I took myself back to my village where I have been for days running. Life is still rudimentary, people wake and the vast majority head to the farms where they engage in subsistence farming. Once they leave in the morning the environment is like a ghost town.
Only very few people are on the roads. A few of us the “city men,” who for one reason or the other find ourselves within the vicinity get ourselves engaged in discussions centred mainly around the state of the country and her development trajectory. Every time we threw up particular topics and felt things weren’t properly handled, one particular fellow always responded with the refrain, “country of particular concern.” He took that from President of the United States of America, Donald Trump, who recently returned our country to the status of “country of particular concern” over incessant killing of Christians in the country.
As patriotic citizens some of us protested the tag. Our contention was that our country is too strategic to be degraded in such a manner. After all, we have appropriated the title “The Giant of Africa”. How then can a giant be treated like an ant? This was the foundation upon which we wove our disagreement.
Unfortunately, events happening with and around us appear to be proving us wrong and Trump right. One of our citizens, Victor Oladokun, recently said: “Visionary leadership is the capacity to see a desirable future long before it arrives and the ability to bring it into the present by influencing, inspiring, and using the gifts and talents of others.” The question would then be what vision or future of the country have our leaders seen? Forget about capacity to bring it to reality.
We are in a very perilous state. A country of over 200 million people with vast arable land can’t feed her population. We got crude oil at the same time as Arab countries like Qatar, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Those countries have become like first world countries leaving us at a rudimentary level. Two thirds of the citizens don’t have jobs, industries have closed down and yet no serious attention is given to this very important matter. The same number of citizens as mentioned earlier don’t have access to effective medical care. This is happening in a country without any social security benefits whatsoever.
In the country today the human life has lost value. It is so much so that cattle have a higher worth. Those who kill cattle belonging to itinerant herders are hunted, arrested and tried in the courts but the same is not done in the case of terrorists who attack, kill and sack entire human settlements. In two incidents last week, one in Kaduna and another in Plateau State suspected Islamic terrorists rode into settlements on motorcycles, ransacked residences, killing and burning down houses and still left very successfully without challenge, not one person was arrested.
At the end came the usual reaction, the state governor moving to the scene in an armoured vehicle, getting there and appealing for calm and patience. The Federal Government comes through with what has become a familiar pattern, condemning the attack and pledging to bring the vandals to book. It followed up with inviting security chiefs and the Governor of Plateau State to a meeting in Abuja.
The question is, what use are such meetings? Why is it emphasis isn’t placed where it matters? How come felons come in huge numbers, riding on motorcycles, invade locations for hours and still manage to escape without challenge and any arrest? Shouldn’t this be the focus? Who are those in-charge of security in the area? What kind of security architecture did they have in place? In fact given President Tinubu’s past promises somebody should lose his or her job.
One of the many troubles of this country is placing or giving emphasis to minor matters. Last week the President gave indication he wanted to borrow US$6 billion, to which he sent a letter to the National Assembly and within few minutes he got an approval but the proposal for state police has remained just “an issue.” It was an issue discussed over meals with members of the National Assembly. Till today no one knows what the next step is yet citizens are being killed daily like bush meat.
We all agree politics is the foundation to finding answers but our political culture is daily making nonsense of the position. We are buffeted by poor governance, yet our political parties are choosing their candidates for both party and public offices by consensus. Everyone including those elected on different platforms are jumping into the ruling party and the question has been what are the attractions? Good governance and desire to sustain it or what?
The most ridiculous was the national convention of a supposed national political party which turned out to have all the features of a birthday party for an individual. Nothing could be be more absurd. This system that threw up this scenario is incapable of producing quality leaders. The destruction of internal democracy in our political parties is responsible for the kind of leaders we have in the country.
Rascality can never be ruled out in human matters, including politics. This is why modern governance system makes provision for a judiciary. Elsewhere were good governance became a culture, the judiciary was one of the major instruments used to achieve that. Judges used judicial pronouncements to bring back sense into recalcitrant political players. Judges in those places didn’t hide under “courts are not father Christmas.” Judges gave verdicts that showed they too were not only very knowledgeable they were as well members of the society where they operate. In this system the executive doesn’t build residences for Judges, the Judiciary arm has responsibility to themselves.
Nigeria indeed is a country of particular concern. The simmering heat is huge. It is our prayer we don’t record a burst, an unpleasant eruption. The plain truth is that things aren’t looking good at all.
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