats me hollow!”

We doubtless now have a new worrisome surge of cases. The evidence is out there in recent obituary announcements. And while we hear only about prominent citizens, there is little doubt that many more cases go unknown and unannounced. The reported cases are also much higher in number now than at this time last year. Of course, without mass testing, we can’t really know the extent of the cases at any time. Yet, about this time last year, experts and opinion writers were pleasantly surprised about how Africa had appeared to manage the pandemic response so well that just few cases and deaths were recorded contrary to earlier predictions of bodies on the streets of Africa. There were theories about such a success story.

Thus, Anne Soy, a BBC Senior Africa Correspondent, suggested five reasons “why Covid-19 has been less deadly (in Africa) than elsewhere.” Her first two reasons were “quick action” on the part of governments and leaders with some instituting precautionary measures even before a single case showed up in their countries, and “public support” for public health measures, with people wearing masks and observing social distancing voluntarily. Restrictions on economic activities were taken in good faith even though these cost a lot of pain despite relief measures.

Soy also cited favorable demography which includes a comparatively larger youth population “with a median age bracket of 19 years” whereas most deaths from the earliest variants of Covid-19 were in the older populations many of whom end up in nursing homes in Western countries, and therefore more vulnerable to infectious diseases such as Covid-19. In Africa, however, rural communities with sparse populations are home to the older populations, and this shields them from mass infections.

The fourth of Soy’s reasons was African warm climate and high humidity because Covid-19 “spreads better when temperature and humidity drop.” As she observes, African countries away from the tropics have been worse off.” And her final reason was “good community health systems.” And here commendation is due to our hard-working and knowledgeable community health experts at federal and state levels. Lagos State excelled in the management of information as well as in an all-out effort to curtail the spread of the disease once the first case was discovered. Soy acknowledged the experience of health experts in dealing with such infectious diseases as Ebola, measles and polio as an invaluable asset in the onslaught of Covid-19.

It is instructive that Anne Soy ended her article which had appeared in October 2020, in the following words: “But all this doesn’t mean that people in Africa can afford to relax.” Unfortunately that is what we have done. Hence the new surge!

We indulge in careless behavior. Politicians host large gatherings of supporters with little or no thought about consequences for public health. But even without large events, the disease can and has been spreading simply because we have given up on the very sensible precautions that we embraced at its onset. Masking has been all but abandoned completely. Folks who recently visited the country returned with tales of the carefree attitude in the matter of health. They’d be picked up by Uber drivers who would mock them for putting on masks! Thankfully, many such visitors received their full vaccination before departing the US.

We had few cases in 2020 in part because of the reasons listed by Soy in her article. But we must not forget the other part. We were dealing with a new coronavirus which had not had a chance of mutating. Since then however we’ve had several variants with the now dominant variant being Delta. And some of the advantages that Africa had with the original Covid-19 appears to be no more. This includes especially the young population which is now quite heavily impacted by the Delta variant.

While we can still count on public health experts to give responsive leadership as they’ve always done, we must also call on political leaders and the general public to do their part. Vaccines are effective and efficacious even against the dreaded Delta variant and it is incumbent on political leaders to come up with a plan to get Nigerians vaccinated. We cannot continue to depend on the large heart of donor countries or organizations. We are a sovereign nation with a responsibility for the health of our people. Whatever it takes must be done to get shots into the arms of Nigerians without discrimination.

Of course, reality stares us in the face. Vaccines will not be available for everyone tomorrow or even in the next three months. That is the truth. Therefore, political leaders must avoid the grossly irresponsible and oppressive political stunt of issuing vaccine mandates when vaccines are not available for everyone. From experience, we know that such political gimmicks only end up hurting the poor and helpless.

Importantly, individuals and groups with leadership roles must now mobilise precautionary resources. Testing must be reinstated and contact tracing must follow every positive test. Make masks available in all churches and mosques. Ensure that the NURTW cooperates on mask mandates for public transporters and commuters. States and local governments have a moral duty to educate the public and provide resources to implement health mandates.

Let us not fall for the myth that Covid-19 is a disease of the rich and wealthy. It doesn’t spare the poor and needy. It doesn’t discriminate between old and young, men and women. While some are more vulnerable because they have preexisting conditions which affect their immune system, many healthy individuals have succumbed to the disease and are no more. But we know that it is preventable if we follow proven health precautions.

Yes, God is our refuge and strength. But God doesn’t want us to test him as even his beloved son clearly understood. And God helps only those who help themselves. Helping ourselves through these tough times of public health emergency requires the cooperation of everyone. Let’s apply COVID sense and practice health safety measures.

By Segun Gbadegesin

Constitution matters! It is the holy book of national life. The nation lives by its dictates. We choose our leaders according to its directives. They swear to uphold its tenets and to defend its sanctity. All things being equal, where the constitution leads, we follow.

Of course, all things aren’t always equal. Leaders don’t always demonstrate fidelity to the constitution. For that reason, we have the court system, itself a creation of the constitution. To be sure, this works for the most part, except when we deal with situations of extreme nature as in military coups. Whereas the constitution confers right, soldiers only exercise their might, right be damned. Even here, however, soldiers also have their excuse, credible or not. For them, they strike only because the constitution is being abused and they have a duty to save the republic. Thus, even when it’s being emasculated, the supremacy of the constitution is grudgingly acknowledged.

One of the mysteries of any constitutional republic, ours included, is how amazing it is that we confer such supremacy on, and put so much of our faith and hope in, a document authored by humans like us. Consider the fact that as humans, they have their own preferences and interests which we unrealistically expect them to suppress in service of a greater good of constitution-making. Furthermore, even when they are so unrealistically disinterested and self-consciously nationalistic, they are not immune from errors of judgment or errors of omission.

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From our national experience, especially the various military-civilian transition constitution-making, it is clear that self-interest or, at best, institutional preferences of the military has always prevailed in what ends up becoming the constitution of the republic. In 1979, the military ensured that its prerogative on land use, which it had decreed into existence, became a cornerstone of the constitution. Civilians had no choice. While that constitution mimicked the American system of government, the military ensured that it did not copy the robust decentralization of power that characterizes the American federalism.

Recently, there was a submission on the unconstitutionality of secession and the argument against it is that it is not in the constitution. But one doesn’t have to be an advocate of secession to identify the problem with that objection. First, what if it was omitted inadvertently because it didn’t occur to the drafters of the constitution that such a fundamental right ought to be accorded to groups and nationalities? Toward to end of the last century, Ethiopians adopted a new constitution which established the right of secession. They were not crazy and certainly they were not out of their minds when they did. Of course, being a constitutional provision is also not a guarantee that the authorities would respect a claim to that right. Think Tigray!

Second, what if there was an error of judgment on the part of constitutional conferees? As observed above, constitution-making is a human endeavour. Like all such endeavours, it is prone to error and the millions of people who are to live by it are the potential victims of such errors. While we have a responsibility to respect the articles of the constitution out of respect, we should refrain from fetishizing it.

Third, what if the military, as the supervisory authority over the making of the constitution both in 1979 and 1999 was just professionally opposed to secession and it exercised its monopolistic right of disapproval? Without access to the deliberations of the conferees, we won’t have answers to any of these questions.

Fourth, and perhaps most important of these points. What does it really matter that secession is not in the constitution? That it is therefore unconstitutional? Well, then, is military takeover of government in the constitution? No, of course. Indeed, the constitution specifically provides for a democratic republic in which citizens elect their representatives at every level of government. That provision rules out governance by force of arms. But it didn’t prevent military coups against democratically elected governments in 1966 and 1983.

Did the military do it and get away with it because it had the power of the gun? Yes, in part. But it also relied on a moral argument, namely that the civilian authorities had violated the constitution in various ways. We may argue that the military had no authority to make such a judgment. But we should remember that many civilians agreed with them as evidenced by the jubilations on the streets on both occasions. The point of the analogy is this. Like the military, secessionists could make a similar moral judgment based on their own experience. Having no access to weapons is the material difference.

In recognition of human frailty, constitutions have provisions for amendments, ours not an exception. And we have taken advantage of this provision on more than a few occasions since 1999. But these have been done almost always at the discretion of the ruling party at any particular time, making it more or less a partisan exercise. Such partisan efforts have always left out major amendment needs.

A pressing issue has also been raised regarding the effectiveness of amendments in light of the structural challenges that have been identified with the constitution. If there are fundamental flaws that strike at the heart of the constitution, can amendments do the trick? Or should we opt for a brand new constitution? If we do, aren’t we committing to brand new constitutions ad infinitum since no constitution is ever perfect?

These are interesting questions. However, if the identified flaw has to do with the fundamentals of national existence, a targeted amendment can fix it once and for all. Therefore, the objection based on the fear of incessant constitution-making exercises is without merit. The case for a truly federal constitution that preserves the cultural democracy of every component part of the republic, as opposed to a quasi-unitary system which melts them up in a pot of unanimity is one such fundamental issue. If an amendment can take care of this, why hasn’t it happened in the previous amendment exercises?

There are two stronger philosophical arguments for a new constitution instead of an amendment. One is specific to our clime and its past constitution-making experience. The other is a general philosophical point traceable, interestingly, to the American experience. It’s interesting in the sense that our present presidential system is modeled on the American system with its constitution as our inspiration.

There has been a persistent pushback against the claim of a unanimous consent to the adoption of our constitution. The “We The People” phrase has been characterized as a big lie for the reason that the people had no say, by participation or referendum, in the making of the constitution which was initiated and approved by the military. If a constitution should rightfully originate from the will of the people, then we have an illegitimate constitution.

The 1960 Constitution has rightly become a reference point, not because it was perfect, but because it satisfied the procedural and processual condition of involving the people through their elected representatives in the making of the constitution. And it was the culmination of all the previous exercises from the unitarism of the 1922 Clifford Constitution and the regionalism of the 1946 Richards Constitution, the 1951 regionalism-boosting Macpherson Constitution and the 1954 Lyttleton Constitution which cemented the federal principle as the foundation of the state.

If we were going to jettison the structure that our representatives agreed upon as the basis of the new nation, shouldn’t this be a unanimous decision? The military, which is just one of the several institutions of government, taking it upon itself to unilaterally change the agreed upon structure, is at best an error of judgement, or at worst, an unforgivable illegitimate use of power. It is the cause of the problems the country has had in the last fifty-five years. What is even more egregious is that when they also had another opportunity to correct their error in 1999, they just doubled down. Must this arrogance of power be accommodated? Maybe if it sustains the peace and stability of the nation. But is this now the case?

By Segun Gbadegesin

The COVID-19 pandemic has turned the world upside down in many respects. Ask grandparents unable to hug their grandchildren. Or parents who have to juggle between working virtually and attending to the study needs of children in virtual classrooms. Or the trauma of lost jobs and the heartache of shuttered businesses.

On top of all of these are the millions of folks worldwide who have suffered enormous disruptions to their lives as victims and family members, and the physicians who have gone beyond the call of duty to care for them. Furthermore, while we are not used to seeing governments and their agencies as victims, there’s no doubt that this virus caught many, if not all of them, by surprise. And while some strove hard to meet the challenge, others, including some of the rich and powerful, were caught pants down, with enormous consequences for the governed.

Though, we had prematurely thought of seeing the light at the end of the dark tunnel, the virus has demonstrated its ferocious capacity to do harm with its various mutants, the latest being the Delta variant. When, hopefully, all is over and done with, historians will have plenty to ponder about the global experience of the first part of the present decade. For now, however, we can indulge our curiosity regarding what we have encountered and are still experiencing in real time.

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I hope that we all agree that the fact that we are still dealing with the devastating effect of the virus eighteen months on, is because its degree of ferocity has not been robustly matched by either the intervention of governments or the sensible response of the public. But there is no single answer to the question why this is so. There are multiple answers, varying from the tragic consequence of politicization, arrogance of ignorance, misplaced assurance of faith, and the claims of freedom to be unreasonable.

For a once in a century plague of the magnitude that struck the world in early 2020, we cannot fairly blame any government for lack of adequate preparation. It caught everyone unawares. Whether the virus escaped from a lab in China as the Trump administration alleged is yet to be seen as investigation is still ongoing. If it turns out that it did, then, of course, China would bear enormous responsibility for the global distress it caused.

Meanwhile, however, we can assign blame for how governments responded subsequent to the virus’s emergence. Did they take it seriously? Did they see it as a ploy by their political opponents to do them in? Did they deploy all resources at their disposal to fight the virus nationally and globally? If not, why not?

That the former President of the United States, Mr. Donald Trump, downplayed the virus is no longer news. He admitted as much in his interview with veteran journalist Bob Woodward. He downplayed it because he didn’t want people to panic, he claimed. He referred to the virus as nothing more serious than the common flu. Yet, he confessed privately to Woodward that it was exponentially worse than the flu.

For the better part of the year, Trump engaged in this duplicitous approach for political reasons. He feared that a long lockdown would tank the economy in an election year and he would be blamed and punished by voters. His allies in Congress and his base supported him all the way. In the end he lost, not because the economy tanked, but because voters saw through the dishonesty of the approach.

To his credit, however, Trump didn’t object to investment in vaccine against the virus. Operation Warp Speed was at his behest, resulting in the historic success of three vaccines at a record time. This feat promised to return the country and the world to normalcy. But even though it was developed under a Republican president, Republicans are disproportionately averse to having a shot of the vaccine than Democrats with Red states won by Trump recording an average of 40% vaccination rate to Blue states’ 93% vaccination rate.

Without the desired herd immunity that requires 80% vaccination rate nationally, the country has been overrun by the Delta variant and it is not letting up even as political leaders are letting down. From Florida to Texas, Executive Orders have been signed banning mask and vaccination mandates. They argue for personal choice over government mandates.

Personal choice is certainly preferable to government mandates. This preference is however predicated on people having the requisite information and adequate knowledge for informed decisions about their health. We know, however, that a vast majority of COVID deniers and vaccine resisters are fed with lethal doses of conspiracy theories which have been devastating to their welfare. They are told that COVID is a liberal hoax, that vaccines cause infertility or autism, or that they can change a person’s DNA. It is however one thing to be fooled, it is another thing to fool oneself.

Not a few had fooled themselves in believing such misinformation because they were too arrogant to seek information before it was too late for them. And Republican leaders in Congress have wasted precious time before they now embarked on corrective vaccine campaign when they saw that their constituencies are dying unnecessarily. The arrogance of ignorance is a terrible life changing disease. That the richest and most powerful country in the world can have such a disproportionate number of ignorant folks who are egged on by media pundits who know a lot better is mind boggling.

The misplaced assurance of faith is even more disturbing since the beginner and finisher of, for example, the Christian Faith himself had set the example of not tempting God when he sent Satan packing. Yet some pastors play God. One in Tennessee even threatened to throw out any of his congregants wearing mask in the sanctuary just as he objected to vaccines as a liberal scam. This is a state where the virus has become so deadly that even Republican leaders are urging vaccination, and he had lost some of his members to the virus. What else could go wrong!

In our own corner of the world, there is a combination of ignorance and misplaced assurance of faith. While we thankfully have a government that has placed its trust in science, and a media which takes seriously its responsibility to inform, there is a sizable amount of misinformation coming from the realm of faith.

Not all Christian priests or Muslim clerics distrust science. But quite a fair number of evangelicals boldly but falsely assured their congregants of the potency of their touch to heal the disease. Now that Delta has penetrated the land, and all precautions appeared to have been thrown to the wind, and we don’t have access to vaccines that the rich nations control, what is our expectation?

Finally, there is quite a bunch who don’t profess any faith in God but are quite assertive and proud of their freedom, even it is freedom to be unreasonable. Surely, liberals place a high premium on individual freedom. But it is freedom with a high sense of responsibility. Thus, no one has a right to falsely shout fire in a crowded movie theater. And no one has the freedom to cause harm to others. But this is what we should expect from freedom claimants who refuse masking or vaccination and go about infecting others with deadly virus.

Back to our clime where we don’t have the luxury of available vaccines. What should be our attitude to the escalating incidence of the virus? The elders advise the motherless to avoid back injury. That is because without a mother, they don’t have the certainty of nursing a back wound. That is our situation. With no adequate hospital facilities, with a dearth of medical professionals, and knowing well that rich nations would rather keep their surplus vaccines for their reluctant citizens, shouldn’t we wisely embrace preventive measures? Why do we go about as if there is no fire on our roof? Why tempt God? Why allow the hateful prediction of bodies on African streets to become self-fulfilling? It’s hard to comprehend!

By Segun Gbadegesin

A few months ago on this page, I ruminated on the tension between the ideal and the reality in politics, with a focus on Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s theoretical insights and practical agency. In particular, I noted that Awolowo viewed the purpose of politics as the pursuit of the common good and worked his heart out to deliver for the masses. The reality, however, was that many of his colleagues, even in his own part of the country, thought differently. For them, politics was about promoting self-interest.

Today, however, I am attracted to another pair of concepts that appear to have been dominant, albeit disproportionately, in our political experience. And it is also quite interesting that Awolowo’s theoretical insights are also extremely helpful in understanding the tension between biology and ideology in our political experience since the beginning of the republic. For one thing, as we shall see, the tension between biology and ideology also mirrors the tension between reality and principle.

In the March 2021 piece, I made reference to Awolowo’s submission in The People’s Republic on the historical origin of the state: ” …in Nigeria, and in most parts of Africa, it is the paterfamilias, sometimes advised and assisted by the materfamilias and other adult members of the family, that keeps the reins of the family in his firm control. He it is who, having regard to the common interests of the family, lays down the rules by which the conduct of the members of the family will be governed, adjudicates all disputes among them, and punishes any offender.” (p.76)

Awolowo goes on to explain how this arrangement works for the common interest of the family members. However, he also notes that with time, the explosion of different family units led to competition for resources and thus clashes between family units, thereby requiring cooperation among family units to avoid a war of all against all. However, even, with such essential contract to cooperate, every family unity will still seek to retain certain rights for the protection of their family members in the larger unit of cooperation:

“…the contracting families or aggregation of families would rule out the possibility of each of them being a law unto itself within the union; but would ensure equality among them, and the preservation of the rights and freedoms which the members of the different families had hitherto enjoyed.” (p.82)

This historical reality which Awolowo depicts so vividly no doubt privileges biology as the dominant factor in the founding of the state and in the direction of its affairs even as it acknowledges that no particular state is composed of a single biological unit. The expectation of the model is that each family or biological unit will insist on equality of rights and duties.

But we are also aware of a competing paradigm. On this model, which social contact theorists defend, it is individuals, not families, that come together to form the state. And it is common interest rather than biology that brings them together as members of a political community, and defines their statehood status. Such interests include, for instance, security of life and property, economic advancement, and education. And since there are likely to be various approaches to securing these interests, we may expect divergent views and, therefore, the formation of groups coalescing around different ideas. Such is the foundation of ideologically oriented political parties.

Note that Awolowo’s nod to the historical and biological trajectory of state formation does not constrain or restrict him to a biological justification or explanation of state functions and procedures. One could be realistic about the origin of the state without committing to the perpetuation of biology in its composition or justification. So, Awolowo would definitely agree with Ernst Renan’s observation that while biology may be desirable it does not compel, a standard defence of multiethnic or multinational states.

Now, the question that interests me here is how faithful we are to that defence. We are quick to defend multi-ethnicity and multi-nationality by appealing to the common interests of individual citizens and the need for inter-ethnic and inter-nationality cooperation and harmonious approach to issues. But how truthful and faithful are we to that creed?

Consider the treatment that Awolowo received from his contemporaries on account of his core ideas and theories. First, his theory led him to the requirement of federalism as the adequate constitutional principle for a multi ethnic and multinational state like Nigeria. This was consistent with his historical account which privileges ethnic, biological, and cultural units in the composition of the state. He was attacked by some of his contemporaries as an ethnic bigot. Of course, he was right, and they eventually came to the same realization that he meant well.

Second, Awolowo founded the Action Group as a political party based on the ideology of welfare liberalism which he and his cabinet pursued in the Western Region. With the visible success of the party’s programs in the West, including a successful public education program, he sought unsuccessfully to extend the ideology of welfare liberalism to the federal level by contesting for the office of the Prime Minister in 1959. Instead, he became the Leader of Opposition. Soon, however, some leading members of his own party, prioritizing primordial interests, and afraid of being left behind in the sharing of the national cake at the center, rebelled against his leadership. The rest, as the saying goes, is history.

Now, that tension that surfaced in the early years of the First Republic has continued to date. We do not now have clearly defined ideological parties. But let us agree that at least the All Progressives Congress claims to be one with its progressive mantra. As I reminded us last week, however, a progressive party must be known to be for certain core principles that it pursues in practice. As in the Awolowo era, these must include qualitative and free public education, good healthcare, infrastructure, poverty reduction, gender equality and good governance structures.

But if you focus on the debates and voting patterns in the National Assembly, and you are a keen observer of political groupings and resolutions of governors based on geographical regions, you would be hard pressed to see an ideological commonality. Recent voting patterns in the NASS show Northern members voting in solidarity and Southern members voting in unison. We have always had zonal meetings of governors sharing common interests pertaining to their zones. Now, however, we have inter-zonal meetings of Northern governors and inter-zonal meetings of Southern governors. Biology and geography, not ideology, now rule.

Where will this lead us? We are hypocritically disdainful of ethnic politics as we shoot verbal arrows at “ethnic bigots.” At the same time, however, we are visibly and demonstrably playing ethnic politics. From the highest office in the land to the lowest, biology is implicated in our approach to national issues. But we use our bully pulpits to mouth platitudes about national interest when the interest that matters to us is primordial.

Perhaps this is inevitable. In a context where inequality of access still predominates, where scarcity of resources is the reality, where what one group gains is lost to another, competition for resources is bound to be fierce and every paterfamilias and materfamilias committed to the interests of their own will not be moved by ideological purities that negate their interests. What this requires is a formula for equitable distribution of resources and/or access to positions. An example is the Federal Character principle which we have simply just jettisoned.

The Igbohos and Kanus of this world are at least honest about their beliefs and desires in pursuit of ethnic-nationality interests. Also, neither of them is an elected official or appointed cabinet member with a mandate to protect the constitution! In spite of their ordeals, and to their credit, they have exposed our hypocrisy to our face and it hurts. If it does, maybe we should change course and prioritize ideology that cuts across ethnic and sectarian boundaries, which sees every citizen as a subject of inviolable rights, including liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Hopefully, it is not too late.