Follow Us on Google
Up until last week, this writer had thought this space had had enough on and about politics Nigeriana, especially its most annoying aspect: crosstitution. Clearly, it had not; it has not. In fact, it never shall. No matter how much it tries, this column shall never be able to ignore political corruption.
Nigeria has experienced so much nonsense, that now even the most abominable, even the most scandalous means nothing to Nigerians. Non-Nigerians cannot imagine the things Nigerians laugh off. Nothing shocks Nigeria and Nigerians anymore. It can even be said that what can shock Nigeria and Nigerians does not exist.
Before, during and after our quadrennial electoral cycle, we get treated to loads of madness. It is either this or that politician licks back their puke by doing exactly what they had sworn on their father’s grave they never shall or their political party shamelessly flip flops. Like the one that cursed another for contemplating subsidy removal but did exactly that from day one when it had the opportunity. Akwaibomights insist you react with just one shoulder when you hear something incredible so you have something left to react with when you hear an even more incredible part of that same something.
One hopes you reacted with just one shoulder when you read about the party that cried wolf over subsidy only to itself later turn tiger (as we say in Nigeria) and transmogrify into the wolf. The very next thing you are going to read will certainly require you reacting with another shoulder. A member of that party, a whole former governor of a state, a whole former minister of the federal republic, a man you always thought was among the most honourable remnants you hope still exist around here, came out and while laughing confessed that his party always knew removing subsidy was key but that they had to pretend just to deceive the electorate. Now, pray, where are you going to take another shoulder with which to react when you hear that the same electorate laughed and cheered the man along, in spite of the fact that the man’s party had in a decade left the country in a messier cul-de-sac?
Nigerians must wake up from our senseless slumber. Just as we set aside money for tomorrow, we should set aside some of our compatriots for trust. That is, we should have some of our people we trust in all ramifications. People we can follow, even blindly.
One of such is a fine gentleman who never shies away from fighting personal or corporate battles. Not too long ago, he fought back and successfully reclaimed his emirship. In his time at the helm of our apex bank, he told us getting rid of subsidy was our national economic talisman but we chose instead to believe conscious liars. Then too, he spoke truth to power, he dared the government he served; something about missing funds; which eventually led to his early ouster by President Goodluck Jonathan -at the time.
I know Nigerians know Nigerians who belong in this category. We must do everything to get them. We must do everything to encourage them to speak up, from time to time, to provide national guidance of which we are in dire need. I am wondering though, if Messrs. Omoyele Sowore and Inibehe Effiong are too young and too politically involved and interested and too electric (whatever that means) to be accorded this honour of trust.
With the next national ballot well over a year away, the heat generated by its build-up is enough to run a locomotive but it cannot. Because it is mere waste. It is this persistent minus energy generated that allows the country to remain almost stagnant and in darkness. We continue to grope for help and solution, hoping and praying.
Even so, the clowns among us are becoming emboldened daily to dig deeper or go off on a tangent more and more. The scoundrels think the masses are fools or robots or both. You have no idea of the stench of the rot: the deceit these so-called leaders spread, the impunity they supervise and of course, the thievery they organise. The rape is wanton but professionally done!
Look at how we abuse or debase our constitution. It says north, we go south. Look at how our courts seem to have become headquarters of criminal playgrounds. Things have so deteriorated, a few sane judges left get so alarmed they deploy unprintable language against own colleagues in setting aside lousy judgements.
Still, the national hypocrisy persists. Nigerians are experts in looking the other way. That anathema is a function of corruption, of ethnicity, of politics, of religion and of self. Nigeria can burn to hell as long as the Nigerian gains in the foregoing areas of interests.
However, All Progressives Congress which during the Buhari presidency prided itself as the governing party (indirectly taunting People’s Democratic Party’s 16 years as the ruling party) must immediately pinch itself awake from its decade-long somnolence. This is not to say that the party is the cause of where Nigeria is. However, this is not also to say the party has not contributed to keeping Nigeria where it finds itself. APC must stop acting as if PDP is the cause of how APC itself leads the country.
Going deeper, APC must stop repeating the mistakes of PDP. Impunity is an ill wind. All these criminal crosstitutions should be discouraged and punished. One party system is inimical not only to democracy but also to national development.
Furthermore, APC needs no clairvoyance to declare some PDP members who have crossed over persons of interest. I shall return to that “of interest” bit, presently. Meanwhile, President Bola Tinubu and company must pay special attention to former members of PDP who now in APC have been badmouthing their former political family. If they are so ungrateful to PDP that gave them all, any need to wonder how they shall treat APC soon?
Thirdly, coming back to the extraneous declaration of Nigeria as “a country of interest,” the party and indeed our national government must stop our trademark macho posturing. Were our leaders not given to too much hate for the truth, Nigeria would not need Mr Donald Trump’s United States of America as a mirror. Now, at least, we would stop taking human lives as nothing; we shall stop euphemising terrorists as bandits.
APC must not travel the road that PDP preferred when, after the Chibok girls kidnap on the night of 14/15th April 2014, the same United States moved against the Jonathan presidency. Since it hurts my pride as a Nigerian, I cannot tell this story the way it was. Let the party in power cause a top meeting urgently to seek ways of dealing with the monster that President Trump has highlighted. Abuja cannot keep living a lie; politically, religiously and so on.
Finally, the biggest lesson in all of this is never to do on to others what you cannot withstand. The hen (that was born in 2012/2013 when APC gathered, plotted, manufactured lies upon lies and disseminated them at home and abroad against PDP and then President Jonathan) has come home to roost. So, rather than hire bogus PDP members to foment trouble aimed at breaking the party, APC should realise that nobody can survive nemesis affliction that arises a second time. We rejoice though, that the 2027 elections, even before they hold, shall take Nigeria one step away from this precipice.
God bless Nigeria!
