Nigeria: Of Rulership And Craniology

I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. -Robert Frost, “The Road Not Taken” Reacting to news that our friends in the Federal House of Representathieves were quibbling as expected over the N320 million they had voted for Kolanuts, Gulder, and nkwobi to celebrate the joke that the rulers of Nigeria call “Democracy Day”, Rotimi Ogunsuyi, a progressive voice in Nigerian internet listservs, wondered aloud if epe (curse) didn’t come automatically with the territory of rulership in Nigeria. Interestingly, one of Dimeji Bankole’s paid quislings, totally tone deaf to the irony and gravity of the big picture, had forwarded the story in a laughable effort to showcase his corrupt Principal’s probity. I am beginning to think seriously about the plausibility of Ogunsuyi’s funereal reading of ...Read the full article.

[DeepThought]

it will never occur to the rulers of Nigeria to try and replicate Masdar City in the Niger Delta. Their cerebral instinct will be how to divert their loot into buying the most expensive villas in Masdar City – a project that people with oil money like them envisioned and built.If the Abu Dhabi authorities were ever to release the waiting list of prospective buyers of property in Masdar City, it is a safe guess that Nigerians would be shocked by the number of their Governors, Senators, Reps, Ministers, and Presidency people queuing up to buy property there

What further explanations do we need? Nijiriya no bi food? Is that not how the "leaders" and even ordinary Nigerians see political office ?

Oga, go tiff your own share out of the national cake and go buy you own house for Dubai.

Shikena!!

[Suleimana]

Has the time come for Nigerians in diasporas (I hear we are the most educated immigrants in USA) to come together and exert some political pressure on their host countries? Even the dog on my street knows that if the EU and US really applies the screw on Nigerian leaders, things will start to change.

I say corruption proceeds is far more dangerous than terrorist money. The terrorist kill by the hundreds, corruption by the millions. You can have homeland security to curb terrorism but what can a poor man do in Nigeria? You may even argue that terror is the outcome of poor foreign policies but what did my mother ever do to this country?

Think about how the US & EU forced the world to sit up and prevent terrorist from getting funding. Can we plead with them to do same with corruption proceeds?

[edoji]

"Most Nigerians are convinced – without evidence – that something biologically weird happens to otherwise perfectly normal people when they get to Aso Rock or Government House in the state capitals".

I believe that there is something in politics that fills the skull of our politicians with Cement instead of gray and white matter. I believe their brain neurons have been debilitated by multiple sclerosis, or other metabolic and inflammatory disorders that resulted in deficient or abnormal thinking....
AND I HAVE THE EVIDENCE!

[Abatakan]

Originally Posted by Suleimana

Has the time come for Nigerians in diasporas (I hear we are the most educated immigrants in USA) to come together and exert some political pressure on their host countries? Even the dog on my street knows that if the EU and US really applies the screw on Nigerian leaders, things will start to change.

I say corruption proceeds is far more dangerous than terrorist money. The terrorist kill by the hundreds, corruption by the millions. You can have homeland security to curb terrorism but what can a poor man do in Nigeria? You may even argue that terror is the outcome of poor foreign policies but what did my mother ever do to this country?

Think about how the US & EU forced the world to sit up and prevent terrorist from getting funding. Can we plead with them to do same with corruption proceeds?

@Suleimana
Voice of reason,take the issue of immigration(controlled immigration) walks the street of europe/americas and africans abound doing jobs native can`t/won`t do.US/EU will not do the right thing as per your comments as it will affect the status quo,there are powerful interest all over the world that will do everything/anything to protect their interest,yes sadly US/EU included.
Case in point according to BBC`Former prime minister John Major is one of only a handful of leaders of the country (UK)not to have attended Oxford or Cambridge`.So go figure if the same cabal will turn against one of their own in any third world country.

[quietswami]

As humourous as I find this piece, I am less inclined to think that the Midde-East will be the source for inspirational leadership or strategic planning. Perhaps the glimmer of hope for Nigeria will be in the seeming gradual change in the investment stance of the Middle Eastern Leaders (Royal Families) from squandering oil dollars in the West to squandering at base. A change of heart either spurred on by economic realities in the West, growing awareness and insurgency of the downtroden classes, or possibly al quaeda's growing influence in the region!

Would I want a Nigerian version of a hare-brained scheme to have a ski resort in Lagos? No excuses for the deplorable state of the Nigerian leadership but for an alternative I'd like to aim higher! However, from my standpoint the real issue is not with leadership but in a people's inability to define their vision and organise accordingly!

[Kay Soyemi (Esq.)]

Originally Posted by quietswami

...Would I want a Nigerian version of a hare-brained scheme to have a ski resort in Lagos? No excuses for the deplorable state of the Nigerian leadership but for an alternative I'd like to aim higher!

However, from my standpoint the real issue is not with leadership but in a people's inability to define their vision and organise accordingly!

quietswami,

May you live longer than your forebearers!

"However, from my standpoint the real issue is not with leadership but in a people's inability to define their vision and organise accordingly!"

I just had to revisit that statement.

Many thanks.

[Silent 1]

This makes for depressing reading, but, as a measure of how bad things are, hardly begins to scratch the rot and shame called "Nigeria".

I am wont to insist that, though Nigeria's problem is mostly a leadership problem, it is in some sinister and paradoxical way, equally, if not more, a followership problem. All along the strata of society you find followers who are leaders one way or the other: at work ( private and public), in schools, religious houses and in private homes actively, passionately and persistently trying to out-do each other in destructive and negative leadership.

Again, that "Nigerians" do just as well as any other people or race (including the Arabs) in other fields of human endeavour(outside leadership) points to a bigger problem, a bigger foe -- "Nigeria". There is something about this "geographical expression" that, threatens, even urges us to be bad, to do wrong, to rape her to death.

Its about "Nigeria" - about you and I - not simply the corridors of power.

[emj]

I have a slightly different use for craniology in the Nigerian context. Most Nigerians are convinced – without evidence – that something biologically weird happens to otherwise perfectly normal people when they get to Aso Rock or Government House in the state capitals. Some attribute the changes in these people to “something in the air that they breathe in the corridors of power” and I have heard others propose that it is in “the water they drink”.

Yep, u got that right....something in the air and water...could hazard a guess that the water is spiked with Forgetfulmicin and they also sniff glue.

Given the desperation of our situation and the mess that our rulers make of our lives, it may not be an outrageous proposition to measure the skull of anybody going into government in Abuja and the state capitals and remeasure their skulls when they leave office to determine if, indeed, something about the nature of power shrinks the human cranium in Nigeria. A reduction in the size of the cranium and the brain may explain why they become rulers who do not qualify to be called leaders. Desperate problems, they say, call for desperate solutions.

That theory is not quite right cos all they got is pea-brain anywaz

Could there be some truth to Tolu Ogunlesi’s sobering definition of Nigeria? Says Ogunlesi: Nigeria is not a country, not even a geographical expression. Nigeria is a way of doing things wrongly or leaving them undone

Tolu is so right...but then soon and very soon, we will shout eureka, we've finally found and done it right


PS>>...Thanks for this beautiful write up...what a way to start the week...something to chew on 4real

[shinycoin]

Masdar City is almost complete and is now gradually being inhabited. If you are still not convinced that we need craniology as part of a broader tapestry of explanations of the psychology of Nigerian rulers, wait until we begin to hear revelations of their initial cerebral reactions to Madar City. My good guess: it will never occur to the rulers of Nigeria to try and replicate Masdar City in the Niger Delta. Their cerebral instinct will be how to divert their loot into buying the most expensive villas in Masdar City – a project that people with oil money like them envisioned and built. If the Abu Dhabi authorities were ever to release the waiting list of prospective buyers of property in Masdar City, it is a safe guess that Nigerians would be shocked by the number of their Governors, Senators, Reps, Ministers, and Presidency people queuing up to buy property there. Craiology please!!!

Excellent write up and beautiful piece on the Masdar city project.... never heard of it untill i read your piece and i have to say thank you for enlightening me.

its sad really that the Nigerian situation is as it is, cos we cannot entirely blame it on the African life style, cos Libya has oil and its citizens do not live in the misery that Nigerians are, neither can we blame endless years of military rule, cos the same Libya has been ruled by a military oligarchy for well over 25 years and last i heard, Libya, though not Dubai or Abu Dhabi, is still a paradise in the desert.

Incidentally i agree with you.. if and when the list of prospective property buyers of that futuristic city is ever published, Nigerian millionaires will top the list and politicians will make up the majority.

We are a country mired in shame!

[Kabikala]

Nigeria: Good people, Great nation!

[Eace]

Actually there has been such a study - craniology I mean, although it was more generalisedDon't know the origins...)

Brains were put up for auction. The most prized were saved for the last day - European brains; American Brains; African brains. The bidding started and soon there were only two bidders left - both Chinese. They were bidding for the African brain.

Why? wondered some spectators incredulously; an African brain?

The wise Chinese laughed. "The other two lots have been excessively used. The African brain hasn't been used at all!"

A joke in bad taste perhaps but on reflection, a cause for alarm. Leaders are the products of their societies. It is just that leadership is a more visible position.Change must start from the grassroots, the homes, the schools, the learning and work places...We've all got the same brain wiring...Aso Rock doesn't change it, power just exacerbates the negative inclinations.

[M. Akosa]

The article writer is correct. We need craniology of some sorts to find out if Nigerian leaders are BAD or MAD.

All along we know they are just bad, but the criminal justice system in Nigeria has been unable to control our leaders urge for insatiable greed, coruption and reckless abuse of power of office. Some of our leaders might be mad as well, but we don’t know yet. We are not seeing what is really going on inside their thick head.

Now, maybe craniology can even help us identify the mad ones, so we may seek the neccesary psychosocial intervention for their madness, to counter their out of control behaviours once they enter Aso Rock.

[NWANZA]

Originally Posted by edoji

"Most Nigerians are convinced – without evidence – that something biologically weird happens to otherwise perfectly normal people when they get to Aso Rock or Government House in the state capitals".

I believe that there is something in politics that fills the skull of our politicians with Cement instead of gray and white matter. I believe their brain neurons have been debilitated by multiple sclerosis, or other metabolic and inflammatory disorders that resulted in deficient or abnormal thinking....
AND I HAVE THE EVIDENCE!

When are we going to get the evidence from these guru's?

I think they are up to something here, but not the bolded part above.

Is it some atonement that was not completed with the God of the SUN?

[Sesan Ibitoye]

Nothing wrong with the Nigerian brain. And a complex study of each head before they get on the throne will not be a bad idea. Actually a good one as some Profs will then chop from it. Craniology! Who does not know a good thing? Our house of power is filled with cobwebs. That is what catches them that venture into the power house: the madam weilds the power of the bedroom and command the man of power to play ball or else...The paramount ruler of village asks that he, the man of power, produce personal dividends immediately or else...the father/mother-in-law hold the man of power to ransome. He must produce or else...How about the siblings of the man of power, his parents and his old school mates who are all looking to our new man of power? And if he refuses to play ball, we hold a village meeting and deliver him to the village diety. We make his life miserable...but the man of power gets more power if he submits to the calls and demands of "his people". We give him chieftancy titles, lands and even new wives...Our problem plenty and our mumu too much!