By Oluwole Ogundele
Good governance and self-sacrifice especially on the part of the leadership are inseparable in a neat way. The focus is on the common good or societal growth and development. Good governance is not about nauseating rhetoric as if the led are moronic. It is about moral integrity and profound commitment to high ideals. In other words, such fundamentals as transparency, accountability, probity, justice and equity are sacrosanct. Good governance and politics are not exactly the same, even though they are related.
Painfully, many Nigerians are yet to understand and appreciate the existential fact, that followers have a critical role to play in engendering good governance, a pre-condition for peace and progress in a myriad of ways. By this token, the ordinary people cannot afford to withdraw or retire into their shells, while most of our leaders (from one administration to another) were/are well known for defecating in the public space as if they had/have diarrhoea. Defecation in this context means insane greed/corruption, insensitivity, extravagance, and a gross lack of unalloyed patriotism. This is in addition, to the weakening of the available institutions that ought to serve as checks and balances.
It seems to me that more and more demons are let loose on our geo-political space. This explains the reason why a state House of Assembly in the southwest is planning an overseas trip while insecurity largely traceable to unprecedented material poverty ravages the land. This is our Nigeria laced with very thoroughly dilapidated roads.
Humans (regardless of their geographical locations, skin colours, and types of hairs) are corrupt by nature. Corruption is a borderless social disease. Consequently, every serious society tries to deal with this menace through the lens of rules and regulations or laws. Certainly, there will be no peace and by extension, progress without respect for the rule of law. Nigeria can only ignore this at its own peril. Political office holders appear to be much more corrupt than the ordinary people basically because they are in charge of the distribution of the local wealth generated by the latter.
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But in Nigeria, most people assume that God must do everything for them. This is wrong because God is not idle. Although we as spiritual animals, need to pray hard, this does not mean that we have to be lazy in a wide range of ways. Nigerians like other members of the Homo sapiens group must be scientifically and technologically active in order to subdue the earth. All humans are supposed to be mini-creators.
God has also given Nigerians the mental and physical capacities to curb the excesses of the political leaders. Praying without acting (especially when the political class members are busy casting caution to the winds) is tantamount to testing God. Neither the Bible nor Quran tells us to be quiet in the face of political recklessness and/or tyranny. Similarly, the Nigerian indigenous belief systems have a zero tolerance for bad leaders regardless of their ethno-religious backgrounds.
The oppressed, exploited followers are also promoting bad governance through their popular but nauseating culture of sycophancy. They continue to eulogise (at every opportunity) clowns masquerading as leaders. Succinctly put, a sycophant is a flatterer who is bereft of self-esteem, godliness, and moral integrity, as he targets a favour or wrinkled carrot from a political class member or members. A sycophant is prepared to sacrifice idealism on the altar of insane materialism.
Indeed, many Nigerians are chronic sycophants. The idea of good governance does not exist in their vocabularies of popular discourse. To them, the national ship could sink due to bad leadership. Like a bunch of gorillas, all they want is food, no matter how poisonous to them in the long run. Sycophants are the gate keepers for the oppressors and exploiters of the led.
The danger inherent with the Nigerian culture of sycophancy is that the political leaders are most probably going to continue to take the led for a ride. Methods of organising public events need to be revisited. Caution is often thrown to the winds by calling every Tom, Dick and Harry for recognition by a master of ceremonies (MC). Precious time is usually wasted on needless introduction and unmerited eulogisation of the political class members and their business associates, who have with the passage of time, put the country in a virtual state of siege.
While nothing is wrong about respecting people in the public space, everything is disgusting in over-doing the act, as if seriousness and a sense of moderation have gone to the dogs. The rigmarole that often characterises the Nigerian social gatherings is most ridiculous. Our abusers would never adjust to the realities of the country so long as we continue to celebrate them in uncritical ways. Are we saying that those who raped and are still raping mother Nigeria are from another planet? Such a very crude tradition is at variance with societal growth and development.
Nigeria has a poor reward system. That is the reason why retirees do not get their gratuities several years after leaving public service. This discourages efficiency among those who are still serving. The narrative has to change in the interest of the common good. The real patriots are hardly celebrated. The current administration under the direction of PBAT inherited a comatose economy. The roads among other infrastructural facilities have collapsed. But despite this ugly situation, those leaders who shirked their responsibilities during their heydays are now heroes, in a country defined and ruled by weak followership or unbridled sycophancy. We should stop sending a wrong signal to the youth who are getting ready for leadership positions. Our tomorrow is engineered by the present.
Where are the true patriots? Nigeria is promoting underdevelopment by referring to a bunch of grandstanders as patriots. Innocent followers are repaying the foreign loans (with poisonous conditionalities) taken by most of the past administrations. These were loans not used for development projects. In other words, past leaders (with a few exceptions) unashamedly sold Nigeria’s future to the foreign world. Are we going to continue like this, and for how long? Nigeria is bleeding very profusely. PBAT should tell those irredeemable sycophants to be quiet because, at the end of the day they would abandon him.
In sum, masters of ceremonies among other categories of people, have to moderate their disturbing, sycophantic tendencies and excesses, in order to pave the way for good governance across the board. Indeed, sustainable development will remain a mirage as long as those who dangerously short-change(d) Nigerians are still being celebrated all over the place. These spiritless praise singers are a component of the numerous crises in the land. Therefore, they should stop eulogising our abusers who have turned many citizens into paupers despite the abundant natural resources in Nigeria. We need to learn to integrate some of the finest values from the West and parts of Asia with the indigenous epistemologies, so as to craft a new, people-friendly socio-political and economic identity for Nigeria. We have deceived one another for too long. It is time to get down to business.