The Nation Newspaper

Category: Oyinkan Medubi

  • Failure to model

    By Oyinkan Medubi

    There are many students in courses they are not equipped to take either by interest or ability… There are also many students who are in tertiary institutions they are not intellectually equipped to sustain but are there because of parental influence and insistence.

    Once again, it is that time of the year when we celebrate our teachers because, no matter what we do, we must not forget them. They are the pivot of the nation, the fulcrum on which the weight of the nation stays, the shoulders unfailingly carrying the load of our collective will and conscience, the biceps forcing knowledge into our young and the interrogator of the old, valuable question: where in the world can one locate the mind of a Nigerian man?

    Truly, we can never celebrate our teachers enough because they are everything to their charges and hence to the nation. Say what you will, they have worked assiduously over the past 59+ years to educate you and me, have patiently (though not always) pointed our way skywards, lifted our drooping shoulders and given us the tools of life to expand our minds – chisels, hammer, stethoscope, briefcase, wig, chalk and a mind to question everything within and without our grasp intelligently. For example, what is the meaning of existence? How many grains of sand are there on earth? I tell you, teachers are great.

    In this role, the teacher is supposed to wake up the minds of his/her charges to make them interrogate the multiverses they live in and their very own existence too. Their models take them to high levels of inspiration not common to ordinary men and women. In this task, the teacher is not supposed to see the learner in binary sexes but rather as minds to be nurtured into fullness. Most of my teachers were males who saw me mostly as one mind from which to flush out the unexplainable stupidity they noticed. Honestly, I still don’t know if they have succeeded.

    Sometimes, some teachers flounder in this role as it appears they are doing now, going by the stories in the media; and the nation is flummoxed on account of that. The reports of ‘sexcapades’ named among some male lectures in our nation’s tertiary institutions are becoming worrisome, to use the well-worn cliché. The media calls the phenomenon ‘sex-for-grades’. This happens when the teacher fails in his modelling duty. This is worse than being caught napping in class, and it’s called failure to model. Today, we are going to address this failure to model in the tertiary institutions.

    Over the years, the teacher’s role has expanded for many reasons, the most important of which is the fact that the family roles are thinning out and parental responsibilities are contracting. Many students now find themselves needing answers and the teacher becomes the most viable and available role model to give them, especially when the parental one fails.

    It is gratifying to note though that many parents are still performing their duties to their children. They know where they are at all times, are interested in their children’s interests, and guide the children towards life enhancing goals. Too many parents, quite unfortunately, have left these duties undone, preferring to chase after money instead. The nation hardly notices the parent’s failure to model though, but sits up at the teacher’s failure.

    The teacher’s failure to model has attracted many reactions. Many, including the law, have condemned the teachers involved, and rightly so too. Many have blamed the attitude of some females, and rightly so too. However, these blames can hardly scratch the problem. We must go to the source of the matter, which is the society.

    I listened to the argument that said that the teacher has been given a job to do; and it is his responsibility to do that job, come hell or high water. Even if some girls have taken it into their tiny brains to seduce the male lecturer for grades, he should be strong enough emotionally, mentally, psychologically and physically to resist Lucifer himself should he come as a woman. The only problem I have with that is that Lucifer is so much stronger than us mere mortals. Unless the male lecturer is moulded in the form of an archangel, the ability to resist may not really be trustworthy. So, the theory of inner strength might not really fly, especially when confronted by a determined femme fatale.

    Did I ever tell you of the day I met a young female student standing in front of a male lecturer’s office, waiting to go in? I did? Good, I will tell you again. You should have seen her; she was literally dressed to kill; i.e. kill me. Since it was a harmattan season, I told her that the sheer transparency of her dress was killing me with the shivers and I felt cold just looking at her. She was a woman with a purpose, and unfortunately, her free will overrode my objections that day.

    True, the fellow that lady was going to see that day should have had enough brawn to throw her out of his office and reprimanded her for her brazenness. Yep, in a fairy world where I am grossly rich and do not have to work my fingers to the bone to earn a living. No such world exists. So, sir, relying on a man to always invoke his power of resistance on the female that ‘strips’ herself in his office is not very realistic. What’s on a man’s mind, asked the famous psychologist, Sigmund Freud, I say nothing but dross.

    True, there is something very dastardly, low, common, and ungentlemanly for a man to take advantage of a little one’s desperation to gain admission into university or get good grades. However, I have since learnt two things. One, nothing is ever as it seems. Two, no story is ever one-sided; you must always find the other side of the coin.

    Anyway, I believe the society has contributed somewhat to this anomaly. To start with, there is not enough censor of the national malaise, which is the parental failure to model. Too many parents actually encourage their children to take short cuts to ‘success’. After all, as they say, you can only teach what you know. I think the nation should begin to hold parents to account on their wards.

    Now, you’ll ask, what about illiterate parents and their children? It is all the same thing. An illiterate parent can still model for his/her child based on the inner goodness and generosity of spirit engendered in him or her which is transferrable to the child. A concerned parent is a concerned parent. Even an illiterate can inspire his or her child to maximum performance. It is a matter of how much he/she is concerned.

    ‘Parental failure to model’ is just as important as ‘teacher failure to model’. I believe that parental failure to model is at the heart of children not being properly guided towards the right paths in life. There are many students in courses they are not equipped to take either by interest or ability. They are there because their parents have put them there. And that’s another thing. There are also many students who are in tertiary institutions they are not intellectually equipped to sustain but are there because of parental influence and insistence. The pressure to succeed can lead children down all kinds of paths.

    We are celebrating all our teachers today, but this bit on modelling needed to be said. It is the duty of the teacher to give his or her wards second, third, fourth and all the chances they require in order to succeed. However, the greater modelling needs to come from the parents who must ensure that the child is adequately equipped for life outside the home. Failure to model is a societal thing that needs to be tackled, societally.

  • The SAD state of things

    I sure recollect, dear reader, those moments when I am a figure standing in front of a camera and told to smile as the word ‘cheese’ is pronounced. Well, I do smile, not because I know what cheese is (many of us learnt to call the word long before we saw it) but because somehow the word makes me spread my lips only to remember that I have forgotten to flush out the strands of orange caught between my teeth. Just as the camera’s shutters come down, however, I can’t help wincing because of the pain caused by the blisters on my feet caused, you guessed it, by my shoes. So, between the dirty teeth and the pain, the picture is shot. I come out looking like an Ojuelegba-crazed figure, half-wincing, half smiling, dirty teeth baring, and altogether ready for deportation to Mars.

    I believe Nigeria is just like my figure in that picture. True, the country has cause to smile. At 59, there are plenty reasons. Just think of the many accidents she has been able to dodge (civil war, coups d’état, etc.), the many assaults of the enemy from within and without, the many aggravations she has endured from her so called admirers (think politically motivated uprisings), etc. So, like me, the country’s teeth are barred in a smile, while she’s also wincing from the agony of her load of troubles. I think our venerated Fela called that shuffering and shmiling but which sounds more suspiciously to me like shmiling in shuffering.

    To be sure, I believe few would argue that Nigeria is perhaps the most socially disorganised society in the world. The reasons for this state of things have been trashed here and everywhere, including university seminar rooms and universally acknowledged beer parlours so we need not waste time on them. All our seminal opinions and beer parlour discourses have narrowed down our problems to be governmental laziness and its unwillingness to confront the truth. Sadly, though, like in all old men’s wars, it’s the young ones who suffer, but they are now refusing to say ‘cheese’.

    There are worse results. Nearly every Nigerian is suffering right now from social angst and cultural disorientation. I hardly know what these are but since you have asked me, I will assay to explicate them. After consulting my all-knowing google, I find that social angst is a mental disorder resulting in fear of everyday social interactions. It is also called SAD! Imagine, who can blame us for being sooooo SAD in Nigeria, what with boko haram, bandits, herdsmen, kidnappers all on the loose? I tell you, they are enough to make me SAD!

    Cultural disorientation, on the other hand, they say is when an individual suffers from what is commonly called culture shock. This is when we begin to experience for real things that are normally and vaguely foreign. For instance, right now, travelling around Nigeria on Nigerian roads gives me and many others the greatest cultural disorientation and social angst you can imagine. The reason is plain. You don’t know whether you are going to do one of four things: be kidnapped, have an accident because of the bad road, be robbed by armed men or, wonder of wonders, arrive at your destination. Tell me, what can be more shocking than that?

    Unfortunately, Nigerian governments have fallen into the habit of not really caring about what befalls this country, as long as some of the individuals who man the posts are aye ok. So, let the bandits roam, let the insurgents rule, let the herdsmen rile on, it’s all the same, thanks.

    One tell-tale area of our national life is this matter of housing. In reality, individuals have been left to the vagaries of their cultural upbringing. I am no psychologist, but I’m guessing that with the economy getting more and more incomprehensible, many young people actually have angst about their future, hence the tendency to resort to the line of least resistance – lash out at others.

    Theoretically, everyone deserves a decent housing arrangement. By rights, every Nigerian who desires it should be given access to a means of obtaining a decent accommodation without too much hassles. This need not necessarily come directly from the government. The government should however be able to pave the way to make this possible by enabling private companies interested in estate development working hand in hand with banks. Ditto for electricity.

    Right now, the executive arm of the government is playing lip service to these social concerns. The legislative arm, on the other hand, is even less caring. The latest news right now is that it is consuming as much as 15% of the nation’s budget and the members are just aye ok. One, I think those members think they are more important than everyone else in the state. Two, I think it is also in their nature to think that they are more important than the entire state put together. I have said the same thing, right? Never mind. The thing that worries me is that no one has adequately described to me exactly what this group does to warrant that much pay-out. Do you think they are twisting our collective arm, like… say… you know…the mafia?

    Anyway, the result of all this social disconnect is that Nigerians have become a people who have lost their smile. And why not? To start with, rather than focus on nation building, the different nations within the nation are busy (as usual) creating many Nigerias among themselves, i.e. apportioning the different arms to themselves such as politics (to…), service (to…) and economy (to …), and other absurdities. Under that kind of evil arrangement, what can make one smile? Congratulations, government; you now officially have a nation of people who have lost their smile, which is a world offence.

    The world believes that Nigerians are the happiest people on earth. I still have posts put together on Nigerians abroad. Come, these posts present the opinions of some foreigners on Nigerians they have lived, worked or associated with. Surprisingly, these posts tell of the smiling, good-natured and hard-working people they know and love, with one top notch even declaring she ‘wanted more Nigerians in her community’. Of course, I shouted, ‘here I am, take me,’ but I guess she could not quite make out my words.

    The politics of the land have turned the nation’s economy into nothingness which in turn has turned the social fabrics into rags and in turn, has made the people lose themselves in the search for that crucial reconnection. One word? Lost. Who is to tell them, however, that the answer is in the political connection? Not me, sir; no, not me. Clearly, for want of a political direction, the land was lost. For want of the land, the economy was lost, then the people were lost.

    Last Friday was the World Smile Day. That was the day the importance of smiling was once more brought home to us. However, I’m not sure I have the heart to tell anyone to smile when the prospects of having even a square meal in a day are as dim to many as a dim-witted storm.

    So, what to do? There is one thing we can do, and that is to make do with the consolation prize: which is to seize our smile, no matter what. The next best thing is for us to begin to insist that national affairs begin to be truly national. Let Nigeria begin to belong to Nigerians instead of northerners or south westerners or south easterners. Obviously, what we call ourselves matters a great deal. Perhaps, when we begin to bear the name ‘Nigerians’, then we can have a Nigeria to smile about.

  • Nigeria at 59: still too old to learn?

    Getting wealth before learning to work never did anyone any good. Unfortunately,
    Nigeria got wealth before she learnt to work.

    I don’t know about you, reader, but I find the stereotypes of Nigeria being bandied about in some stories rather distressing. One story says that judgement day in heaven will be different for Nigerians because, while being normally dressed to judge other races, God will have to wear a pair of knickers to judge Nigerians. Another story talks about how Japan invented a machine that nabs thieves and when taken to several countries for demonstrations including U.S.A., U.K., Spain, Ghana, etc., it effectively and successfully nabs thieves in their thousands. However, within five minutes of being brought to Nigeria, it err… gets stolen.

    In yet another story, Obama, Queen Elizabeth and Buhari are said to have gone to God to ask when their countries would develop (or get peace). The figure given to Obama makes him burst into tears. The queen also bursts into tears when a figure is given her. However, when it comes to the turn of Nigeria, it is God who bursts into tears.

    These stories portray Nigeria as a baby with a pea brain that is eternally doomed and so can’t learn a thing. Perhaps so, I don’t know and I don’t want to. Let the facts keep lying. They are lying, right?  Let’s look at some of them.

    Over this week, I read a news report that the naira is now 480 to the dollar. The result is in a news report that says a man battered his wife over the fact that he could not find his two thousand naira (N2, 000). I panic and think, oh dear, the hunger in the land is getting unbearable. The economy is so bad now that domestic squabbles are turning into fisticuffs over what used to be paltry sums. In truth, the man may just have had an ill-governed temper and so his fists could not really tell the difference between his wife and his enemy.

    If you think that is bad, listen to yet another report that says a woman organised the kidnapping of her own niece to gain N30, 000 to use ‘for a business’. Really?! What business, I ask, Kidnapping, Plc.? The wonderful thing is that the woman fully expected to succeed in that business and make profit.

    True, these stories can hardly be said to be lying about Nigeria and the antics of her citizens. They show a country made up of professional dummies. But, if the philosophical theory that says ‘I think, therefore I am’ is true, then these people do not exist. They are only figments of my imagination. Nigeria does not exist; Buhari is not struggling to rule the country; kidnappers do not exist; no one exists, only my beautiful mind. Then, who on earth stole my housekeeping money?

    There is one group though that I would just like to close down the shutters of my mind on, and that is our state governors. You know, in spite of the hunger in the land, I hear that some of them have placed orders for bullet-proof cars. I ask you?!

    You know, I easily get confused. When Buhari won the election, I was a little confused. I asked someone: did I not hear that the last government had paid many people in dollars just to ensure that they would win the election? It took me a while to reach the conclusion that money can buy you a lot of failure. If you don’t believe me, just ask PHCN. They’ve had lots and lots of money over the years and it’s bought them nothing but failure all the way. So, I tell you, I’m easily confused.

    This confusion is rearing its ugly head again in my mind. I can’t seem to make the connection between armoured cars and safety. The dots connecting them are sometimes turning into squares in this my beautiful mind. Governors are buying bullet-proof cars! Many of them do not have any good recording on their blood pressure machines. Why not get a bullet-proof panacea for that first?

    In the midst of all the rhetoric about lack and hunger in the land and families eating amala with water or red oil as soup and people dying because they cannot afford drugs of a few hundreds of naira and people cooking up leaves to make vegetables and all kinds of unsavoury situations, someone can think of buying bullet-proof cars. I ask, is it to protect the occupants against the people’s hunger or anger?

    I tell you, the people are hungry, therefore angry. If you want to know how angry the people are, just look at the spate of kidnappings in the land. As sad, terrible and despicable as that act is, it represents a loud cry for financial and psychological help. It’s a financial cry because lack of jobs soon makes people wander listlessly into the devil’s workshop and take up ‘occupations’ that don’t make any sense. It’s also a psychological cry because only an unsound mind can think that money made from depriving struggling people of their freedom, i.e., asking hapless people to buy back their freedom, represents good money.

    The rhetoric of bullet-proof cars is similar to the rhetoric of private jets. It’s an attempt by the governors to escape these little things plaguing the rest of us lesser mortals – being shot by robbers, being kidnapped, being torpedoed with water sachets, rotten tomatoes and eggs. Oh yes, they happen. They happen though because of the absence of good governance.

    Sooner or later, one has to touch ground from them jets and armoured cars and walk on this terrestrial earth, if only to go to the bathroom. Now, we do not know what these cars are supposed to achieve for the governors and their wives but I’ll tell you what it cannot do: show that Nigerians are serious about self-governance. Indeed, it’s a little like monkeys playing with stolen guns while swinging on trees. You can bet there will be some misfiring. Who gives a gun to monkeys?

    More importantly, who is related to these governors? I really want to know them, if only to envy them. Perhaps, who knows, I might one day go to greet them as the friend of a friend of a friend and get a ride in one of them armoured cars. You can bet I will tell you about it. I don’t promise though to be happy all the time I will spend in that car, but I tell you, I will appreciate the experience.

    At 59, Nigeria has not apprehended the art of self-governance and putting the right foot forward. All we seem to have learnt in the last 50+ years has been to take stupidity to the highest level instead of ideas and innovations. Who gets marks for stupidity? Only knocks, hard ones, on the head, delivered directly from above, can rain down. That, ladies and gentlemen, is why God burst into tears in our story above. How in heaven would He deliver those knocks on the country: through a recession perhaps?

    There is not much wrong with this country that a few strokes here and there can’t fix. Like someone suggested, sell a few things like our oil rigs, the assembly, state government houses, the government itself … Who knows what good can come from there? Seriously, getting wealth before learning to work never did anyone any good. Unfortunately, Nigeria got wealth before she learnt to work. America learnt to work before getting wealth. Perhaps these hard times will force all of us to learn to put our backs to it and actually learn to work. Otherwise, we will be forced to conclude that at 59, Nigeria is still too old to learn.

    ***This article was first published on October 2, 2016 but is still relevant today.

     

  • Demonstrate democracy now or quit trying

    It is a true axiom that we learn most through experience. For example, by experience, I have since learnt not to initiate any conversation with a snake, scorpion, or bees. They have very little tolerance for English. Once I tried to reason with a scorpion and came away with a nasty sting resulting in screams that could be heard for miles. Through experience, I have also learnt that my dog, or any dog, can only take this much taunting. Hurl sticks at them, they can take; but hurl abuses at them and out comes their weapon of single destruction: the nip. Nah, nah, I don’t want to regale you with the tales of the so many nips that have come out of those four-legged things. By far the most important lesson I have learnt – no it’s not quite the most but it nears it – so far through experience is that you never, just never, leave your favourite pot of stew on the stove and pick a call from your favourite friend. The two favourites never mix – a little like introducing your favourite friend to another favourite friend. You’re the common denominator and they’d both rather talk only to you. I’m sure you know I’m really talking about the stew.

    Life, you find, is full of little lessons, if you would only learn them. I have been told endless times by the maintenance officer in my house to always look out for things in the car before zooming off: do the tyres look normal?; what is the fuel gauge reading?; is the oil screaming at you ‘change me, change me’?, and another long list of things. Well, I think he has since learnt that the only item on that list I am able to cram into my over-filled head is really the one about the fuel gauge, and that too came from the experience of finding that it is possible for cars to stop in the middle of nowhere and refuse to go further. Before that experience, I honestly never suspected cars to be capable of treason.

    Just the other day in May, we celebrated the national democracy day, and now, we are learning that the world is celebrating it too. Now, what am I to make of this – that democracy is that important to the world? Going by its ideals, I would say, yes. But going by its practice, I would say, naaaah. Just look at its ideals: a government chosen by the people themselves and expected to be accountable to the people; a government imbued with internal checks and balances; a government deliberately purposed for good things for the people. If democracy was such a good thing and half the world is going for it, how come then that the world is in such a sorry state? How come we the people are always so short-changed? How come I have so much to complain about? How come all these how comes?

    The reason is not so far-fetched: the way it is practised. Just look around the world and tell me, which democracy is really working at full capacity? What in truth do people get when they go for democracy? For democracy, most people get governments of people who have no idea what to do with their mandate, like watching monkeys on trees. Now, you know what those are, don’t you? Monkeys are that breed of animals that deftly move around the world, your legs, and the treasury with incredible nimbleness. They generally do not do any work, eat voraciously, are forever picking out lice and are attracted to shiny stuff. Don’t they just remind you of a group of people we know so well in Nigeria?

    Honestly, we just cannot write enough about Nigerian politicians’ interpretation of democracy. Going by their antics, I sometimes believe they have never even heard the word, let alone what it means. You can certainly say about them ‘they have got the wrong end of the stick, alright’. Now, let’s examine their work ethics. I have always wanted to trail a Nigerian politician on his/her typical day just to find out what their work ethic looks like; just that dear reader, nothing else. Failing that, I am left to my imagination. I am therefore seriously tempted to believe that most politicians’ days are filled with anything but work. The men get busy on little things and the women among them get busy on littler things and well … shopping. Just look around you. How many areas of Nigerian life have been impacted by this group of people? We have asked this question before, yet no answer has been forth coming.

    Listen till I tell you, the voracious appetite of politicians is sure staggering. Funny thing, I am thinking they consume all in the name of democracy. In my town, presently, a certain party chieftain is said to be in the process of buying up an endless number of properties, and all within a spate of a few months of ascending a particular throne in the party. And the country is paying for everything. I honestly do not know what they want the rest of us to do: knock our heads against our puny brick fences while they keep acquiring? I believe one of the things this country needs is a law that limits this particularly sickening, indiscriminate property ownership. Sadly, that is one thing I know this breed of politicians will not get round to. They are much too busy acquiring.

    Well, for one thing, democracy gets politicians busy picking out lice, mostly from their own breed, (smile) just like monkeys. Have you seen the way these people have been going at each other in this country? If they are not busy inanely counting votes of no more than thirty-five upside down, then they are busy chasing each other across the pages of newspapers. If they are not busy hacking each other down with machetes, they get down on the hack job of literally picking out lice from the deep folds of their agbada and babanriga. And the serious business of governing? If you don’t know, that is the serious business of governing – bringing down the opponent.

    All of that rigmarole of playing politics is to one end really (and this is so hard for me to write): to acquire the shiny stuff that life has to offer. This includes acquiring million dollar personal houses at home and abroad, shiny new cars for wives and girlfriends and friends of girlfriends (somehow, that never gets to me), shiny new islands in Dubai and environs where they think the long arm of the law and, God forbid, that of God Himself, cannot reach. All those shiny stuff allow them to bring up their children in the opulence of a workless environment where those children’s heads are filled with nothing but how to pilfer more from the world in greater style of … guess, opulence! There, was that so hard?

    We need to demonstrate that we understand democracy now or quit trying. Clearly, in the hands of this present breed of politicians, it is patently endangered. In itself, doubtless, it is one of the noblest pursuits of man. Democracy allows government to be unobtrusive and minimally involved in man’s daily life as it quietly directs national activities for altruistic goals such as building structures for the benefit of mankind. Democracy is worth pursuing because it allows man to reach that basic and minimum level of life required for the pursuit of happiness. If only we did not have all these politicians standing in the way of our pursuit of democratic happiness. Now, what do we do? Just what do we do?

    ***First published 15th September, 2013 to celebrate Democracy day. Unfortunately, nothing has changed.

  • The many governments of Nigeria

    It is appalling that live bullets are still being used against unarmed civilian protesters by the Nigeria Police. After all, there are many less lethal means of controlling crowds or protesters in these modern times available to the police. Just look at Hong Kong

    I am sure you have heard this expression before, ‘everybody is a government in Nigeria’. Well, dear reader, it is true. As I am speaking to you, there are governments, and there are the governments. For example, your ordinary governments govern your living within the geographical entity called Nigeria by taxing you. By rights, they should work for you but in truth you work for them. I think they are called THE GOVERNMENT. I think… no, I am sure the only time they work for you is when they want to tax you. They tax you for letting you build your house on their land, letting you ride your car on their bad roads, even for letting you breathe in their air. I tell you, you exist so that they can tax you.

    Then, there are the other governments in your life. Those ones govern the way you move and eat. They are the heads of the house. He can be recognised easily because he says ‘I am the head of this house; so what if I decide to eat my pounded yam with salad?’ It is his right by law. Failure of THE GOVERNMENT however forces him to sink his own well for water, install his generator for electricity, grade the road that passes in front of his house and provide his own food. Yes, sir, he forms his own government, atop which he sits, monarch of all he surveys, daily handing out the err… ten commandments. God help the ant that defies those commandments. Of course, those ants are generally called children, but what does it matter? An ant is an ant.

    Well, I’m sure you know every government has its own Achilles’ heel. While the house boss sits atop his government, he is in turn ruled by his plumbers who determine whether or not he can pump water into his house from his well. Then there are the generator repairmen who determine whether or not electricity will come out of the generator he bought. I tell you, every government has its own bosses.

    There exists the greatest government of all, which is that of the missus. Atop her local government council, she broods no dissension. Opinions differ as to the membership constitution of this council but I cannot forget the picture of a country’s powerful prime minister carrying the parcels of goods his wife had purchased as he, well, trotted after her. When the missus decrees that the bins need replenishing, many a man has opted to forego the shaving powder to make enough financial room for the needed purchases. Besides, every wise man knows that wisdom consists of living in trepidation of the one who can quietly slip something into your food to make you sleep till next week.

    There are other governments, of course. There is the government of the bank. Ho, ho! Don’t get me started on that one. Have you noticed that banks have taken to introducing all kinds of charges? Let me see now. There is the stamp duty charge which stands for only God knows what. Then, there is the trading charge which means what exactly, I do not know. Then, there is the tax on interest which is paid to whom, I have no idea. Worse, my bank charges me VAT on the tax on interest! I have never seen that kind of crookedness before, except on my gnarled cashew tree. Worse, they seem to be operating with impunity since I gave them no such permission to deduct any which how from my filthy lucre.

    Do we talk about the DSTV people? Oh yes, we should. There they are, bringing these wonderful pictures to my screen but at what cost! To start with, the blessed thing has to be fed every month with what they choose to call a subscription fee but which is really a bleeding fee. It’s my blessed blood it takes to feed it. Promptly on the date due for the subscription to be renewed and it fails to arrive, the services are cut. No pitiful mercy; no consideration that most homes do not get to use their subscriptions for more than two to three hours in a day courtesy of poor electricity supply; and no English courtesy commonly conveyed by phrases like, ‘by your leave’.

    There is worse. I understand that in the home country of the company, consumers are charged by the rate of consumption, i.e., prepaid. Why is this not operating here? Only God knows, and perhaps THE GOVERNMENT I told you about. Perhaps they know a thing or two they are not telling us. The same goes for the GSM providers. None of them answers to me. Government pleasers all of them!

    So, you see, there are so many governments operating on their own in the country. The one that I find most incomprehensible though is the Police government. That is the force we should run to in order to report all these self-declared governments but most times, we really can’t find them on our side. Take the latest citizens versus police matter that broke out in FUOYE which resulted in two students losing their lives and two others being injured.

    There are so many things we have not got clear in this country, but I don’t want to go into all that, only the ones that bear on this unfortunate story. The most important is that our public institutions have yet to learn that it is the people they serve, not the leaders that the people elected to serve them.

    The story says that the students were on a protest against poor electricity supply when the incident occurred. To start with, I thought it had been decided a long time ago that live bullets would and should no longer be used on defenceless protesters any more, especially students who, everyone knows, are more ruled by the testosterone hormone than anything else. Blames and counter blames have been flying around since the sad event, yet no one, not least the police, has been able to say who exactly fired those shots at four students! It is appalling that live bullets are still being used against unarmed civilian protesters by the Nigeria Police. After all, there are many less lethal means of controlling crowds or protesters available to the police everywhere. Just look at Hong Kong.

    Unfortunately, there is no getting away with anything, least of all the taking of human life. I’ve told this story before or you probably know it already but I’ll repeat it here for its relevance and for those who were absent when it was being told. The story is told of a policeman whose son was graduating from university. All the loving relatives who were involved had gathered themselves together for the ceremony and were waiting for the young man who was to arrive by another car. The news soon came though that he had been shot that morning at a check point on his way. Everyone was not only appalled they were filled with rage. The father calmly told them all to sheathe their anger for retribution had come full cycle since in his own heady days, he had been involved in shooting students at a riot. I’m just saying. It would be a lot better if all involved would just let truth and justice take its course.

    I believe all these governments are thriving because THE GOVERNMENT is not proving its own worth by putting its foot down on many national issues such as making life fairly possible for all its citizens. There ought not to be these private governments. They get power drunk. Just ask any head of the house.

     

  • It’s fratricide, that’s what it is!

    Laws help misfits see their way out of their muddle … (and) … whoever gains from such people, no matter how highly or lowly placed, should also be placed on other planets. We have enough planets for them all.

    I did not consider myself too old or too young to appreciate the efforts of Sunny Okosuns’ Papa’s Land (Who owns the land? Refrain: Who owns Papa’s land?)  and Fire in Soweto as one man’s efforts to end the occupation of Africa by foreign powers. If I thought they were one man’s effort then, I have since found out that efforts like his were offered on behalf of the nation. In other words, his crooning voice represented the voices of the people of Nigeria.

    Okosuns’ songs were only a part of the Nigerian people’s responses to the foreign powers’ assault upon the integrity of the sovereignty of some southern African countries, including South Africa. These songs and other more politically forthright actions from the Nigerian people and governments might not have set South Africa free, they however contributed in no small way to the freedom that land enjoys today.

    Nigeria, and other African countries rose up as a body to help these southern countries that were in the bind then because they felt the kinship and commonality that binds all the people of Africa. This commonality made them feel the sufferings of the people under the laws of apartheid and deprivations. From the write-ups on this subject, many South African leaders lived in and were accommodated by Nigeria when the battle was fierce.

    Now, however, this story is changing. South Africa (SA) seems to have forgotten this commonality that binds. They are remembering only the disparity that separates the powers of love and unity. South African residents, in fits of anger and loss of self-control, are killing Nigerians. Brother is killing brother; that’s fratricide.

    Quickly, I checked my dictionary for fratricide. It is when a brother kills his blood brother, usually over money or a woman. So, when South African youths rise against their fellow black brothers, they are only committing fratricide; they are killing off their own kith. Against the background presented above, it not only spells ingratitude, it also spells doom for the African continent.

    Africa is poor. However, Africa is poor not because it is not materially wealthy but it is poor because it lacks the leadership volte force to bring about the necessary volte-face in her fortunes. In other words, the people needed to bring about the perfect U-turn in her fortunes are lacking. So, her stories of deep neglect, serious haemorrhaging of her resources causing debilitation in her parts are just being deepened. All that internal bleeding caused by the ‘eat or be eaten’ philosophy of the early fathers of Africa set the foundation.

    So, the facts are that Nigerians and other foreign nationals, mostly black, are being killed by South Africans. Indeed, judging by the videos being spread around on social media by the violence-spewing joy-rides among us, things are grim indeed. Even though these videos have been declared largely fake, the facts are still indisputable. The reason is that everyone seems to know someone who knows someone who knows someone who knows someone who is affected by the violence. Violence will keep going round in circles because it is forever chasing its own tail.

    Anyway, reports on the outbreaks of violence in SA have imputed the xenophobic actions to attempts to rid the land of drug-dealing foreigners. According to these reports, South Africans suspect that Nigerians and other black nationals are behind the drug trade in the country. Not to put a fine point on it, they say these drug people are corrupting their young and vulnerable. This is the ostensive cause.

    To be honest, though, I think drug dealers should be put out of this planet. They do not fit into the earthly society’s most sublime aspirations. When someone chooses to corrupt the youth and wreck their lives through drug peddling as a business, then he has totally lost his way and is deserving of society’s greatest condemnation. He should be put out of sight as a misfit.

    As deprived as the African society is, I believe that each country still has laws for handling infractions and social misfits such as drug dealers. Laws help misfits see their way out of the muddle they have made of their own lives not to talk of other people’s lives. Whoever gains from such people, no matter how highly or lowly placed, should also be placed on other planets. We have enough planets for them all.

    Laws exist so that jungle justice does not rule. Laws target offenders; jungle justice sweeps all standers-by, passers-by and sitters-by in its wake. Whereas laws are controlled by the experts of the law, jungle justice is controlled only by passion. Passions are recklessly blind. In the South African story, most of those killed so indiscriminately are said not to be drug dealers but professionals living in SA.

    Xenophobia is not new to SA. It had existed previously for different reasons. Today, the fight against drug peddlers is being peddled as a principal reason. In the past, it was suspected that Nigerians, and other black Africans, were taking the jobs that the indigenous people were not qualified to do. So, rather than go for anger management classes and learn how to manage their issues, those indigenous people hounded their African brethren.

    Whatever the reason, the fact is that the act of fratricide, which people fondly call xenophobia, is getting more worrisome for the reason that there are existing reports that the police in South Africa are not helping matters. According to these reports, rather than arresting the attackers, the police there are adding a helping hand to the attacks. This is where it gets awry because I believe this is done in ignorance that once an aggrieved crowd tastes blood, its targets only change. Today, it is foreigners, tomorrow, it would be fellow citizens.

    I have detected three strains of responses to all these. The first was the instinct to retaliate against these attacks by also attacking South African business interests in Nigeria, particularly the stores, etc. Like many people have pointed out, this is fighting fire with fire, and it will not do. What we need is ice-cold water to cool the fire and put it out. When two people are angry at the same time, all we get is a shouting match that resolves nothing. People who are looting stores are the witless ones; and you know what they say, looters are scooters gone into disuse.

    I also heard something about someone suggesting that the Nigeria Police be allowed to help the police in SA to protect Nigerians there. Seriously? I ask, why should a foreign police operate in another land when that land is neither conquered nor at war? There is no such thing in this here case. Besides, I’m not too sure the Nigeria police can help much. They should concentrate their energy on policing the internal affairs of Nigeria; there are still many stolen cars not yet recovered.

    To ensure that drug dealers do not enter a country is the joint responsibility of the source and host countries. Although people still have the freedom to go where they will, however, the host country has the right to keep out the people she suspects of crimes. Nigeria can also step up her checks on potential disgraces to the country.

    The police in SA should do their work. Drug dealers are law breakers and should be treated as such, whether they are foreigners or home boys. Mob killers are also law breakers. Both should be teased out and brought before the law. Just because the enemy is a foreigner today does not excuse the killing. The police that does not uphold the law today to end this fratricide could become the target of that mob tomorrow.

     

  • Why Nigerians really need to pray harder against their enemies

    Why are we expecting a healthy society when all of these (and many more) ‘enemies’ are being made daily because we do not do our jobs as we should?

    In Nigeria, it is a well-known secret that the churches and mosques are filled to capacity with hypocritical worshippers. Perhaps I am chief, I don’t know. I do know though that more than ninety-nine point nine-nine-nine per cent of these worshippers go to pray for, among other things, ‘financial breakthroughs’. This means they pray that unmerited, unexplainable and unworked-for riches should suddenly fall into their laps. They also go to pray for divine healing. This means that in spite of their eating habits, the heavens should see to it that they stay in perfect health.

    Above all, this given percentage of Nigerians referred to above goes to pray for protection against all their enemies, big or small. The enemies may include their landlords (so he would forget the rent), their creditors (to forgive their debts), their debtors (to repay their debts), or that their favourite witches should die, die, die! Certainly, these are noble prayer requests. To my mind, however, I think this list comes down to this: they need to pray harder against their enemies. That is where the root of Nigerians’ problems really lies.

    I once gave a ride to a young, female university graduate around nine in the morning in one of the cities in Nigeria and naturally, I asked her where she was off to. She said, ‘to church’. And this was a working day, a Monday. What was she going to do? She obliged me. ‘To pray’ she said. I asked her what prayer remained for Monday that Sunday did not take care of. She said ‘more prayers’. What about her job? She said, ‘they would understand.’ What about night vigils: aren’t those for mop-up prayers? I certainly know how to ask questions, no? She replied that ‘enemies were always around, so one cannot rest.’

    At that point, I left off asking anything more. As it turned out, the young lady believed enemies were behind her not getting a good job, her not being married yet, her not having a car yet (a few years after graduation), etc. I forbore to point out to her that these powerful enemies were also likely to be behind her not being able to stay at her job and she must go around praying during office hours. I also did not point out to her that she needed to really pray against the enemies she was making that very hour she was not being in her office to serve them.

    Anyway, a light bulb went off in my head on that matter. It struck me that Nigerians really need to pray against their enemies o. Since they are always going around praying, work is being neglected. In the morning hours of weekdays, people ‘have gone to pray’. At noon times, people cannot rest in their houses because others ‘are praying’. Throughout the night times, innocent people cannot sleep because the guilty ‘are praying’ into loud speakers, presumably against enemies that are standing in the way of their breakthroughs and perfect health.

    It then occurred to me that Nigerians have an awful lot of enemies to pray against. I therefore decided to assist them by drawing up a list for them. So, if you are a Nigerian, you need to pray against:

    — people whom you have offended by ‘swallowing’ the money that should have been used to tar the roads leading to their houses. You must pray against them; they are dangerous people;

    — people whom you have offended because you have pocketed the money released for the electrification of their village or district. They are worse than cobras and must be bound spiritually;

    — people who accuse you of raising their electricity bills so that you can pocket the difference. They are liars that must be consigned to darkness;

    — people who know that you are part of a syndicate that extorts huge sums out of clients who come to conduct normal businesses in public offices are dangerous people who can’t recognize a business deal when they see one. They must be prayed against;

    — people who hate Police/FRSC/Civil Defense/army check points must be checked spiritually;

    — people who know you kidnapped their files and demanded ransom before releasing them from under office carpets need to be prayed for, or their souls will rot in hell;

    — people who know that you allow road contractors to bribe you into confirming their shoddy work, (and think this is why we have such deplorable roads), really need the whole spiritual works, to bind, gag and send them to oblivion!

    — people who know that you own a registered company through which you regularly take contracts from your office (where you are employed) are your enemies and should be prayed against;

    — people who know that you take money from the country for contracts you don’t execute or you execute shoddily need to be prayed against;

    — people who know you’re just drawing a salary you don’t deserve in your office, since you hardly show up there for more than a few days in the month, must be out of their minds. Pray against them, man;

    — people who know you’re just collecting money from your office as a worker for work you don’t do are not good people. They need to be prayed against;

    — people who think that the police are fraudulently collecting what they call ‘mobilisation fee’ (before they can respond to people’s emergency calls) are those whose heads are not correct. They deserve to be locked up spiritually;

    — people who think that it is wrong to kill other human beings in order to perform a money-making, power-making or client-drawing ritual must be bound until you perform an exorcism on them;

    — people who go around thinking you swallowed their pension money really need to be prayed against;

    — people who think they are the victims of your armed robbery or kidnapping or human parts-selling enterprises need cleansing prayers. They are enemies;

    — people who think they are victims of police ‘stray bullets’ also require serious prayers;

    — even cows, goats and sheep that believe you have illegally built your cities and houses on their free patch must be seriously prayed against…

    Clearly, all Nigerians are the enemies that we must pray hard against. Only a handful have managed not to be someone’s enemy; and I think they are dead. The sober question, however, is why have Nigerians gone around making so many enemies for themselves? I think a more appropriate question is, why are we expecting a healthy society when all of these (and many more) ‘enemies’ are being made daily because we do not do our jobs as we should?

    I think the answer is in the word ‘corruption’. On account of corruption, nearly every Nigerian now believes in cornering as much resources as possible to their corner, and it does not matter how it is done. No public agency runs for the sake of doing the ‘greater good’, only the private good. That’s why you are told in a public agency to ‘do the needful’ or ‘do what you’re supposed to do’ or ‘play ball’. Your failure to do that makes ‘you’ an enemy that must be prayed against.

    What strikes me most in people’s prayers is that they hardly pray to be helped to do right by their neighbours. No, no, it’s others who need that help. Obviously, though, Nigerians need a lot of help to apprehend the meaning of the word ‘altruism’ or ‘patriotism’. Perhaps, when we begin to pray for our enemies, maybe the spirits of these words will come upon us and lead us to do right by each other. Did you say Amen?!

    ***This reworked article was first published on 17/9/2017

     

  • Bursting the myth of making it

    The point is that a visionary leadership would have galvanised the Nigerian populace immediately after independence into nation building, national ethics, patriotic acts, etc., so that today, we would be talking of a different national character built on patriotism and love of fatherland.

    Reader, here is the news. There are complaints that the Nigerian youth are emigrating to, or being stolen by, Canada. The political ministers have been given their portfolios and as usual, no one is happy with the arrangements, well, except the people who are happy. Got that? Kidnapping is still thriving as a business for the practitioners who people think are herdsmen, bandits, unemployed people or just plain, bad, evil people. Also, development is still scarce around here. Transformers are still supplying light to single compounds while entire communities have no single transformer leg to stand on.

    Nigerians are still burying their dead in Hummer jeeps or BMWs while some of their countrymen, women and children cannot afford to buy food to eat. They catapult those who have served as governors to the senate to become senators, or failing that, to become ministers. The country is so poor that it perennially comes in among the last in the world index of poor states, yet its governors, representatives and senators are the highest paid in the world. Their government houses use generators; their houses of worship are built on human remains or human skulls. They steal billions just to show off to neighbours or to go into politics. Some of their state certified kidnappers are so generous their communities give them titles and rescue them when they are arrested. Yep, things are still normal around here, thanks for asking.

    So, all these we know, but what we just can’t agree on is what is responsible for this discordance, this contrariness, this backward movement when the rest of the world is forward looking. Many think that leadership failure is the problem; some think it is followership. Some, like this column, blame the colonial power for laying the foundation of crookedness in addition to the first two. The answer I think you will agree is all of the above.

    There is the story that broke of one Mr. Obinwanne Okeke, an under-30 Nigerian entrepreneur who was said to have been arrested by the FBI sometime last week for an alleged $12m fraud in the USA. The question that has been nagging me ever since that story broke is what in the world propelled this young man to crawl these ten miles on broken bottles of danger in order to ‘stand out’ or ‘make it’? In short, who led this young man astray? As the movies say, who dunnit: the leaders or the followers?

    Stories abound of how the churches are filled with worshippers who are preoccupied with the quest to ‘make it’ mysteriously and supernaturally. You know what that means, don’t you? To me, I think it means you come into sudden wealth one way or another so that you can slap your neighbours and the police will smile at you, really. Now, you know why everyone wants to ‘make it’. The quest to make it is so gripping on nearly every Nigerian now that it has led them into doing things in the dead of night and in the dead of day too. Yet, I suspect many have not seriously asked themselves just what they will do when they make it beyond being the envy of their neighbours. Some need it to build houses that are out of this world which their children will auction off without any respect, and some to buy cars their neighbours can only dream of. So, how’s that for an ambition?!

    Anyway, this epistemological search is what is making many occupy seats in the worship houses now to listen to sermons that encourage them to reach out and ‘grab it’. It has even led many clerics of all religions to unspeakable acts of sacrifices in order to also ‘make it’. So, when people are not in the worship houses, they are kidnapping; oh yes, for the same end. When that fails, they go into politics: another arena of the get-rich quick. That too has led many to do unspeakable things. When they ‘succeed’, they become ‘leaders’. Now, you know why the leadership is not what it should be. In short, many people have done everything to ‘make it’ but what they ought to do, which is to work hard. Ha, ha!

    The point is that Nigerian leadership right now is compromised. They appear to have lost the moral compass which should have helped them to lead people towards hard work and nation building, rather than ego building, or building strange looking houses. The leadership is not modelling the route towards happiness, contentment and good living right now. Instead, the leadership is modelling for the people the route to profligacy, licentious living, reckless power display and complete disrespect for others’ pains. These are the lessons people are learning, and believe me, there are no greater learners than the young ones.

    Oh yes, we are trying to understand what could have compelled Mr. Obinwanne to do what he did, if he did. The truth is that this country’s leadership has taught its citizens to laugh at hard work; indeed, we are even laughing at those who are hard at work because we regard them as the lame of the earth, who will also end up being the wretched of the corporate world. Mr. Obinwanne is not alone in that laughter. I understand the FBI has a long list of them in their files.

    Many people have asked me why Nigeria’s story should be so distorted and different from the story of other nations that also went through the same experiences like India, Malaysia, Singapore, America, etc. I answer them in two words: visionless leadership. There are other two words we can use, of course, such as uncontrolled heterogeneity; inherited suspicions; untapped illiteracy, unused literacy, dysfunctional elitism, etc.

    The point is that a visionary leadership would have galvanised the Nigerian populace immediately after independence into nation building, national ethics, patriotic acts, etc., so that today, we would be talking of a different national character built on patriotism and love of fatherland. Our reality is that neither the PDP nor the APC has any inkling on how to help the country retrace its steps. The PDP was too busy literally ‘living it up’ while the APC is presently more preoccupied with settling herdsmen into already occupied and built villages, thus displacing more people. So, what we have is everyone trying to build himself up as a fatherland.

    As of now, the rate that the young ones are emigrating from the country is not flattering to the image of Nigeria. It is like people fleeing from a war zone, yet hopefully, the country is not at war. It is so bad, one youth wrote in the social media to this effect: ‘please, Canada, come and steal me; I’m wearing a red shirt for easy recognition and standing in front of my house.’ Well, I’m now giving notice that if something is not done quickly, I will also tell Canada: please come and steal me though I’m not a youth. I’m wearing a boubou and standing on my car for easy helicopter lifting.

    If this country does not want to see more of the likes of Mr. Obinwanne, if the allegations are true, then some serious nation building had better start. Right now, the APC, being the party on the throne, has the opportunity to really do some social engineering by bursting the myth of ‘making it’. The party must shake itself of its parochial tendencies and wake up. It must begin to initiate how the Nigerian society can be so constructed that every Nigerian can find his place to pursue his happiness without getting on the FBI list.

  • No, not my food…!

    Every country produces some of what her citizens require to survive. However, in Nigeria, there are too many factors that have imperilled even that tiddly diddly effort.

    Dear reader, so many stories broke during the week I found myself gawking, hissing or simply flipping. Oh yes sir, you can definitely flip when you don’t believe what you’re reading. For instance, I gawked when I read about how the El-Zakzaky man was being expected back in the country from his trip abroad. All I kept thinking was, if being the government’s ‘guest’ would afford me such fame so that the media would be compelled to report my every footstep to you, dear reader, then I had better look for one law to … Well I was going to say ‘save’ but if you say ‘break’, no problem. Anyway, now you understand why I gawked.

    I gave one loooong and loud hiss though when I read that our entertainment circuit had finally lost it, and had gone head over heels insane. I heard that one Mr. Kelechi, also called Techno, had organised some ladies to dance naked through the streets of Lagos just to shoot a music video. Seriously! The society normally draws the line at decency in artistic expressions or scientific experiments. So why in decency would ladies dance in the nude round the streets of Lagos? Unemployment? No parents?

    No, I’m hardly your barometer for decency. Anyone who eats pounded yam with salad instead of soup and takes sandwich with Vaseline instead of mayonnaise should not talk of decency. Should I go on? Everyone knows what decency is. It is that line you get to and your brain tells you ‘get back, idiot, before you corrupt your toe.’ Mr. Kelechi crossed that line, corrupted his toe (but that is his business), corrupted the ladies he used (that’s our business) and even attempted to corrupt the entire society! Now, that is a dare! That was why I hissed but I was a little pacified when I heard that he had been arrested. I hope they make him dance naked round Lagos.

    When I read, however, that Pres. Buhari had given the Central Bank of Nigeria a directive that forex should no longer be given for food items, I flipped. All food items? I mean, there is just so much a girl can take. Now, I am wagging my finger. For long, I have noted the government’s anti-PU tendencies – little or no power in my house (I hate that), no pipe-borne water at all except from my well (I manage that, thanks), no rain over my zone (ok, I’ll not hold that against the government too much), just name it. Now, the only comfort left me is being threatened.

    Have you ever heard the saying, ‘when all else fails, eat’? Well, it’s true. Unfortunately, though, you have to have food to eat. This column has joined voice with others long and loud enough to cry out about the abysmally low level of food production in this country. It was during his first and second coming I think that Pres. Obasanjo launched the two green growing programmes to try and turn our faces away from the oils that lie beneath the grounds to the nutrients and how to use them to grow food. He only succeeded somewhat. The oil had got somehow under our skin, so to say. Now, out of the blues, the present president has directed that…

    There were reasons why the previous green revival attempts failed. To start with, the migration tendencies of Nigerians has always been urban-ward rather than rural-ward. Reason: the few social amenities Nigeria has are distributed mostly around the cities. The rural areas have been left to fend for themselves, actually, which is as good as saying they have been abandoned: electricity-wise, health-care-wise, road-wise, job-opportunities-wise, schools-wise, just name it. So, the ones who can also abandon those areas for their fewer life-enhancing opportunities.

    Have you also noticed that people in the cities don’t farm? Reason: no land; they have mostly landlords. This means that for culinary sustenance, we city slicks have been at the mercy of the wise few who remain behind in the rural areas to farm. So, your dependable, stick-through-it-all close-to-the-earth rustic has also been thinning out. Logically, food has also been thinning out.

    While it is understandable to want the country to be self-sufficient in food production, the facts on ground point elsewhere. And, simply giving a directive to stop paying forex to food importers will not solve the problem. It will make food more expensive.

    The fact, as far as I know it, is that no country is self-sufficient in food production. Food imports range from country to country, depending on economic (e.g., importing coffee from a neighbouring country for cheapness), political (e.g., importing apples from nations in alignment with your nuclear disarmament interests) and super political (e.g. importing eggs from countries that would sell arms to one) reasons, etc.

    So, I don’t think food self-sufficiency means totally producing all a country needs but that she should be in a position not to be held to ransom by anyone. Every country produces some of what her citizens require to survive. However, in Nigeria, there are too many factors that have imperilled even that tiddly diddly effort.

    To start with, local efforts in food production are still too small to feed the nation. Everyone has remarked on the success of rice production, and they should. The point however is that a great amount of rice is still brought into the country to the relief of many of us. I’ll tell you why.

    Not too long ago, I set out to purchase OFADA rice in order to proudly acquaint my stomach with a home-grown product. To my horror, it proved that between harvesting and my table, there appeared to have been little or no cleansing intervention. It came bagged but was still as dusty, nay muddy, as when it was first dried. Worse, there were things in it that crunched like stones. Oh yeah, they were. Even worse, it was more expensive than the smuggled rice. Naturally, I am thinking of re-joining the rank of smuggled rice eaters.

    I understand that to fully process that rice to a level of comfortable consumption, i.e., no stones or mud, some basic infrastructural help would be needed such as ELECTRICITY, STORAGE, AND WATER for goodness’ sakes! To encourage people to invest in food production, there must be a corresponding act of readiness from the government, such as providing amenities or overseeing the provision of such. If the government would just hand off many of the things it has presently dipped its hands into and do its own work, many things would fall naturally into place. As an example, what is the business of government with things like RUGA? If enabling infrastructural environments are provided, people would sort themselves out. That is the meaning of a free society.

    Then the incessant attacks and constant harassment of farmers by bandits and herdsmen that have gone unchecked and unreproved by the security forces is somewhat reprehensive. The government scores very low on this, no doubt. Not many people are too eager to increase their farming efforts when people are being killed, hacked, maimed, and women raped, on farms.

    That presidential directive on food importation has the ultimate good of the country at heart but I believe it’s time has not come. People are too hungry, despondent and hopeless right now for any governmental experiment. I would advise that we let things be until we put the necessary things in place. If we are looking to cut spending, I suggest we look in the direction of fuel subsidy spending that appears to be growing daily. I ask, sir, look not in the direction of my food; no, not my food.

  • Honestly, I worry about what we are teaching our youth

    Our democratic dispensation rests on the laws being observed and respected. Heck, it rests on everyone – men and women, employed and unemployed, sane and insane, law-abiding and criminal, saintly and sinful, human and rat – being respected.

    I went on a search today, dear reader, of that invaluable topic to write on for your benefit, you know, something meaty you can chew on. I am sorry to say, O Great Reader, that I found none worthy of your attention this week. However, I came across two news items that I found rather disturbing and a little, shall I say, disturbing. Yeah, I know, I repeated that. That just goes to show how disturbing I found them.

    First, I read that Mr. Sowore, the man who led the movement, #RevolutionNow, had come under the government’s deep frown and the courts had been let loose on him. In short, the court had granted the DSS leave to hold him for 45 days for leading a protest. Hmm. I immediately thought two things. Shouldn’t the man have been charged to court, rather? And then I thought, does the government know something we don’t?

    The second piece of news was even more disturbing, if the reports are to be believed. It said that some policemen, as well as a civilian, had been killed by some soldiers as those policemen transported a kidnap kingpin across Taraba State to police headquarters. Again, I said, hmm. What is going on? Why would anyone stand in the way of the police trying to solve this giant riddle of kidnapping in Nigeria? Of all people too, why would soldiers want to stand in the way of Nigeria trying to solve her problems?

    Honestly, when I read those news reports, I became worried about democracy, about Nigeria, about the future. I mean, since the Nigerian constitution recognises protest as a legitimate means of self-expression, I have used it all the time. Whenever the housekeeping money has been handed over and it has fallen short of the current market value of the dollar, I have protested very wildly. I have quoted the law.

    Granted, I don’t quite know the law, but I have used my protest judiciously. ‘The naira is now 364 to one dollar and I am expected to fill the pantry with this amount of money? Why, this won’t even buy shoes for the rats in my house, let alone the centipedes!’ ‘You feed the rats in the house? No wonder they have refused to leave.’ ‘Well, the rats should not have to watch us eat all the time while they get nothing…’ ‘I think we should allow adjudication on this matter. Let the courts decide whether it is right or not to feed rats that are not wanted in the house.’ And the protests have gone on long and loud until we have all agreed to that adjudication.

    Democracies thrive under a good judicial system. In that environment, the courts are almost sacrosanct and should be revered. However, the courts must earn that reverence by their remaining, err, sacrosanct. There’s a lot of repetition today, ain’t so? Well, the point is that, unfortunately, there have been too many reports about the courts being less than sacrosanct. I assure you, I have not just learnt the word. I did that a long time ago, when I also learnt aardvark, abalone … Oh dear, we digress. The point is that any self-respecting court should be able to adjudicate on any matter, be it whether the government should keep keeping the Shi’ite leader in detention, whether Mr. Sowore should be charged to court or whether or not I have the right to keep feeding the rats in my house pending their sentencing.

    Anyway, my worry is what we are teaching the younger generation with all these methods of doing official business. We will talk about that presently, but honestly, if we want to see the immediate result of Nigeria’s political lessons on the Nigerian youth, all we have to do is look at some of our young governors. They are representatives of the younger generation, and you can judge their performances so far yourself from news reports about them. I must just add that if they learnt anything at all about how to rule well, they are yet to show it. Rather, they appear to have imbibed all the lessons that were taught in the smelly alleys behind every dirty political classroom in every irregular political dispensation this country has known. They are hardly credits to anyone. So, like I said, I worry. I worry that the youth are learning everything but the right lessons.

    Nigerians are focused right now on the end justifying the means. This is why it is possible for a kidnapper to be so rich he can buy his way into opulence and social acceptance and out of trouble. He can literally buy anything, anyone he so desires. This is what the youth see and wish for, and first chance they get, copy. This is what has me worried.

    Our democratic experiment rests on the laws being observed and respected. Heck, it rests on everyone – men and women, employed and unemployed, sane and insane, law-abiding and criminal, saintly and sinful, human and rat – being respected. It rests on knowledge of the paramount foundation of the social engineering process – the rule of law. But that’s a topic for another day.

    Building a society certainly does not consist of the egoistical display of miniscule power and wealth that we see all around us now. It only shows ill breeding. It also does not lie in piling up possessions to the high heavens on fraudulently acquired monies. That shows a stunted, slow mental retardation in the individual. Unfortunately, the youth cannot see beyond their noses and beyond the uselessness of these pursuits to get at the real thing – being true to the country.

    I don’t want to tell you all the things that the youth have learnt so far in this country, but I’ll tell you how our youth are in two categories. The first category consists of the mass of youth who are genuinely looking for lessons on how to move their lives forward and are getting nothing but leaders showing nothing but egocentric and larger-than-life lifestyles. Then there are the others whose ancestors have handed them, and others willing to learn, the tool of exploitation to use against the society, including the first category. Oh, there is a third category: the group that have somehow kept their head while the rest have been losing theirs. Unfortunately, though, these are tooooo few for our comfort.

    Either way, my worry is that our youth seem to have absorbed those things that don’t make for a nationalistic life; they have absorbed all kinds of flotsam and jetsam of life from their leaders – how not to run a life, how not to run a government, how not to treat the citizens. This is sooooo Machiavellian. Not that I have anything against the guy, really, except this end justifies the means thing. These people have certainly not learnt anything about patriotism and how to treat the country like an egg. I worry about these things and how we’re handing them the wrong tools for living.

    I have mentioned my own worries; what’s yours? If you don’t want me to worry anymore about what we are teaching the young ones, then, it is time we began to teach them the real lay of the land. The young ones need to be equipped with the right tools for life, for decent living and not some mirage that gets them nowhere. As we celebrate this year’s youth day, let’s begin to teach them the real values of life so we will worry less tomorrow.