Amidst these calls,are strident cries of:marginalisation,crisis of confidence, mistrust, large scale and pervasive corruption, maladministration and general mismanagements. To compound the mess and filth all around,there are some elements within that are singing war songs in discordant tunes and promoting ethnically induced emotions, trying to pitch the Igbos against the Yorubas and the Hausawas against the Igbos and with rude words not used in polite societies.
At this point a line dropped into my mind, can’t remember offhand the author, but there it is…”While no one lives his life more fully, more intensely and more consciously than the man who is calm.”
There are three types of calmness in the nation,the Sphinx, petrification and fatalist and amidst the persistent and growing unease and depression.
The types of calmness that has engulfed our nation,in the face of mounting crisis of confidence,misplaced trust, corruption, intimidating maladministration and outright mismanagement, indeed, are not the right and true types of calmness.
The Sphinx, petrification and fatalist calmness to which majority of Nigerians including the vast number of “siddon looks”,the leading agitators and combatants have subjected themselves has portrayed all as mere cowards slaves of the environment, hopelessly, surrendering to the present conditions, and even, recklessly indifferent to the future.
This being the case, encouraging Nigerians to further accept life as a rudderless ship, drifting on the oceans of time, with no compass,no charts, no known ports to which they are sailing,should be seen as drawing inspiration and motivations from a similarly failed bid of fifty years ago, thus, consequently,creating a switchback journey and a sordid gap between what is-and what can be.
In a curious twist of fate,this has been responsible for the bottled up emotions now seeking an escape. But we must not forget that life is not about oneself and what one wants but about others.
It is indeed sad and unfortunate, that the ever intractable problems of human greed,innately dishonest, constant and ever recurring call for true fiscal federalism in the polity and lately restructuring, of course,presupposes that the fifty odd years old wounds inflicted on the nation by tribalism, mistrust, ethnic chauvinists,tribal jingoist and other fissiparous tendencies,and indeed,conflicts and frictions that have still to be resolved, and that has characterized the pre-1966 era were still with us.
The nation’s failure to treat the issues of political,social and economic equality as a de rigueur derivative matters of principle of state and not mere political decision has no doubt crippled our feelings for one another, damaged our moral sense and its presently trying to destroy our souls.
If I were to hazard a guess here,I’ll say,trying to curb,halt or control it by the chants of war,would only amount to nothing but throwing a kiss at a revolving door. It is in our minds and hearts that the real battle must be fought and not towing the baseline set by ethnic chauvinists.
In the face of all this,the nation needs a crow’s-nest to be able to see a long way and avert disaster, now that it is stuck three sixty degree apart in stagnant waters. How do I mean? Nigerians of whatever extraction are casualty of our new and modern world,and are largely victims of circumstances, living lives blighted by privations and abuses that has dreams shattered and destinies truncated, even, as poverty, recession and depression have conspired against the people in troubled times.
The passengers felt a violent bump as the plane landed to the warm embrace of the richly macadamised tarmac and impeccably and nicely turned out ground staff.
On the ride from the Port Harcourt airport to the town, one could see a dirty,lonely and dark street in this crude oil city. Tenement houses,attractive when they were first erected,but now they were past their prime. Looking as dejected as a man with a shrinking income. Paints work at its last gasp. I fought back another yawn, I know I do that when I’m touched. What have we done with the petrodollars.
As all this was going on and trying hard to locate and posit where it all began, from the deep recess of my mind, there came upon me some revulsion, as cars whistled and rattled by one after the other as shops,well dressed attracted women and men had faded,all now a glittering rhinestone set in a dinghy setting.
Here- grime and incessant crowds – moving, hurrying-jostling. Busy ants running industriously about there ant-hill in a retrograde, getting worse, returning to a less good condition in a nation reduced to a state of ruin through ruination of the country side. The priority for us as a nation and a people is to salvage the ruins and not allow what we can’t do interfere with what we can do,even as we refuse to move forward looking backward.
What is the way out? People! Incessant people! all chattered and fussed,of a depressing uniformity. Looking round the polity, the incessant atmosphere, with the frank curiosity of a child, you find a nation peopled by men and women that know only their own desires and that were as yet unaware of pity.It is very terrible, yes-very terribly sad.
It is right to say that,there has been tremendous damage done to the nation’s body politics, its bones and marrows. The whole country is in recession and a season of economic decline, with reduced trade and industrial activity and many people unemployed and totally subjugated to the wishes, whims and caprices of the political elites, are ample evidence of the rut,rot in the system. Yes! The recession has had an enormous impact on all, as all have become poor, bereft of ideas,morally bankrupt, dishonest and experiencing widespread deprivation caused by unemployment.
Nigerians have been busy running their lives and personal affairs(any(which)way);that they have not time to go into the pros and cons of these questions, agitations and clamours pros and cons,otherwise, the nation would have been on fire. Do we then call recession a blessing.
All across the country there is so much destruction through morally reprehensible heist,massive grafts,bribery, corruption all of which has resulted into cries of neglect, marginalisation, and clamour for self independence, resource control, and a renewed call of “…to your tents,O!”
All have in deed, grown resentful, puzzled and suspicious of one another,and our government rather than act rightly and in loco parentis, sponsored the nation with its ruinous expenditures.
The people are growing palpably upset and startled and worried about the continual state of dithering in the nation.
The politicians must stand up to be counted as the nation now know that the political elites own wants are very simple. The political elites should know and note that the people are growing weary and restless and that there is a certain kind of meekness of submission- brings out the worst in a man. A word here is enough.
Meanwhile, the nation continues tumbling and in economic decline not knowing when it will blossom. The ongoing disintegration becoming pathetic by the minute, as some are clamouring for its political disintegration and restructuring, its political elites, bona fide and de facto leadership continuein their mesmeric rhythm to dilly dally as they keep mass mesmerizing the people even as the people are kept permanently pauperised.
The people live and pay for darkness,business barely get six hours of electricity, companies spend an average 20% of their revenue to generate power,the unemployment rate so high,could not generate PAYE, the nation’s inflation rate continues to soar. Take home pay can no longer take workers home, they are on the top of the train in Lagos state. No potable water in most part of the country,but we can farm and pipe crude oil from the Creek thousands of kilometres to the North,but could not pipe good and drinkable water for a few kilometres. The taste of water I had was laden with the taste of petrol and diesel.
With the foregoing as a background, the institutions and the will needed to decisively win the battles against the nation’s oneness,unity and progress are lacking and the corresponding political will absent and the battles becoming polemised.
It is as clear as daylight that the years of neglect, decay,decadence, negligence and what have you, almost made sure there would likely remained no trace of flesh or marrow in the nation’s till,and the bones themselves are in such lamentable conditions, decalcified-soft and badly eroded. It left a problem,and, to see the truth about the nation’s problems is like trying to see inside one’s own eyeballs.
Time is at a premium the presidency and the sequestered Senate has been caught in the web of presumptions and not looking inwards and are bound to suffer distractions of a kind that will require both to let the nation be controlled by the antics inherent in the present ideological engineering and laying the basis for a true fiscal federalism,and must learn to steer this course, irrespective of the distraction and contraption weaved or contrived to put the notion of one indivisibleand indissoluble Nigeria off balance. This is the time to set a new agenda for Nigeria.
It must be noted however that
I.) the disputed events and requests of 1967 still constitute a vexed question among those seriously affected by it,and still tend to divide Nigerians into such inexact camps as pro-revolution and anti-revolution,whatever the notions, it can be said here that no “revolution”,in the sense of drastic changes in social systems and values resulted directly from that internal war of attrition.
ii.)stemming from i, is another question arising from the clamour for a united Biafra to assert the autonomy and desire of the ethnic minorities in Eastern Nigeria to remain within united Nigeria where they would be able to realize their legitimate aspirations rather than stay in Biafra where their land would be regarded as a natural lebenstrau by the much more numerous Igbo’s whose treatments of the minorities in the past had left much to be desired, and thus,presented a complex setting for any actualisation of a Biafra republic.
iii.)the Ahiara declaration which sought to raised the issues of Biafra to an ideological level of a socialist Biafra struggling against a neo-colonial capitalist Nigeria, can now no longer hold water in the senselessness of war and story of human drama of immense proportion-All of us must exhibit that critical sense of self-examination,if we must avoid tragedies of untold propoportion.
iv.)we must not be clouded by emotionalism arising from perceived injuries and injustices in the pursuit of any agenda contrary to the progress,oneness and unity of the republic,but,must with sober reflection and the gift of hindsight, discern the several missed opportunities in the protracted process of nation-building since independence.
However, the government must consider the nexus of the arguments of the pro-Biafra calls -willingness on the part of the federating force to federate:
i.) Meeting the basic needs of the people, food, clothing, shelter.
ii.) The rich economic potential to be exploited for the general interest of Nigerians.
iii.)with depleted foreign reserves,falling oil prices,leakages,mounting debts,and a nation that is insolvent and brought to its knees by large scale looting, insurgency, sectarian violence, violent agitation by militants, Nigeria can hardly withstand a political landscape marred by any hostile clamour for self independence.
The pursuit of any agenda contrary to the principles of the republic, their rights and sovereign status must be forestalled not for propaganda nor motivations by any primordial instincts and solidarity. Napoleonic and other war reminds one of the dangers in soldiers fighting or marching with empty stomachs, who cannot match and or withstand the foxtrot dance: slow,slow,quick, quick, slow macabre of war.
Nigeria is what God, nature and Lord Lugard has put together, and any expectations that Nigeria would tear itself asunder from internal disaffections and disagreement may not materialise. Wherever our reconciliation, rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts have failed, there the nation should revisit. It’s never always too late for leaders and peoples to make a fresh start.
To the egocentric so-called leaders in the Biafra enclave, applause with fame and prominence is not eminence. The man of the hour isn’t apt to be the man of the ages. Its the seemingly unimportant, unhonoured and ordinary people who want to live longer and enjoy better health that determine the course of history.
The war-mongers and secession lords are like a people with a thimble-worth of capacity standing on the edge of a vast ocean, who have access to a lot of water but won’t get much of it because the capacity is so small and negligible.
Yes, there are times when silence is not golden, when we have to speak up against injustices and inequality, but when it is a retaliatory means of expressing anger,the ensuing emotional manipulation can be deadly. We can seize the initiative when we address injustices or wrongs,but not by sulking and pouting, but by effective communication, to draw the attention of our leaders to the plights and not resort to threat of secession or war,or trying to make undesirable decisions by default.
Those who look only to the present are certain to miss the future. Those spoiling for war and secession are all in cloud-cuckooland. The government may not leave such unchallenged. There is a time to be silent and a time to speak. The claims of Biafra as a political proposition and as a mass movement striving for security, safety and independence is merely a bargaining tool,as such pendatic dialectics and claims could no longer hold water in a new Nigeria, where the notion of “drift a little apart” has been defeated and is now an aberration that can not withstand the crucible of the fire of rational reasoning.
The continued agitation for self independence and or recession for whatever it is worth, and assuming a new character and display of bellicose nature, is an act of defiance and treasonable felony. So,the actors should have the courage of their convictions and marshall any reservations about the things that make them perpetually uneasy to the National Assembly, but with no threats.
The National Assembly on its part must note with courage,honesty aand emphasis that the agitations for self-independence is a tragic event in Nigeria’s development and evolution as a multi-nation state,and must demonstrate its quality and resourcefulness of its intellect in sorting the problems raised by the ” National Question “.
The National Assembly must be decisive with our worries without heightening the nation’s pulse and anxieties over fears that have refused to be turned into reality and may not,because our worst fears never happen and in our case,this Biafra and Igbo cause(s),so to speak may never materialise,because,they are mere miseries that are in anticipation, and mere recurring preoccupation that has over time become obsessions,whose outside were conflicts inside were fears.
In view of the unresolved national questions, and
especially now, that the feeling of charged air,the impression of molecules dancing through the atmosphere ready to come together and explode, and with the ominous signs in the air that things are not OK, in spite of the perfidious pretences all around, the presidency and the national Assembly must note the
hor’s de combat to the people’s aspirations, ambitions and the destinations they would want the nation reach in no time, even as the nation
a.)go to a greater depth at
proffering solutions and to increase the welfare and happiness of the people.
b.)to throw open the doors of all that is making the nation uncomfortable, and
c.)the government must back a new set of economic and social measures, prominent among which must be measures to fight poverty, to counter unemployment with work and to provide a social safety net.
At times like this, the doors of solution should be thrown open wider to accommodate all-comers;divergent in mathematics makes a series increase without limit as more of its terms are added,the government must beat the campaigns and agitations in their own strategies and tactics.
In the door opened for divergent, the nation would discover numerous other insurgents and motives and combating them should not be turned into breaking ice in a stream.
The president in an interface between his person, his office and the Nigeria State take a holistic view, of the state of affairs that has been further compounded by the widespread poverty, illiteracy, political apathy and the destruction of the moral authority of the ruling elite, and, ipso facto, the negative intrusion of multinationalism.
The government must note that:
i.)winning the battle against Boko Haram,and suppressing the Niger Delta Avengers and other agitations is not the same as conquering the wars posed by the national questions;and
ii.)the inherent incompatibility and chauvinist tendencies-
peculiarities that are by their very nature require much more wisdom,patience,a huge political will and panache.
In the search for solutions,proposals and answers to the national questions,we must note that,to date,very little has changed in the structure and character of political relations, phenomenal scope and intensity in the nation since the 1900s, where:
i.)people have been alienated from decision-making process
ii.)a nation lacking fiscal federalism where states don’t have a say in the management of the Commonwealth,how it is mined, marketed or how the goose lays the golden egg save what is appropriated,
and
iii.) oversimplifying the Nigerian and self-interest of a ruling oligarch and other psychological factors-rather than the rational calculations of the complex interests of the larger population. In this context, interest is defined as no more than the self interest of the ruling elite at any given time, in an immensely pluralistic and complex country.
Since the 1900s Nigerians corporate existence has always been against the backcloth of conditions and images which ordinarily are mutually exclusive. At the level of domestic politics,the nation has witnessed itself drift and catastrophically for that matter, in the direction of anarchy,but was able to paper the cracks, but at a greater cost both materially and humanly, therefore,our better judgement should have suggested that the effective solution to this and the myriads of problems confronting the nation lay in persuasion, dialogue and a negotiated peace.
The people will keep asking questions, questions of nationality as long as politics and religion and resources would be with us. These include but not limited to ethnicity, nepotism, bitter political partisanship, intolerance, bigotry. These forces have in their various combinations,undermined any potential for evolution of a common will and the kind of society- which the nation’s abundant resources could have afforded.
In the negotiations that are bound to follow to forestalling social collapse and for truce and true peace
to come back into the system all the parties including the national leadership must not be encumbered and or immobilized by forces which either are unwilling or unable to control.
But to give a thorough and a good assessment of our situation with a view to addressing our nation’s problems in a positive way. If you dam the stream of natural behavior, sooner or later the dam bursts and a cataclysm occurs, as artificial conditions bring about their natural reaction. Of course, the most important objective would be the rehabilitation of an economy which has been assaulted by corruption and madness of fellow countrymen.
In a normative sense,the nation has to find a permanent solution to problems which lay at the core of the fractiousness of the Nigerian state, to do nothing will be the greatest of all national mistake second only to that of 1914,to do nothing about the national questions,( fear of ethnic and religious domination, deprivation, inequitable and unfair distribution of economic and political power and government patronage by any individuals and groups arising from their historical location in the political system)because you can only do a little, amount to a disservice to the nation, therefore, we must do what we must, do what we can to the logic of the philosophy of equality.
The very essence of leadership is that you have to have vision. Not just look at what is,that is why the nation may never attain what could be. The Nation, nay,its leaders should not lack the primordial instincts and impetus to note that the teeming mass of marginalised young people growing up in deprived neighborhoods, lacking a future and growing up under the tutelage of depraved local leaders must be protected from being used as battering rams. While the use of coercion,(advisedly), the use of legitimate apparatus of state violence, buffet of deceit, anarchy must be curtailed.
The government must aim at finding common ground and recreating confidence in the ability of the Nigeria state to guarantee a safe environment for all to achieve their goals. It will be a grand betrayal to the cause of liberation of our good people and good governance, if the nation can’t restore our dignity and continue to divide ranks, subjugate our kith and kin in servitude and degradation.
The nation’s rules and institutions must not be manipulated to suit the disposition of leaders and the ruling elites, and no icy silence must overshadow the unresolved frustration, rather, the leaders must adapt themselves to the realities of the frailties, disposition and the dispensation on ground.
To all the burlesques actors in the ND,MASSOB,IPOB,BH front, in their bumbling amateurism should note that, if you seek cheap popularity, you will obsess over every conflict. Deep within is a desire to run our own lives,and in some cases other peoples lives too,that we become experts at manipulating one another.
This desires for control brings about different attitudes and behaviours which we must all avoid for peace to reign. Emotional blackmail, the guilt trip and humiliation and manipulation is a game any number can play, but those who engage in it pay a high price in conflict, hostility and resentment.
Men of intellect and wisdom could harbour no prejudices, must dislike injustice,militarism, militancy and war. The nation cannot accept the Burkean idea of change and preservation as a credo of political life,therefore, must be inspired by the highest of motives and by such higher ideals as patriotism and nationalism and must be repulsed by the wanton and senseless waste of human lives in the pursuit of politics by other means.
It is of interest to all that our national troubles can be likened to an illustration of a four steel rings,the first can support eighty grams,the second sixty grams,the third fifty grams and the fourth twenty grams, linked together you will think the greatest weight the chain can support would be eighty grams. But no,a chain is only as strong as its weakest link,so the answer is twenty grams.
It is the same with the nation, its only as strong as our weakest area. Likewise the resolve to do what is right is most likely to break in the area in which it is most vulnerable. In the spirit of change, the nation needs visionary leaders with vision that bring optimism, hope and goodness.
The nation must also be opened to the idea of a different dimension,-psychics call it a fourth dimension. The nation has in its march of nationhood tried everything but the idea of a different dimension and energy channel, that, places us one step above man’s everyday level of functioning.
It consists of pure thought and feeling, open-minded,not weighted down by the physical world, with a believe in a world of possibility, while the people see drifting leaves leaders should see life.
The National Assembly must make leaders of our youths by orientation not perverts. The political elite must strive to make our reality, it may be what the nation wants or need. Getting stuck isn’t always an option, but staying stuck is! The best thing is,no matter how long you’ve been stuck, the right attitude can get you moving. The nation only need to get good direction, focus, energy and confidence.
The nation is expected to cover every inch of blade of grass to ameliorate the conditions of Nigerians whose whole lives have been constant battle against poverty. This falling giant of a nation must be helped to rediscover its mojo. Nigerians expect things to move efficiently and quickly and in the way we want, when that doesn’t happen, we tend to become paranoid, irritable and frustrated.#Jimi Bickersteth
Jimi Bickersteth is a super blogger and writer.
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