Nigeria is more than 47 years old.  To many political observers, she has been moving like a ship without a rudder.  This is not meant to disparage my country but to ask each citizen to for once the truth.  Nigeria’s dalliance with the dreaded corruption devil has been her undoing as the giant and the economic power in Africa yet none of the leaders have so far refused to make a mid term correction.  The question here is then, knowing all that Nigerians claim to know about the problems that are bedeviling Nigeria, why on God’s earth are reasonable Nigerians not finding long lasting solutions that will stand the test of time?   Nigerians think they understand all the problems facing the nation but when it comes to institutionalizing solutions, they become very pessimistic about any and all solutions put on the table.  In view of this lack of courage to come up with credible and long-lasting solutions to the problems, portents are all ominous for our nation.   But where do we go from here?

We start seeking a comprehensive solution from a strategy of reducing the number of political parties and forcing the parties to come up with political dogma that all Nigerians can agree with, one that will guide the people and attract reasonable Nigerians to choose one over the other.

Nigeria can be said to have three major political parties: Action Congress (AC); All Nigerian People’s Party; and People’s Democratic Party.  In most of these political parties, there haven’t been rhymes or reasons to the political manifesto that can attract average Nigerians other than the need to maximally misuse Nigeria’s resources and share the booty.  It is surprising that some Nigerians refer to PDP sometimes as “Party of Deceitful People,” yet a lot of Nigerians at home and in Diaspora are flocking in droves to join it.  Why is this so?  Answer to this may give an eye opener to Nigerian’s political thinking and help other political parties redefine themselves either same or differently so that distinct parties can be formed that will be better opposition parties. I’ll leave the answers to the pundits and political scientists to come up with.  All I know is that for me, a political party that serves and represents its people will get my vote?  Do we need to disenfranchise the people, steal their money and abuse them before we claim to be politicians or a great political party?

Nigerians need to rediscover the old adage of being their brothers/sisters’ keepers, and still adhere firmly to the culture that guided the nation through the sixties and seventies while modifying part of the culture that can make our culture more universally accepted in the global world.  We must not loot the treasury for the sake of just having a worthless mansion in America or London and if some cannot help their kleptomaniac tendencies, they must be discouraged from transferring the loot to a foreign land.  One thing is to be a thief another is to be a useless thief caring for no other person but development of a foreign land while neglecting his.

Nigerians have always narrowly defined leadership by allowing individual’s abilities to obscure larger societal needs which is likely to prove more important in the larger context.  Leadership is by no means for the swift or for the strong but meant for those human beings that know their limitations, have the ability to listen and surround themselves with men who can tell them the truth and guide the right way.  We are in a polity where issues are never discussed and if they are discussed they are with respect to how a leading party can better loot.  Moreover, issue after issue, no matter how negative, never hurt our politicians because issues never matter.  If we say we are following American type of Democracy, then, at least some of the issues of our time must drive our polity.

Our politics needs to be about building our infrastructures: healthcare; roads, E N E R G Y (the most critical ingredient to industrial development and political liberation), regrouped Nigerian Airways (pride of our nation); industrial capacity building; job creation; moral and psychological rebuilding of the battered psyche of the nation; reduction of insecurity of lives and properties which joblessness brings about; and most importantly, sane polity.  What does it profit a leader who stays eight years in office with joblessness, enhanced corruption, epileptic energy, increased fuel price, becomes richer than he got into office if he is despised, cannot guarantee his own safety, and has little legacy to hold on to.

Some younger Nigerian entrepreneurs might be changing the way business is conducted in Nigeria.  Many young Nigerian businesses were able to represent Nigeria and their country well during the last Offshore Technology Conference, OTC in Houston.  The nation needs to recognized them and show the shift in business attitude.  Nigeria needs to begin to encourage the nation’s business men and women, the scientists by increasing R&D funding; encourage Nigeria to diversify her economy.  Although no matter how dexterous a leader is, he may not be able to individually improve citizens’ economic advancement but may, through putting a formidable economic team together, good economic policies that can address both national and global economic needs within the Nigerian context.

Our leaders so far, especially in the last administration, see economics from a party – politics prism.  Most of our previous leaders including President Yar ‘Adua did not hale from Mt. Olympus or from the lush forests of mythical Narnia but from incredibly humble beginning yet as soon as some of them become rigged leaders, they forget whence they came and treat us like dirt.  It is time that Nigerians demand that we get away from this type of myopic economy, parochial thinking and absurd rich versus poor mentality.  Won’t it be better for our nation if our economy benefits the majority of Nigerians than to benefit just a few especially those few pride themselves in encouraging capital flight and individualizing our common resources?

Among the issues that will create most anxiety in near terms during our next election iteration are the economy, domestic matters like healthcare, security, improving educational standards, creation of real job, establish some form of social security such that it is not political leaders that are secured but all able Nigerians are and creation of genuine solution to the Niger Delta problem.

If the solution to Nigeria’s problem is to be universal, it must engage the right and responsibilities of average Nigeria to soul search and see themselves as part of the larger problem.  Afterall, leaders come from the people.  So if the leaders are corrupt, deadly, morally bankrupt, the society is to be blamed, as such, the society needs to look at itself closely to find a lasting solution.

The bad news for Nigeria is that objective factors are conspiring to produce unprecedented pseudo success in politics as we are rejoicing.  The good news?  We ask each succeeding government to probe previous government without setting the modus operandi of such probes and the deliverables. How do we continue to ask a thief to probe itself, what if the result of the probe is not released, what can a people do?  We do not need a violent revolution but people demand for real change.  If Nigerians refuse to demand changes in the way they are governed after the destructive and corruptly disastrous and humanistically deadly eight years of the mercurial OBJ, then, our nation will be doomed for never?  May God never say amen to this.  Desperate times demand desperate measures and this is a desperate time for Nigeria.

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY TO ALL OUR MOTHERS – SWEET MOTHERS INDEED!!!

Robot  # 1 | 22.09.2008 09:55

Nigeria is more than 47 years old. To many political observers, she has been moving like a ship without a rudder. This is not meant to disparage my country but to ask each citizen to fo...Read the full article.