Over the length of my sojourn here in the United States of America, I’ve stumbled on a few of the expository works of Will Durant, an American writer, historian, and philosopher. Each time Durant spoke about civilisation and its sustenance, or when he wrote about nation-building and its maintenance, his submissions and expressions were liberally replete with wits and wisdom, not perfunctory persiflage. Durant once wrote, “The essential cause of the Roman conquest of Greece was the disintegration of Greek civilisation from within. No great nation is ever conquered until it has destroyed itself.” Even from deep in his grave, Durant’s unwaning warning-voice still speaks very loudly till today to nations neck-deep in infantility and the benightedness of government and governance. Our country, Nigeria, is a bellowing example. Many are Nigeria’s afflictions.
I read in the Good Book that “a man’s enemies are members of his household.” What it means is that problems and challenges confronting a man are often unleashed on him by those close to him. Is that not the truth about Nigeria? Destruction and affliction will never find landing spots on a nation’s helipad if men within don’t permit, enhance, or create a fueling fecund environment for their thriving. A plethora of Nigeria’s ills are not launched from outside. The concoctions of Nigeria’s afflictions are hewn not by the fighting fingers of strangers, but by the bruising hands of her own people. Our country is in a do-or-die duel with savage and mean enemies within who are also very powerful and highly positioned.
Every election cycle in Nigeria gets Nigerians fired up with hope. Hope that what is wrong is about to be made right. Hope that what is sickening will, at last, become succouring. And hope that what is considered an affliction will flip to an affirmation and confirmation that the nation is about to hit a turnaround era. Hope! For Nigerians, the lifeline they hold on to for a better Nigeria has always been hope. Unfortunately, for doggone too long, hope has been deferred until a time unknown. Power-hungry human cacodemons continue to rule everywhere. Thieves are celebrated and thugs adored as gods. And there’s nothing else the people can count on but hope.
Why is Nigeria moving fast backwards and not gliding forward as expected? Her leaders have not changed. They act the same old script of pillage and plunder. Public service to them is a platform to feed fat. From truth they deflect rabidly and recklessly, and then they infect the polity with unmedicated schizophrenia for money. These defecting and infecting human virulent viruses do not understand that public service is serving the public. God honours public service because it is a service to human beings. With these human viruses, the definition of public service has been perverted. Men serve and steal. But the ravishing thirst and readiness to steal some more is not subdued. This is how Nigerians have been Nigeria’s problems. This is our self-affliction.
It recently came to mind a tale of three Nigerians; two men and a woman. This happened not too long ago. The men lifted Nigeria’s crude oil. The men made $3bn. The men kept the proceeds. The men shared booty with the woman oil minister. New Sheriff in town blew the cover. A criminal investigation was launched in the US and UK. Assets of all three were forfeited at home and abroad. Crude and criminal behaviour around crude oil is a behemoth in Nigeria. The love of money continues to make men crude. The god of money has hijacked the very soul of a sweet nation.
Nigeria lost more than $2bn to oil theft during the first eight months of this year. Personalities behind the heisting are still unknown. Ordinary Nigerians don’t deal in crude oil. Big boys with links in government and our security apparatuses do. The Nigerian political and business terrains are a tenebrific tragicomedy. It seems as if Nigerians have bid good-bye to sanity in government. They have surrendered to the shackles of screwball-leading lords. That Lord Lugard’s country is a dire and delicate convolution is no bone-breaking news. Decency and morality in government dwell only in the realm of our imaginations and desiderata. People’s lives aren’t deemed as precious because we refuse to change our attitudes toward government and politics. The quota system has destroyed and desecrated our university education. Nepotism has crippled our Armed Forces and the civil service. And rampaging herdsmen are nearing eviscerating our agriculture. In very many areas, we have been our own enemies. Frequent acts of brazen lawlessness in Nigeria are the new norm. Their roots have deepened. Our children are christened in lawlessness, and it’s the only lifestyle they grow up to know.
New entrant Nigerian lawmakers receive about N5bn In a one-time ‘’welcome & thank-you-for-serving” freebie after they are sworn in. Outgoing lawmakers and governors will receive “bye-bye & thank-you-for-serving” windfall running into billions too. What do the people get? Nothing, but the short end of the stick. Laws stand on the side of politicians but bark against the people who are in the majority. Yes, it is true that I neither live nor do business in Nigeria; but I have not woken up one day regretting that I was born in that land. It remains the home I love. It is a land of many opportunities trapped within the walls of Jericho of mammoth misfortunes. We open our eyes every day to much grace which God has released upon the blessed land. But bunch-by-bunch, and granule-by-granule, we waste the divine grace and disperse the same on the altar of deliberate ignorance.
Nigeria is roughly 185 million people. She is about 40 million more than France (66.8 million); Italy (60.8); Belgium (11.2); and Holland (17 million) put together. She is almost 3 times the population of the United Kingdom (65 million); and almost 20 times the size of the United Arab Emirates (9.1 million). Nigeria is 25 per cent the total population of the whole of Africa. It is twice the population of Egypt (91 million); three times the size of South Africa (55 million); 12 times that of Zambia (16.2 million). Lagos alone, one Nigerian state out of 36, is about the same size with the nation of Ghana which stands at 26 million. None of these nations has the volume of human and natural resources Nigeria can boast about.
From Adamawa to Bauchi; stretching down to Osun into Ekiti, and spiralling eastward to Enugu and Abia; there is no single state in Nigeria that God has not blessed with natural resources that can make any nation qualify as ‘wealthy.’ Nigeria has abundant wealth buried under its soil. Unfortunately, Nigerians have been Nigeria’s problems. This is our self-affliction.
A nation that stands strong will stand firm and unshakeable because her people are determined to keep her strong. A sage once made this terse statement, “The only person who can pull me down is myself, and I’m not going to let myself pull me down anymore.” The only people who can pull Nigeria down are Nigerians. I hope they cease and desist. The only people who can build Nigeria up are Nigerians. Shouldn’t this be the approach from here on?
– Twitter: @FolaOjotweet
