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Obasanjo, Bush, Tetuila and Maintain
citizens of a mad world
Taju Tijani
At
the close of the 20th century, there was roaring optimism for the
birth of the 21st century. I was one of the starry-eyed optimists
who partied and drank champagne with family on that cold December night to
usher in a brand new century. Future archeologists may find my footprints on
the pavement of Trafalgar Square where I decided to lose all inhibitions of
adulthood in the dying days of year 2000!
First, my ex-Prime
Minister, the honourable Tony Blair in a rare mood of blatant triumphalism had
proclaimed a massive project of re-ordering our mad world. He blamed a world
that had lost its moral compass. He innovated and created posts for ethical
mandarins in his government. These mandarins became moral and ethical guardian
angels over a decadent United Kingdom. Among his breadth of visions was the
desire to eradicate poverty in the Third world. Other pet dream was to liberate
and put a liberal gloss on the trade imbalances between rich and poor nations.
He also wanted to pursue a 2-state solution in Palestine, guide his holistic
government through the maze of third way policies and promote democracy in far
away lands.
Overnight, Tony
Blair metamorphosed and became the biblical Joseph the dreamer and his amazing
technicolour coat.
Blair’s utopian dream for
a collapsed world was enough to destroy the agnosticism with which I view all
politicians. Oracular Blair had seen the state of our mad world and came to the
conclusion that our world desire stability, progress, love and peace. But his
brilliant dream for our mad world was aborted by his Atlantic friend, George W
Bush. Like my friend called Dollin, Bush sees the world through a pessimistic
lens. He checkmated Blair and cautioned him not to be silly with his optimistic
view of our world.
Psychopathic George W Bush converted Blair and
by 2003, the world woke up to watch flares over Iraq’s skyline heralding the
commencement of war. By far the most awesome agent of darkness in real human
form is George W Bush. He destroyed the peace of this century in his mad
ambition to dislodge his bedfellow in darkness, Saddam Hussein.
This Washington buccaneer
foreclosed all arguments clamoring for peace. The prospect of peace and
prosperity in a mad world was alien to the ears of Bush. His epiphany, like
mine, was to conclude that since we all live in a mad world that had gone
rotten, why not set out blindly and destroy it on a massive scale? His
carefully choreographed image of a bible thumping neo-con was turned into a
smokescreen to disguise a mind infected with pure evil.
America’s
uncontrolled rage and the dream of world dominion through barbaric use of guns
and ‘daisy cutters’ exposed human beings to a charge of barbarity and insanity
and that bestir my artistic angst. The idea of living in a mad world, infected
by evil minds is encouraged by the scandalous foibles of politicians, the materialisation
of churches, the death of justice, the absence of courage to speak truth to
power and the continued timelessness of corruption in Nigeria.
To turn
the searchlight on Nigeria would seem appropriate at this juncture. Aremu Olusegun Obasanjo, the famous boiler
chicken merchant in Sango Ota was rigged into office as Nigeria’s president and
he saw the birth of the millennium while in office. This former combatant,
intrepid warrior, politician, writer, philanderer, ‘baba alatika’ and enfant
terrible entered the rough waters of Nigeria’s politics with so much optimism
even though he had no credential of a messiah. We trusted Aremu, but the
nomadic spirit in him would soon make him restless. He became a restless
wanderer like Cain and junketed around the world meeting the good, the bad and
the plain ugly.
I was
among his captive audience during his visit to the UK when he held the keys to
Aso Rock. He was in the UK to rub minds with Nigerians in the UK Diaspora. Obasanjo
has always been portrayed as a prudent manager of resources, but on this
occasion, he sold out.
Baba was a waster, I swear! He came to London with a
full planeload of business moguls---from ‘pure water’ barons to oil and gas
chieftains. It was an assemblage of the
truly great and the good. When Obasanjo grabbed the microphone, the soldier in
him roared to life! He spoke with unusual candour and authority. Frothing with
rage, he charged the UK residents to start thinking of what we could do for
Nigeria and not what Nigeria could do for us.
Under
another crazy seizure, Obasanjo charged us to remit money home to alleviate the
poverty of our forgotten families in Orile Iganmu, Isale Eko and Mushin. Aremu’s
hopelessness and his clarion call to overseas Nigerians to take over his own
responsibility to look after the beaten and battered Nigerians was seen as
banality. Eight years after, Aremu quietly disappeared into the womb of the
dark night of Owu to meditate on a broken dream of nation building.
During his
rule, economics and politics did not come together in a positive way to shine
on the public realm. Decent public services---cheap and affordable housing,
schools, hospitals, transportation, energy and jobs---are prerequisite for a
measure of a decent nation. The EFCC he created with its long arm of economic
justice has been amputated by Musa Yar’ Adua and its gains rolled back like the
miracle of the Red Sea! We live in a mad world brother!
In the
millennium, greed and its temptations gripped many Nigerians and gory-minded
ones became ’ritualists’ in order to rub shoulders with ex-Generals and
politicians who stole our money brazenly and live to spend it in style. Oshodi became
Nigeria’s darkest town where you could get a human skull, the alchemy used in
changing poverty to prosperity. We live in a mad world, my brothers.
Oil and
gas ‘boyz n da hood’ turned Lekki Peninsula into another Dubai. Beautiful and
palatial mansions began to dot Lekki’s landscape and those with tons of cash
moved in to live a comfortable but pretentious lifestyle. Empty mansions became
weekend brothels for libidinous moneybags looking for energetic leg over with
young and delectable ‘acada’ girls. We live in a mad world, my brothers.
On
journeys to our hometowns, we clamour for pure water, plantain crisps and dark ‘bones’.
Our jobless youth cluster around vendors perusing headlines for free and
debating political issues with clinical ease. What do you expect? Majority of
them have second degrees at home. We live in a mad world, my brothers!
Owning a
mobile phone becomes an article of street ‘cred’ among millions of Nigerians. ‘Flashing’
becomes the craze of the day. Rather than phone to talk, our women will ‘flash’
you which is a coded message to return the call and thus shoulder the cost of
the chat. We live in a mad world, my brothers!
Maintain
gave us new dance steps. Plantashun Boiz brought ‘Ajegunle’ freshness to Zionist
lyrics. Tony Tetuila mocked drivers involved in traffic accident and we chorus
‘oyibo repete’ in dance halls. Eedris Abdulkareem lecturer became rave anthem
in smoky night clubs. Yahoozie is the current ‘ashewo’ anthem from Abuja to
Zaria. We live in a mad world, my brothers!
Pentecostal
pastors have abandoned modest dressings for couture shirts, trousers, ties and
even handkerchiefs. They drip of bespoke tailoring of expensive materials. With
their supposedly modest pay, their wardrobes are stuffed with Armani, Gucci,
Hugo Boss and Lagerfeld. Looking great
for Jesus seems to be the in-thing now. There is shocking worldliness in our
churches. There is paganistic adulation for ephemeral, perishable, intangible
and temporal possessions. We live in a mad world, my brothers!
The
complexity of today’s world has made certainty a dangerous hope. Our ambition,
greed and anxiety have destroyed the concept of tomorrow. The world is in turmoil and because we are
all citizens of this planet, we look for happiness in ephemeral things like
cars, houses, music, church, sex, clothes and money. We truly live in a mad
world, my brothers!
Tijani, a social and afro
centric scholar lives in London.
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Posted by Robot| 20.03.2008 08:51