The Nation Newspaper

Category: Oyinkan Medubi

  • Of friends, girls and fat, old men

    Of friends, girls and fat, old men

    The idea of marrying some old man fills most girls with horror right enough that they close their eyes, throw back their heads, stand with arms akimbo, and pronounce with every little strength their puny chests will allow: NO WAY; HE-E-E-E-EAVEN FORBID!

    I still have a vivid picture in my mind of my growing up years in my village when we girls of roughly the same age (yes, age-mates, thank you very much for that word of dubious origin), would gather together to do things: fetch water from the stream, run errands, giggle at our elders or just share girlish giggles that no sane adult could put any logic to. We were young, foolish and free. We were girls. We were friends.

    I have stolen these two posters from the internet because they both illustrate today’s topic; that’s right, every bit of it. Now, I understand that the international day of the girl is supposed to be celebrated sometime in October (I assure you, we will mark the day here) but I could not resist the link between the poster on the girl-child and the poster on friendship, the international day of which is to be celebrated on Tuesday, July 30. If you’re reading my mind as surely as I am reading it just now, I think our little cartoon girl is demonstrating to her friends not only a picture of what she is but also what she wants to be in the future: a queen pronouncing OFF WITH HER HEAD! Trust me, when we girls get together, we fill our mutual heads with all kinds of dreams, hopes and aspirations.

    Funny thing is, some of our childish dreams come true. I know someone who declared when she was young that she was going to visit Europe and would even be paid to live there by that country. Ladies and gentlemen, I assure you that the said lady did visit Europe on the invitation of the host country exactly as our little queen pronounced. I know another lady who said she was going to marry a real prince when she grew up. Hold your breath, reader, while I tell you that the little mouth did grow up to marry one. She still reigns as a venerable queen of her little kingdom somewhere in the… Oh, wouldn’t you just like to know! I tell you, there is no end to the dreams that ooze out of the heads of our young ones. But you will agree they are beautiful dreams, no? Te Hee! Hee!

    Anyway, one thing that is common to all the girls I have ever had the honour of speaking to, however is what is certainly an anti-dream for all girls: the idea of marrying any fat, old man is hideous. The idea fills most girls with horror right enough that they close their eyes, throw back their heads, stand with arms akimbo, and pronounce with every little strength their puny chests will allow: NO WAY; HE-E-E-E-EAVEN FORBID! Oh, yes, it’s just like the girl in our poster is doing right above.

    So, in this what is probably Planet Earth’s Last Millennium, when men of science and philosophy are busy scraping the bottom of their brains’ barrels for solutions to world aches and pains such as ozone layer depletion, AIDS, how to air-condition the roads, or make my computer go as fast as my brain (or is it the other way round now?), our esteemed but not inestimable senators here in Nigeria are busy elsewhere. They are very, very busy scraping the bottom of their brain barrels for only one thing: how to make it possible for fat, old, tottering men to legally get young girls into their fat, old, wrinkled arms in unholy wedlock! Now, who would ever think that such an important topic can be turned down? Certainly not me.

    Come now, sayeth the Holy Book, let us reason together on this thing. Does it seem right to continue to sacrifice the purity of our nation’s youths for the satiation of spent forces (terminology for old men) who have never been of any use to this country, their community or even their families except to attract infamy? Does it seem right for us as a nation to continue to watch while these bright young girls are condemned to lives of pain, diseases, discomfort, mutilation and sadness over some men’s senseless base needs in the loins?

    Many years ago, I watched in horror as a documentary detailed the very traumatic physical, psychological and emotional experiences that young girls given out in early marriage go through. I was surprised to find that the documentary had been shot in northern Nigeria. It was so bad, the documentary showed, that there is an entire hospital dedicated to the cases of VVF, the common problem that such girls have to endure as a result of early childbirth, often through their entire lives. Naturally, the indignation increases when one remembers that the problems are not only man-made, literally, but are completely avoidable. What kind of beasts lived in our men to cause such problems, I mused then?

    Obviously, the kind of beasts that lived in men then still lives in them now, going by last week’s announced gloss-over by the senate of the offensive section of the constitution which allows girl-marriage. Our Nigerian senators would no doubt like to be seen as wizened old foxes. That announcement, however, did nothing but show them up, particularly in those from the north where this culture of girl-marriage is prevalent, as devious, old epicureans that history can’t wait to quickly spew into Freud’s ‘Ich vergessen’ (I forget) zone.

    I think it is time to call in the exorcist. He is MR. FRIENDSHIP which we are celebrating this next Tuesday. Friendship is the kind of relationship which the heavens themselves rejoice over. It not only lets little girls dream, it lets them bare their dreams so that passing angels can work on them to bring them to pass. It is the kind of relationship that enables us all to view others as potential means of making our dreams come true. Friendship is the kind of relationship that allows everyone in the human race to meld into others in glorious connections with nothing in their minds but purity of purpose. Friendships allow the world to go on because they allow us a fodder to use, lean on, cry on, lift up, be lifted by, kick dust with, dream with, share with, give to, be given things by, laugh with, laugh at, and just generally share the sunset with. It brings out the best in us.

    It is not enough in this world to simply have friends. It is more important to be the friend that your friend has. The world needs good friends. Everyone needs good friends. Little girls, who are given out in marriage to old men who are in diapers for incontinence before the poor little things can finish counting the beads on a counting board, need friends. Our little princesses need friends right now among our senators, house of representative members, elders, elites, all over Nigeria, be they old, young, fat, thin, black, yellow, or red, in you and me. Let us be the voices for their dreams right now.

  • Why do criminals enjoy more protection from the law than their victims?

    When the wife of the president begins to talk for the government,
    it can only signify the arrival of chaos.

    Is it just me or have you noticed that immediately someone is a suspect in a crime, he begins to wave his fundamental human rights in everyone’s face. He has rights, he declares, which cannot be violated; he has entitlements, such as access to a lawyer, to decent and humane treatment, and to being addressed with respect, thank you. Above all, he also declares that anything that touches him, let it be so much as a finger, has assaulted him for which the ‘toucher’ must be arraigned, tried and convicted. ‘You saw him, he hit me, you saw him. Put that down in the books, you must!’ Well, if it is not too much for their criminal highnesses, can they please explain to me if they considered the rights and privileges of their victims? I mean, when someone is confronted by a killer, does he go ‘Look, I have fundamental human rights not to be killed, assaulted or maimed. And I certainly have the right to refuse to let you wave that gun in my face.’ Does the assailant listen to that legal plea? Well, does he? If he did, I think crime would practically be none existent, since everyone would be adequately armed – with their constitutional rights to genteel treatment.

    Now, take lawyers. Have you noticed that they are never present at the scenes of crimes to offer their services to the victim? Can you just imagine how much help they might be to a potential victim if they were present to argue for them? I believe they would certainly go, ‘Look, Mr. Assailant, this man, who is my esteemed client, is too young to die; he has children, a good job, and is only minimally selfish. He does not deserve to die at your hands. Let my bills do it.’ Either way, the victim is done for. I think in many cases, a victim would actually choose to die at the hands of his assailants. Some assailants are more polite and godly.

    Don’t get me wrong. I do not hate lawyers; some of my best friends and brothers are lawyers. I also do not hate assailants; they are just mostly misguided. It’s the crime that just gets my goat, and I’m not just talking off my berretta. I once witnessed a people-assailant assault that had me wondering just on whose side the law really rests in this nation. Two young men had broken into a house while the owners were away worshipping their God of a Sunday morning. Unfortunately, they were caught as the house owners returned unexpectedly. Their cries of alarm had people, I mean empathisers who put themselves in their shoes, coming out to deal with the duo. Before you could say ‘hello’, some jungle justice had been administered on them and the duo lay prostrate. The police, such as could get there on time, proceeded to nab everyone who had the temerity to be strutting around that vicinity that day, most of whom had no inkling of what had happened. Now, I ask myself, why pick on the innocent who happened to walk around a little too happily? Where were their fundamental human rights?

    Like everyone else, I have been following the rather quirky and weird events unfolding in the Rivers State as a whole, including the House of Assembly and wondering, just where is the law? If crimes have been committed, such as importing weapons of single or mass destruction into the House as alleged, then there should be some remedial courses. There should have been counsels for both sides before the problems began who would say to the main assailant, ‘Look very well before you leap. This man you are about to attack is in all probability innocent. He has children, brethren who will pray for him, kinsmen who will probably want to kill you in return for trying to deprive them of the place of their son in the House; and a country that will be so flabbergasted by your action they will take the man abroad for treatment and maybe a little enjoyment.’

    Since someone(s) was/were said to have been attacked and blood splattered around, we take it that no counsel was present to provide opening and closing arguments to dissuade their raucous highnesses in the assembly. Yet, no arrests have been made so far. Hmmm, that tells my Sherlock Holmes nose something. It tells me (sniff, sniff) that someone(s) is/are enjoying their fundamental human rights, I tell you, and it is not the victim. That one is being watched closely, even if it is by his doctor.

    On the other hand, the assailants are also being watched very closely, but it is not by the police, SSS or even any detectives. They are being watched by no other than the occupants of the presidency, not to check their activities but to be sure the script is interpreted correctly by the actors. That leaves the victims in their daze of inglorious bewilderment as there is no counsel to intone on their behalf, ‘My client respectfully asks not to be victimised for no other reason than politics. Any other reason will do.’ Clearly, the victim needs a louder voice, `cause it’s all muffled up right now.

    Not so for the victims of a young man alleged to have been collecting blood from school children somewhere in Agege, Lagos. Presently, the poor victims appear to have a voice. For a change, the young vampire is said to have since come under a watch, but it is the Police watch this time. Hmmm, that also tells my Sherlock Holmes nose something: he does not figure in any political calculations of our President or his wife or somebody. Otherwise, he would have been under a different watch with a different script.

    Yet another young man was said to have been arrested for being a trader in blood. He was involved in collecting blood donors for a hospital and also collecting a handsome commission in the process. Now, that is the coolest business line anyone can think of – just find those good folks whose veins are overflowing with the red stuff, match them with the hospital, sit back and watch the combination sizzle as the bags fill up. So does his bank account. How sick have we ascended in this nation?

    Indeed, these are sad times for us in Nigeria. Here we have a presidency which appears to have run amok because someone who should apply the reins has failed to do so. There is not only silence (interpreted as consent by the way), there is even a silent nodding of the head in the direction of all the commotion coming from Rivers State. While all that is going on, the country is going into deeper ruins. Rome is burning people, and we don’t know if Nero is fiddling, but we know he is not directing a hose or a bucket in the direction of the fire. Electricity supply is getting worse, food is getting so scarce now school children have taken to selling their blood for pittances and all we get is silence.

    The presidency needs to come out now with words of assurance to the over one hundred and twenty something million people in this country who want answers to so many questions. Silence indeed may be golden but it does not ennoble in circumstances such as this. When the wife of the president begins to talk for the government, it can only signify the arrival of chaos, which will result in more victims and will eventually lead to our demanding that counsels be present to brief assailants before crimes are committed.

  • Here’s what I think about our educational system

    The social space is experiencing such frenetic energy now everyone is gone mad in it: spending, acquiring, competing, calling, surfing, partying, killing … oh shucks, who cares anymore!

    Today, dear reader, let’s get a little serious and talk about something that concerns nearly, if not all, homes in this country: the education of our children. I’m sure you and I agree we do need to talk about it; what we may disagree on is what you and I would have to say about it. The problem is that we have different points of view: I am, for instance, short-sighted, and you are, for a fact, always wrong. There, I’m glad we’ve had that talk.

    Seriously, if there was any justice in this world at all, all our milito-politicians should be swinging on trees by now because many of them did not go through the old school system which emphasised the rigours of sweat, merit and quality. Since many of them are pampered children of the ol’ time milito-political class (as in, their mothers used pampers to collect their poops), they did not get the old school education. This is why they neither know the value of nor necessity for building a strong, virile society. They were born in financially contentious circumstances (their parents embezzled), reared in disorderly comfort (they were hidden abroad), and now they spew jeopardy all over us all (they now misrule us). That’s why I say that if there was any justice in this world, I should be sitting over the national treasury because I went through the old school education (as one of my readers observed), while milito-politicians and their children should be swinging on trees.

    The problem confronting the educational sector in this country, from the primary to the tertiary levels, is precisely that confronting our national life: it is the paradox of More Wealth = Less Gain. Now, that is a mathematical formula you cannot beat. Certainly, there is more wealth in the country now than say the nineteen-seventies, eighties or nineties, even with inflation factored in. I don’t know anything about net or per capita income and all that, but I know that state, national and personal budgets now have potential and promissory capabilities to do a lot more than before if there is political will. So, when people ask me what is wrong with our educational system now, I say there is nothing that fixing the government, teachers, students and society won’t cure. All of them are rolled into three core problem areas: devaluation of merit, the frenetic increase in the amount of social space and the gradual loss of community.

    Pardon me, but I think the moment this country began to go down was when it yielded to the strange argument that merit was not worth a thing. That thinking worked like a wave, beginning slowly but assuredly permeating the national system until it overtook the entire country. Every child now knows that old time cliché: it’s not what you really know that matters; it’s who you know. When I went to school, things were fairly normal. The sun rose in the east and set in the west (not like now when people can command it anyhow) and people had just one head. And when that head sinned, it generally died, or almost did on account of the punishment meted out to it. Now, children of the big and unjust get into scrapes, and their daddies and mummies pull all kinds of plugs to get their heads out of the net – a matter of knowing the right person. Children now know that to razzle-dazzle the family with intelligence in the hearth may not necessarily get them more provisions to take to school, but knowing the most powerful person in the house can help. Throughout the country, teachers, students and policy makers are not chosen on merit. Children know this. They also know that access to very good jobs sort of depends on a lot more than just good degrees.

    For instance, good positions in many firms, banks, T-com industries have often been filled by weak degrees accompanied by svelte figures or sharp tongues; national public life is peopled with last class brains who expectedly bring out last class behaviour, or first class brains who compromise and bring out last class behaviour. They also see their parents staking out government houses to become minister, commissioner or special assistant rather than staying at home to give their children some quality attention, since it is generally agreed that society should only reward crooks. No? Oh dear, I really thought so. Anyway, Nigeria seems to have brought up its children to believe that there is no equitable access to privileges. If the country generates twenty units of electricity for instance, a good chunk should first go to the leaders, and others can share what is left. Some animals are indeed more equal than others. Naturally, it pays children to study less and become leaders than to study more and become nothing, which is the current formula: More Work = Less Pay; take it or leave it. Meekly, most of us take it.

    Nigerians make up for this deficit in other spheres: the social space. There is now so much energy in the national social space, it is astounding. Listen, every event concerning the child is now a social event. A child is leaving nursery school? Cook and invite everybody. A child is leaving primary school? Dress and invite everybody. There is no end to the litany of ‘cook, dress and invites’ that distract the child at different stages of his/her education. This is why children are more taken with dressing than anything else. Worse, nearly every school-going child can be reached on their mobile phones (students and teachers alike take calls in class); and the more expensive, the more they attempt to put the parents in the peerage class. Does it work? Naaaaah! Then, look, nearly every child is more concerned about his/her Facebook status than about his/her average score in class. And this Facebook thing has a way of making king and peasant equal, unlike the old school times when the teacher exerted so much power his boot reverberated throughout the community. I have a sneaky feeling those good old times are yet to come really. Altogether, the social space is experiencing such frenetic energy now everyone is gone mad in it: spending, acquiring, competing, calling, surfing, partying … oh shucks, who cares anymore!

    Oh yes, the community should care, but sadly, it too has lost its wisdom – both teeth and soul. As someone would say, where is the community now anyway? It used to be that the community made sure all children went to school, all teachers did their work and all men and women went to farms. It made sure no one became a thief, murderer or cheat because it hung beads of shame and repentance on such erring necks. And they were usually heavy. Now, the only necks the community wants to hang anything on are the rich and powerful ones; you know, those thick-set necks oozing oils that scream to anyone looking at them from behind: look at me, I am from the government. Those necks now receive chieftaincy beads. The community is tired and does not want much to do with anyone who cannot command wealth anymore.

    That leaves us the government in this sad story of our educational system. Actually, the government carries a good chunk of the problems: bad funding, weak political will and inconsistent actions. Just look at what it is doing with ASUU and ASUP. Governments come and go, but their tactics never seem to change: ignore, ignore, ignore. All told, what is wrong with our educational system can be fixed. However, it requires our collective wills: Government’s Action + Parental Attention + Community Wisdom = Affirmative Education. Lots of maths today, no? Phew!

  • Here’s to all fathers

    Many unsuccessful fathers are today ruling the world, and only one deduction can come from that: it’s no wonder the world is in this sorry state

    My salute to all fathers today is a little belated, considering that Fathers’ Day was celebrated the third week of last month, but as I always say, better late than never. Besides, you know the kind of present that I value most? It’s the kind that comes unexpectedly, is late, and is very expensive. Ah! great is the quality of the surprise that one brings. Now, onto our story.

    To many children, fathers are the breadwinners of the family. He just seems to represent that part of the family tree where money seems to spring from. This is why it is difficult for children to believe that money does not grow on trees. It does; it grows on the father’s side of the family tree. Oh, I’ve said that, haven’t I? it is because when children need to buy a loaf of bread, ‘go ask daddy’; when they need to buy school uniforms, ‘go ask daddy’; when the family needs a car, ‘we’ll ask daddy’; when the family needs a jet, who else can we ask? Happily, the story is changing these days. Now, it is possible to ask mummy for money for bread too but we’ll talk about this some other day.

    Fathers also represent safety. Oh, there is no measuring the great amount of comfort a child gets when he/she knows daddy is near, particularly in a thunderstorm, or in the face of external threats, or in the face of internal threats such as mummy. You would not believe just how much children rely on those muscles. A father said he had to take his son to the hospital for one ailment or the other. When the doctors took the son over and started pricking and jabbing him, the son felt very let down that the father did not rescue him from the wicked doctors with those strong muscles of his.

    Sometimes, those muscles are used to instil discipline via the cane, and that is when things take unnatural turns and confusions set in. A father recounted how his child looked at him with horror when he had to apply corporal punishment. He said he might as well have brought out the knife.

    If we were to ask young children what their fathers represent to them, many of them would surprise us. They would talk about the words associated with their fathers, mannerisms they best remember about them, the names they call them, but more importantly, the image they represent in the house. I read in one book that a child said they called their father ‘Moses’ in their house because every morning, he called the family together and gave them the ten commandments for the day. So, when they saw him coming, they would go ‘Here comes Moses with the tablet of stone’, and he would go, ‘If I ever see you playing with my comb again …’ Another child said they called their father ‘General X, Supreme Commander’. He was fond of barking his commands at them: GET OUT OF THAT CHAIR! GET OUT OF MY ROOM! GO AND BUY ME AN ENVELOPE! All too often, the children quaked and shook uncontrollably at the sound of his voice. Another child said their father was God. He was too fond of saying, ‘Listen, I made you and I can unmake you. You came from inside my body and you can pretty well go back in there.’ Such sweet daddies, these, no?

    Truth is, fathers stand for many frightening things to their children, all too often because those fathers inherited the genes of fright from their own fathers who got them from their fathers who got them from their own fathers, ad infinitum. At the sound of a father’s voice, the child goes into throes of terror and the father goes away thinking ‘Yeah, that’s how to stay in control of the ship: tolerate no dissension from the ranks’. Want to know the truth? Most children tend to see their fathers as being capable of eating them up if they do not do as they are told. That voice is just too scaaaaaary!

    I best remember my father for many things: provisions, a bank account that just never seemed to flow too well in my direction, and THE LOOK. My father rarely applied the cane on us children but he generously applied THE LOOK. THE LOOK was the eye of steel which spelt only one thing: disapproval. Most times, that was all it took for us to want to sink beneath ground level and just disappear from the face of the earth. You took what did not belong to you, you got THE LOOK; you said what you were not supposed to say, you got THE LOOK; you did what you were not supposed to do such as failing your exams, you got that soul, spirit and body crushing LOOK that wordlessly said, ‘Consider yourself slapped and maimed for that thoughtless action’. That look, I must confess, has saved me from many a scrape and has kept me well towed and reigned in. True, I have got into other scrapes in spite of it, but who knows, there might have been more without it. Even now that he is dead and gone, THE LOOK lives on in my husband. Viva la LOOK!

    So, where would we be without our big, bad wolves, particularly since they rule the world?! Oh yes, your world, nations and states’ rulers are all fathers, I think. Let’s face it, some among them are not very successful fathers at home, since sometimes, children sort of develop immunity against the voices, muscles and looks, and just go their own merry ways. Sometimes, though, it’s the fathers who fail to apply the voice, muscle and look and choose to go their own merry way, preferring to give their talents to the nation or the world or drink or partying while the mother rules the home. When one woman and her daughter heard that the head of their home had been appointed into a government post, they both laughed. He had no clout to command at home. Many unsuccessful fathers are today ruling the world, and only one deduction can come from that: no wonder the world is in this sorry state.

    There are many homes which have no fathers for one reason or the other: death, divorce or desertion and it is clear in such instances that their places and shoes are empty. This is because nature has designed that they should be there. Where mothers are absent, their places and shoes would also be empty because nature has so designed that they also should be there. Natural creation of complementarities has stipulated roles for each divide. Fathers are the last bastion of discipline: ‘Junior, if you don’t drop that knife, your father will visit you this evening with the belt’ produces instant compliance. In the same way, mothers are the last bastion of love: ‘Junior, try and understand your daddy, he means well; now come and take a slice of bread’.

    No doubt, fathers mean well for us, in spite of their ways. That is the way nature designed them to be: furious, angry, whirlwinds; we would like to take them just as they are if they remember that homes are supposed to be havens not hotspots; wives are to be loved, not flung across the room like balls and children are to be assisted to grow up to be what they want to be, not forced into prepared jackets that fit the father’s ambition. All the world cannot be my red shoes. So, here’s a toast to all fathers: may your days be long, your cups be full, your voices stay strong and your LOOKS remain compelling. VIVA THATA LOOKA!

  • Being the butt of the world’s joke is nothing to laugh at

    Once again, dear reader, we have come to that point on our road on this page when we must ask ourselves three necessary questions: where are we coming from, where are we going, and where on earth please can one get the cheapest fish to buy? I am dead serious on this. The doctors have told us perpetually till they are hoarse of voice and mind (mostly mind) that the older we get, the more we should scamper around to eat fish rather than meat. I mean, how on earth anyone can recommend fish over meat just to prolong his life a few miserable years beats me. What exactly is the point of cutting out sweet cakes, beef, pounded yam, jelly, syrup, caramel, eba, etc. when those are the very stuff that life is made of, when you can get them that is? I guess the doctors know a few things the rest of us don’t but I know someone who decided to cut those things off even before the doctors reached him, and I swear laughter went out of his hard palate when those things walked off his plate. I sincerely hope you see the connection somewhere there. So, for now, I am still squaring up, chinning up, flexing down and jigging around in preparation for the D-day: the day of the Fish.

    There is one day that has come though: the day of the joke. Tomorrow, July 1, is World Jokes Day. Now, I don’t know what that is supposed to mean. Are we supposed to sit around on that day telling jokes? Is it that we should celebrate jokes as nature’s way of compensating for the massive pain built into our world, or to celebrate the jokester as the one with the hardest job of all? Come on, he has to make us laugh against our human nature and better sense, when we know better than to laugh in the face of so much provocation.

    My Encarta defines the word ‘joke’ as a funny story, a cause of amusement or something that is inadequate. I know I have regaled you on end with funny stories on this column, and I dare anybody to say that those stories were not funny. (Silence). I thought so. Thank you for your great silence; it will be recorded as a plus for you in heaven (Blessed are the silent when confronted by threats…).

    I do love funny stories, and I will go to great lengths to get them just for you: I listen when people talk, I buy good stories for free, and even if I have to make them up sometimes, what matters it? The important thing is that you my reader gets served with a tantalising dish of funny stuff each week to help you swallow Jonathan’s weekly diet of bitter pills. Poor man; I know he does not mean to be mean to us, giving us all these bitter pills, but what can he do, when we have given him this funny farm of a country to run?! Either him, you or me, but one of us must run amok, and am I glad it’s not me.

    There is no end of the things capable of making us all run amok in this country. When you consider that armed robbers are better armed and possibly more resilient than the police system here, it’s enough to make you hold your hair and go running round and round the room in circles. When you remember that this country exports crude oil in millions and millions of barrels but imports refined oil in spite of the fact that there are enough refineries to fill up Christopher Columbus and Sinbad’s ships ten thousand times each day for ever, you just want to scream. Yep, we have our eyes right behind our heads all right. Then, when you remember that we live in a country where the states are governed by people who are under the tight leash of their godfathers, you know the joke is on us the governed, literally, because it gives them a huge laugh.

    Honestly though, writing funny stories and being surrounded by so many things that cause endless amusement are nothing compared to some things being laughably inadequate. I have said it before and I dare to repeat it now but our national intelligence is laughably inadequate. It explains many things really. Let’s begin with our national focus. It can only be lack of intelligence that constantly tells us as a nation not to focus our attention on building a better country for our tomorrow but to fritter our today away in our own frivolous living.

    Just imagine. Our transport system is a joke; there is none, just us as a people making do as much as we can. So, we have trailers doing the work of aeroplanes and trains, cars doing the work of trains and cars, trains doing the work of cars, motorcycles doing the work of buses, and buses doing the work of bicycles and … I hope you are as confused as I am cause there’s no making it out. Let me do my Italian imitation: But- er, you already know– er, it is all one big- er joke- er around here. When I go out, I hop on anything that comes to hand, err to foot, err to… whatever.

    If you think our transport system is a joke, take a look at the electricity system. It is a huger joke (pardon the bad language) because we have national leaders whose sense of humour has taken the strange turn of making us all buy the generator sets they import into the country to make themselves rich. So, so clownish. There are ringside seats in this comedic club but they are occupied by actors who are enjoying the show, while the spectators are up there on the stage writhing in the pain of deprivation – no electricity in the morning, noon or night.

    As if that were not enough, we have leaders, men and women, doing the dance macabre in front of the nation as they gorge themselves to the eyeballs on national funds. But that’s funny, because you see, I am confident that what they think they have got all tucked away into their stomachs and noses and eyes, the doctors will soon be culling out. Someone said once that Egyptian and Indian hospitals are filled with serving Nigerian leaders who have quietly gone underground for one illness or the other. That is so sad. Do we have to wait for this kind of nonsense before we come to our real sense? There is our own Mandela there whose focus in life has been to give into the system, not take out of it, and see how old he is. More importantly, with so much clout in the world, the man is in a national hospital in SA, not in a hospi-tel in Saudi Arabia, America, Germany, India or Egypt frittering away more of the nation’s funds. He is not making his nation the butt of the world’s joke. No, that’s the job of Nigerians, to be the butt of the world’s joke.

    Unfortunately for us, we cannot afford to sit around telling jokes on World Jokes Day. We can only afford to sit and mope on our singular misfortune of being forced to take part in this Dance of Clowns. It’s an opera. No, it does not end in a pun like all good jokes; it ends in an enigma. Like all endings, however, changes can be made, provided we see through the tunnel and quickly make amends.

  • Is it the season of the mad hatter now?

    It’s Alice truly in Wonderland all over again, and the mad hatter is as usual scampering all over the place

    Now, I assure you this title has no bearing on the fact that our president, Dr. G. E. Jonathan, who I’m sure is a good man in himself, wears a hat. Indeed, it is a coincidence. If my memory is correct, I think Alice in Wonderland was written long before he was born. I would guess several decades in fact. Indeed, the president’s hat (we really must talk about it someday) has become such a status symbol now that it is sold nearly everywhere one turns. When I asked a buyer once why he was buying it, he said he was hoping it would put him on top of the world and remove the world from on top of him. When I asked the seller whether it really did bring luck, he said it had brought him plenty of luck; he had sold hundreds of it. But you know, I’m not sure he was not confusing his luck with the one our president said he had brought to the nation.

    Sometime in the week though, dear reader, I had a good laugh when I read about the president’s call to the nation. On yeah, he still had his hat on, joking or not. He asked us as a people to get over our egoistic tendencies, for goodness’ sakes, and put an end to ‘electoral impunity’! As they say in the movies, I did a double take: What the…! I mean here we have been all this while groaning in pain over the intractable crisis shaking the governors’ forum because of their excellences’ inability to decide which figure is higher than the other, 19 or 16. All we needed was a word from the presidency but none came. Perhaps, we should get a consultant to help us on the matter: we can get the services of a primary school pupil to help us to count pieces of stone on the ambient football pitches of his/her primary school.

    Actually, there are three things here. The first is the fact that this country believes it is running a democracy. You believe it, I believe it but our representatives do not believe it. Just witness how a good number of them got into the assemblies and state houses and even into high positions within those assemblies and state houses. Just witness the fact that it is on record that that good number neither took part in nor won any election to start with. These are the people we ‘elected’ to forge out our peace, development, and future hope. Since they have no democratic foundations, how then do we, simpletons that we are, expect them to understand or even respect our democratic yearnings?

    Following from that is the second issue. Based on the democratic foundations that this present republic is built on, a mini election was conducted and the entire process publicised, as all elections should be. The results were also quickly known, as they should be, like all transparent elections. Now what do we have? The loser is the winner and the winner is the loser. It’s Alice truly in Wonderland all over again, and the mad hatter is as usual scampering all over the place confusing everything; worse, he’s still mad.

    The third issue is even more fundamental, and it troubles me no end. Why on earth would any sane Nigerian insist on romancing and caressing a spectre that we are trying with all our might to kill, burn and bury? Here we are, not knowing what to do with the June 12 ‘mistake’ made by one individual on the behalf of us other stupid millions of Nigerians who really don’t count, and here are others, benefactors of that very ‘mistake’, doing their utmost to repeat the errors of their ancestors. Now, what do we call that?

    Seriously, I asked before and up till now, no one has given me a satisfactory answer: what is the official role of the governors’ forum either in the nation’s affairs or even in the constitution? Why have they so suddenly taken centre stage that no day passes now without one piece of news or the other on the antics of this forum being paraded before my beautiful eyes? Truth is, at this point, I don’t care; I care more that this situation is a metaphor for lessons that have gone unlearnt by us or that we are all appearing not to notice. It is a metaphor for the ‘electoral impunity’ that is so Nigerian because the government appears to have its hand deep in it!

    We are not noticing that elections are no materials to joke around with, even though we seem to be developing the habit of thinking that it is ‘just politics’. We do not seem to have sufficiently grasped the locus of right thinking: that the will of ‘the people’ translates into votes, whether the people be ten, twenty, thirty-five, ten million, or one hundred and twenty million. A vote is a vote, and it is sacred. Indeed, a vote is so sacred that it carries a spiritual essence that is supposed to translate into hope for a better, brighter future. When that essence is tampered with, it becomes a bone that sticks in the throat because the ghosts of skeletons past, present and future continue to haunt the annuller. The June 12 bone is still in Babangida’s throat, Abacha’s throat (well, he managed to dislodge his by dying), our national throat, etc. Since we cannot all take Abacha’s panacea, we just have to keep coughing and hope the sticky bone will one day come dislodged.

    As I was saying, this government appears to be tacitly, and I must say silently too, repeating the political errors of 1993, showing that we have learnt nothing, and we have forgotten nothing. I honestly do not understand how it can pay tribute to the heroes of 1993 and at the other corner of its mouth intone, ‘cancel the newest election’. I can imagine Chief M. K. O. Abiola rising up from the grave, looking gravely at this government and making only one sound: ‘Ah, Ah!’ before lying down again to continue his rest. Now, that would speak volumes – the sound that is, not the rest. The problem is that the government will not be able to hear it, only the people will.

    All this I think stems from one simple problem: the government is still working with the pre-colonial statistics. You know the problem with statistics? They lie, because anyone can manipulate them for any end. The old statistics say that Nigerians are gullible because less than fifty per cent of them are educated or literate enough to understand simple mathematics and interpret simple figures. The horrifying truth dawned on us however when the video of that little NGF election was shown on the internet and everyone began to make comments: Nigerians now know better and can understand mathematics and interpret figures.

    Thus, dear government, it has become very public knowledge indeed that the person who had the nineteen votes (Amaechi) is expected, by mathematical law, to have won the election while the person who had the sixteen votes (Jang) is expected to have conceded victory like an old gentleman. So, by the new statistics, the person with the less number of votes cannot declare himself winner; to do so is to be as confused. But then, he could just sort of be fooling around, like the hatter.

    Obviously, putting a stop to electoral impunity must first stop with the government, then with the politicians. I just wish though that our leaders would see past their long hats and actually do something about reducing the price of my favourite foodstuff in the market. Oh, wouldn’t you just like to know what that is!

  • June 12, sociopaths, and the many plagues of Nigeria

    June 12, sociopaths, and the many plagues of Nigeria

    The annulled June 12, 1993 election stands for many things to many people. To some people, the date is all about M.K.O. Abiola’s unrealised mandate. To others, the date is a reminder of loved ones lost and gone: the ones who died when news of Abiola’s win was being relayed, the ones who died when the tanks were rolled out on the streets in the protests that followed the annulment, and the ones who died when the resulting upheaval necessitated some travelling to ‘go home’. To the surviving relatives of all these departed ones, that date will continually bring sad memories. To many of us ‘others’, it stands as a continual beckon of ever receding hope, still there, still being chased but getting ever fainter and fainter. That fading light is no other than that Nigerians can manage to agree on something when they put their minds to it. That something could of course be an election candidate (like Abiola), a pet peeve (politicians), a favourite colour (food), or a ‘national’ dish (pounded yam I think).

    The trouble is that we have failed to move from the point at which June 12 met us. At that point, we were wondering who we were as a people, either just odious or plain ogres. Then, we killed and maimed each other recklessly in the name of God, and we starved ourselves of needed development for ethnic reasons. Life after that point has been no better; we are still wandering around our national sub consciousness as the Israelites of yore wandered over Palestine, only now without their shame and repentance. We are still killing and maiming each other, and still starving ourselves of much needed developments; the only reason for that now is that we have collectively adopted the psychology of sociopaths.

    A sociopath, says my dictionary, is a person with an antisocial personality disorder, exhibiting antisocial behaviour that usually is the result of social and environmental factors in the person’s early life. The only common factor I see in the early life of us Nigerians is this high level of ignorance mixed with a little bit of poverty. However, I don’t think poverty has much to do with the monumental waste by people in positions of authority that we are witnessing in Nigeria today; I think it’s all that very, very toxic ignorance that got mixed into our corn cereal when we were young. It has made us all sociopathic.

    That’s right; the nation has been seized by many sociopathic plagues, as it did Pharaoh’s Egypt. Shall I name them, or have you been reading the handwriting on the wall too? For exercise, oh do let me; I promise to make it more fun. Our first plague is the government that perpetually oscillates between somnambulism and somniloquism. It jerks its knees only when you hit it with a patella of criticism. Seriously, I know my medical subject, thank you very much.

    The problem is that everything revolves around good governance, and it is not coming from our government. Good governance interrupts evil instincts and directs us all to what is good for the sake of everyone. It insists that everyone tempers his/her sociopathic tendencies with something closely resembling good sense. Rather than slap my neighbour with a law suit for leaving his tree branches to shed leaves into my compound, therefore, I learn to grin, bear it and plant my own tree near the wall. When I find that the driver of the car in front of me has stopped to hold a meeting with his long lost friend coming in the opposite direction, I don’t ‘accidentally’ run into the said car from behind. If I do, I’m only giving way to my sociopathic tendencies. Instead, the government should help me to be able to point him to a law that says I deserve to get home early too after a hard day’s work without anyone stopping in front of me to talk about their village. So, please help us government to help ourselves because sociopathic tendencies have got us something terrible.

    The second plague is that this country is peopled with monkeys with fish brains who have absolutely no inkling of what it means to be real human beings. That includes me of course. Just the other day, I heard the story of how an Okada man hit a taxi and, rather than apologise, hid his fault behind the support of his fellow Okada riders who one by one stopped by to lend a hand in the quarrel. The union support was so much that another Okada rider was said to have pulled up on the opposite side of the road, jumped across and slapped the taxi driver before asking what happened. We have become that lawless.

    Can you also tell me why else someone would take a look at his parent’s house and set fire to it because his parents refused to give him a certain amount of money? Or, how can one explain why an individual would spend his section’s entire subvention on a car for a girlfriend? Yesterday, I heard a new one. A man, someone said, would even go so far as to buy an air-conditioned car for his girlfriend while he and his family would use a non-air-conditioned one. Now, I have heard the common saying that people give out only what they have but surely this is loving one’s neighbour more than oneself.

    My third plague? Take a look at the Nigeria Police Force. Why would our Nigeria Police perpetually confront unarmed protesting civilians with heavy artillery that are usually not available when armed robbers strike? Even though the University of Uyo incident is still not clear (no one seems to be able to tell with any certainty whether Mr. Kingsley was killed within or without the campus), it has happened too many times. It is certain though that there have been too many other loose-trigger incidents involving the police. Why, the Kwara State affair, in which a police bullet said to have been meant for a taxi driver who did not leave the way in time for a bullion van, found a Polytechnic student instead. I say that affair is still fresh in every one’s memory, and so is the young man’s wound for that matter. Now tell me, how much more sociopathic can we get?

    Shall I go on with the plagues? Try the (un)civil service… the (a)public service… teachers… students… politicians… Niger Delta… boko haram… and… Oh, what’s the use; it will just be one plague after another and we will be no wiser at the end of the day, like Pharaoh. We are in dire straits then, caught between the absence of good governance, and those plaguing plagues. A shucks to them things!

    Many of us have carried on as if this fourth republic democracy is built on the blood and sweat of June 12, and so it is. Actually, to claim otherwise would be hypocritical, and we get enough of that from our pastors and Imams and other religious pundits, thank you. Let us wise up. One would have thought such monumental losses of human resources as happened around the June 12 matter would sort of knock some sense into us and bring us, at least, to the edge of self-realisation instead of down this labyrinthine path of self-interest and self-gratification. Self-realisation as a people is the only way we can define who we are as a nation, a people and a kind. Hopefully, it would also assist us to determine our goals, purposes and place amidst this troubled brood of vipers and generations currently peopling this world.

  • Now, who’s going to call us back from the brink?

    This is the Federal Republic of Nigeria where black is white and white is black and Galileo’s mathematics falls flat on its face

    Whenever I have reflected on the skeins of sordid threads being woven into what goes for governance, particularly our democracy in this Fourth Republic of Nigeria, I feel more and more certain that the trepidation in my heart is not coming from too much coffee. I think it is because my ears are hearing too much, my eyes are reading too much and my mouth cannot say enough. So the surplus sordidness passes through my veins and arteries into my circulating blood, gives a thousand excuses for disturbing the blood flow, goes into my heart and makes it go ‘Thump, Thump, Thump!’ The other day, I had to go to the doctor to complain about those thumps, and I don’t even live in a story building, I told him. Reader, I cannot begin to describe for you the mortifications I was put through to get to those thumps. First, I was poked beyond description, then half stripped (don’t you go getting things into your head!) then told to begin to ride a stationary bicycle like the little boy I was, all in the semi-toto. Anyway, the good doctor, finding nothing, began to shake his head in perplexity. That was when I told him not to worry, he should just take the pulse of the nation’s politics for a clue.

    Yes, things just seem to be going from worse to worse these days, don’t they, particularly over this NGF thing? Really, the whole mess has left me wondering about a lot of things. To start with, when I began to hear about the Governors’ forum, I thought it was to enable the governors to come together, compare notes over a bottle or two of beer and generally wind down after a good quarter’s hard work. Then I began to hear that just about everywhere has one governors’ forum or the other – national, regional, parties, gender … What? No gender based forum – That’s because many of them are in mufti. Anyway, I really did begin to wonder – what the deuce are we doing with all these forums? Is that part of governance? Is it in the constitution? For goodness’ sake, who is looking after me while their excellencies are busy seeing to the affairs of their forums?

    Forgive me. I err, I think, in thinking that these forums have not served a single purpose. If we look at it objectively, I’m sure we will find that they have been useful. Let’s see. Have you noticed that in nearly all the states, minus a few serious ones, nearly nothing is happening except for a few stabs at governance? The lives of the people remain unchanged. Every morning, families still load their cars with jerry cans in search of water like in the primordial times (yep, they had some kind of mobility then); candle factories and lantern companies are still surviving though in fierce competition with generator companies for electricity just as in the cave times (they also had some kind of fossil energy then); and yes, people are still moving around on pothole-filled roads (just as they were before those roads were made). So, mercifully, those forums are keeping our dear governors so occupied that they have not had time to look into these things. Who knows, if they had had the time, might they not have made things worse? So yes, we like our pain, thank you.

    The story I am about to tell you is true, painful and I have also told it umpteen times, but at this point, I don’t care. There was a man who went to his Rabbi to complain that life was too difficult; nine of them lived in a room. The wise Rabbi asked him to go take in a goat and after one week, he should return. One week later, the man was prostrate. Nine of them plus one goat in a room was pure hell. He was asked to go and take out the goat and return after a week. He returned to exclaim that life indeed was beautiful; just nine of them in a room, no goat. So you see, it’s all a matter of perspective. Let the governors have their forums and let us have the devils we all know so well. Life is beautiful, no electricity.

    Those forums also tell me that our governors are using their time most judiciously. The fact is that most of them have at least twenty or more commissioners, a hundred plus special assistants and about two hundred senior special assistants. Now with all those hands (and legs), what on earth is left for the governor himself to do? As Obasanjo himself used to say, his ministers’ achievements were his own achievements. So there, those blessed forums help to get them governors out of our hairs so we can go about our daily scratching. Thanks to our otherwise preoccupied governors, many really oouuuld women are still gathering a few firewood pieces they no longer have the necks to carry; families are still bearing the burdens of looking after their terminally sick relatives without governmental assistance, and much more. What do these matter, when the governor needs all the time he can get to travel abroad and see to those newly purchased houses, golf courses, girl friends, etc.

    Then, those forums actually help to protect our governors against sudden attacks of say … poverty. Everyone knows there is safety in numbers. When they all know what the other is doing through those get-togethers, there is little chance of anyone straying too far from the fold and doing too much good for his people. Oh no, not a chance. Such a one can quickly be reined in and told in very certain terms that governance is not about governing but appearing to govern. That one is quickly shown that governance is about motions and gestures rather than achieving. Achieve! What is the world coming to if governors are now to achieve?! I tell you, those forums are super useful.

    There are many other reasons but don’t let us waste time on any more except this last one. Have you noticed how they all have kept us riveted to the news these past few days, so that we all are more concerned now about which governor is really the chairman of the NGF rather than what each governor has done for his people? Have you? We all are now so distracted we can hardly eat. Many of us cannot believe that our governors cannot count; many of us cannot believe that the president would have a hand in joining others not to be able to count that we let our foods burn on the stove, poor as they are (the food that is, not the stove). We are all seeing that nineteen votes are counted for one person, and sixteen for another and who struts around with the president’s medal of recognition? Your sixteen, of course. Now, imagine James Earl Jones intoning this: This is the Federal Republic of Nigeria where black is white and white is black and Galileo’s mathematics falls flat on its face. Newton’s Law of gravity also don’t mean a thing. Just because a building falls and hits you on the head does not necessarily mean it is obeying the law of its weight. It may just be obeying our president.

    So, what does it matter that the role of those blessed forums does not exist in the constitution? They can still take our time, wring out our hearts, confound our senses and generally distract all of us to a point of frenzy where we chew out our heads and pull out our hairs. Problem is, who is going to pull us back from the brink?

  • Now, who’s going to call us back from the brink?

    This is the Federal Republic of Nigeria where black is white and white is black and Galileo’s mathematics falls flat on its face

    Whenever I have reflected on the skeins of sordid threads being woven into what goes for governance, particularly our democracy in this Fourth Republic of Nigeria, I feel more and more certain that the trepidation in my heart is not coming from too much coffee. I think it is because my ears are hearing too much, my eyes are reading too much and my mouth cannot say enough. So the surplus sordidness passes through my veins and arteries into my circulating blood, gives a thousand excuses for disturbing the blood flow, goes into my heart and makes it go ‘Thump, Thump, Thump!’ The other day, I had to go to the doctor to complain about those thumps, and I don’t even live in a story building, I told him. Reader, I cannot begin to describe for you the mortifications I was put through to get to those thumps. First, I was poked beyond description, then half stripped (don’t you go getting things into your head!) then told to begin to ride a stationary bicycle like the little boy I was, all in the semi-toto. Anyway, the good doctor, finding nothing, began to shake his head in perplexity. That was when I told him not to worry, he should just take the pulse of the nation’s politics for a clue.

    Yes, things just seem to be going from worse to worse these days, don’t they, particularly over this NGF thing? Really, the whole mess has left me wondering about a lot of things. To start with, when I began to hear about the Governors’ forum, I thought it was to enable the governors to come together, compare notes over a bottle or two of beer and generally wind down after a good quarter’s hard work. Then I began to hear that just about everywhere has one governors’ forum or the other – national, regional, parties, gender … What? No gender based forum – That’s because many of them are in mufti. Anyway, I really did begin to wonder – what the deuce are we doing with all these forums? Is that part of governance? Is it in the constitution? For goodness’ sake, who is looking after me while their excellencies are busy seeing to the affairs of their forums?

    Forgive me. I err, I think, in thinking that these forums have not served a single purpose. If we look at it objectively, I’m sure we will find that they have been useful. Let’s see. Have you noticed that in nearly all the states, minus a few serious ones, nearly nothing is happening except for a few stabs at governance? The lives of the people remain unchanged. Every morning, families still load their cars with jerry cans in search of water like in the primordial times (yep, they had some kind of mobility then); candle factories and lantern companies are still surviving though in fierce competition with generator companies for electricity just as in the cave times (they also had some kind of fossil energy then); and yes, people are still moving around on pothole-filled roads (just as they were before those roads were made). So, mercifully, those forums are keeping our dear governors so occupied that they have not had time to look into these things. Who knows, if they had had the time, might they not have made things worse? So yes, we like our pain, thank you.

    The story I am about to tell you is true, painful and I have also told it umpteen times, but at this point, I don’t care. There was a man who went to his Rabbi to complain that life was too difficult; nine of them lived in a room. The wise Rabbi asked him to go take in a goat and after one week, he should return. One week later, the man was prostrate. Nine of them plus one goat in a room was pure hell. He was asked to go and take out the goat and return after a week. He returned to exclaim that life indeed was beautiful; just nine of them in a room, no goat. So you see, it’s all a matter of perspective. Let the governors have their forums and let us have the devils we all know so well. Life is beautiful, no electricity.

    Those forums also tell me that our governors are using their time most judiciously. The fact is that most of them have at least twenty or more commissioners, a hundred plus special assistants and about two hundred senior special assistants. Now with all those hands (and legs), what on earth is left for the governor himself to do? As Obasanjo himself used to say, his ministers’ achievements were his own achievements. So there, those blessed forums help to get them governors out of our hairs so we can go about our daily scratching. Thanks to our otherwise preoccupied governors, many really oouuuld women are still gathering a few firewood pieces they no longer have the necks to carry; families are still bearing the burdens of looking after their terminally sick relatives without governmental assistance, and much more. What do these matter, when the governor needs all the time he can get to travel abroad and see to those newly purchased houses, golf courses, girl friends, etc.

    Then, those forums actually help to protect our governors against sudden attacks of say … poverty. Everyone knows there is safety in numbers. When they all know what the other is doing through those get-togethers, there is little chance of anyone straying too far from the fold and doing too much good for his people. Oh no, not a chance. Such a one can quickly be reined in and told in very certain terms that governance is not about governing but appearing to govern. That one is quickly shown that governance is about motions and gestures rather than achieving. Achieve! What is the world coming to if governors are now to achieve?! I tell you, those forums are super useful.

    There are many other reasons but don’t let us waste time on any more except this last one. Have you noticed how they all have kept us riveted to the news these past few days, so that we all are more concerned now about which governor is really the chairman of the NGF rather than what each governor has done for his people? Have you? We all are now so distracted we can hardly eat. Many of us cannot believe that our governors cannot count; many of us cannot believe that the president would have a hand in joining others not to be able to count that we let our foods burn on the stove, poor as they are (the food that is, not the stove). We are all seeing that nineteen votes are counted for one person, and sixteen for another and who struts around with the president’s medal of recognition? Your sixteen, of course. Now, imagine James Earl Jones intoning this: This is the Federal Republic of Nigeria where black is white and white is black and Galileo’s mathematics falls flat on its face. Newton’s Law of gravity also don’t mean a thing. Just because a building falls and hits you on the head does not necessarily mean it is obeying the law of its weight. It may just be obeying our president.

    So, what does it matter that the role of those blessed forums does not exist in the constitution? They can still take our time, wring out our hearts, confound our senses and generally distract all of us to a point of frenzy where we chew out our heads and pull out our hairs. Problem is, who is going to pull us back from the brink?

  • Democracy Day Blues

    The people want life to be more possible so that the president will not enjoy his score card alone; they want to help enjoy it too.

    This is no exaggeration, but living in Nigeria has become like using your fingernails to scratch away at the sides of a mountain until it becomes flat like the ground. So you go scrape, scratch, scrape at the thing: buying endless fuel cans for your generators (if you have one), putting one cement block over another to give your loved ones shelter (when you can), battling daily on the road with unruly, unrefined and uneducated taxi-drivers and motorcycle-riders and generally having to deal with Nigerians who are nice to foreigners but grumpy to their fellow countrymen (and women). In all these, you hope against hope that as you scratch away at the mountain, the mountain will somehow give way to your puny efforts, failing which some angel with wings would give a helping hand and whisk you away onto an uninhabited island where there are no Nigerians. Well, they do say hope springs eternal.

    On democracy day, like all other Nigerians, I was therefore only too glad to observe a public holiday not because I wanted to greet democracy but because I love work-free days and use them to dream up get-away schemes. Left to me, I think all days should be democracy days so we can have an endless number of work-free days. Know what I found? Many people think like me. On May 29, many stayed at home, not really because they wanted to nurture democracy and help it to grow in their little corners, but because they welcomed a chance to rest their feet from trudging the streets in the effort to eke out an existence from the uphill living Nigeria offers most of us.

    The most absurd part about the whole democracy day business still remains the tortuous route it took to get to us. I mean, when you ponder that it came through one of the most renownedly undemocratic blusterers in history, you can only think that the poor thing arrived LOD – Lame On Delivery. I believe that is why the entire democratic enterprise in Nigeria limps to the highest heavens to this day. Just look at us. Our National Assembly has no idea what to do with either the country or itself; we the people have neither the knowledge nor the will to throw out the entire structure and build for ourselves a system that best defines our nature as Nigerians and Africans with peculiar problems; and a presidency more involved in looking in the mirror and seeing its well torsoed chests carrying very expensive name tags incidentally called ‘2015’. But we limp on.

    So, like I said, many of us stayed home on democracy day to give ourselves a break from all the scratching at life thing so that we will not have to be grumpy at other Nigerians for a nice change. Believe me, a life of perpetual grumpiness not only gets boring but is most tiring. Instead, I used the day to ponder on what there is to gain or lose from the kind of democracy we have, where we are getting it, what we can do to fix its wrongs and generally indulge in some good ol’ standard issue blues. I started by thinking about what is right with it … mmmm … Ok, the next one – what exactly have we gained from this democratic venture?

    By last count, not much. To begin with, as I sat down to think, I soon found myself perspiring for the sun was high in the sky, the icebergs were melting, global warming was going on against all my orders to be still and all that, and there was no electricity to make the fans move and provide some respite. In short, as it was in the beginning, is now, and will hopefully not be forever more. For now though, there was no electricity to help me think. I turned myself to the showers. The taps were not exactly dry. No, sir, they were past dry, they went silent a long while back. Oh, have I mentioned that now, thanks to this democracy, I can hardly travel freely in the country? I cannot even now sleep with my two eyes closed, but luckily, I use four. All these basic things are still wrong yet the country spends billions and billions of Naira each year on its democratic structures. So, exactly how would you be wanting me to reckon this democracy for me to gain the simplest thing?

    Just some days ago, I read a report in which our president was said to have given his administration a pass score for a job well done in this their first-half assessment, and well he should. The only problem is that the rest of us do not quite understand that scoring system because I really have not met a student who has been called on to assess him/herself. That would make the work of the teacher very superfluous indeed. The president then berated the rest of us for not using a known and clear ‘marking guide’ in our assessment of his administration. Yes, but is it not an axiom that whoever sets an examination usually provides the marking guide? But this is neither here nor there. What is important is that we all should understand the concept of democracy and here is my take.

    Surely, to the known world, democracy is that means of governance by which the people get together, point out a few among them to go and govern the rest for the sake of peace and quiet. It takes for granted that whoever is elected would listen to the people, respect them and help to make life less of a grind for them. It also takes for granted that when the people perceive that the said elected officials have ceased to respect or help or listen to them, the people know exactly what to do with and about them. Boot them out.

    Alas, in all of Nigeria’s democratic republics, no single set of elected officials has shown any inkling of what it has been elected or sent to do other than to frolic. And so, from the time of the institution of democracy in Nigeria, we have been unfortunate to have one set of frolickers or the other in astonishingly ascending degrees and the people have been paying the price. So, brace up folks, for we the people obviously have a lot more paying to do.

    The experience of most sane countries is that the government constitutes no more than a small percentage of human labour, large-scale industries no more than a small percentage of the national economy, while the rest is made up of small-scale life savers. For the economy to run efficiently, therefore, every organ of the economy requires a great deal of self-determination in which it can rely on the fact that white is white, black is black, and every little decision cannot be interfered with by the president.

    Clearly, it is time to call out the democratic umpire. No democracy can thrive in a colony of ants that refuses to know and respect the positions, authorities and limits of its members. They will all soon go array and awry. Let the umpire tell us: have we got it (democracy) or have we lost it (our good sense)? I think we have not got it, and I think we have completely lost it. For one thing, the government needs to realise that the people want to be respected. Democracy requires mutual respect between the elector and the elected. For another, we the people want life to be a little more possible so that the president will stop enjoying his score card alone. Let us the people enjoy it too.