The
season of politicking in Nigeria is here again. The same unmistakably
familiar signs. You cannot miss them. The season of speechmaking, big
titles, long convoys, renting crowds, media friendliness, praise
singing, emergency philanthropy and sycophancy. You will notice the
good, the bad and the ugly coming out to say how nice they are and the
wonderful things that they are capable of doing.
They
are visiting party secretariats, paying millions of naira collecting
forms to contest positions, making promises and making friends. They
consult their diviners, prophets, marabouts, pastors, imams, etc – all
in a bid to peep into a future and secure their chances.
They
will come to tell you that they have consulted their constituency
members and their communities and they have been put under pressure to
come out. Such a lame, dry and drab excuse. As if they listen to anyone
else except themselves and their inordinate ambition. Some will even go
to the extent of borrowing money, forging certificates and buying
degrees – all in the bid to get a position that guarantees them access
to public resources. One interesting thing about this period is that in
the course of these activities, so many services are rendered and
somehow money changes hands from those who have to others who do not.
But in whose interest are all these things happening? Let none of these
pretenders deceive you anymore – they want to go there once again for
themselves and their pockets.
Some actors in the Nigerian
political scene are a shameless breed and laughable stock. They do not
even have the finesse and decency of changing their tactics even when
they have failed over and over again. The same old story lines. And we,
the ordinary people, are a very vulnerable and malleable lot; we keep
believing them, supporting and even making excuses for their undoing and
failures. As if we matter in their permutations. Do you mean that they
are doing all of these to come and serve? Do you reckon that public
interest is part of their agenda?
I have written about it many
times before now, Nigerian politicians have reduced being a Nigerian to
the simplistic struggle of trying to get a share of the national cake.
And it is like a rat race. Everyone is involved. When you secure access,
you declare a bonanza and invite some of your favourite friends to the
dining table.
It started with the discovery of crude oil in Iho,
Ikeduru in Imo State in 1930 by Shell D’Arcy and later in a commercial
quantity in Oloibiri, in Bayelsa State in 1956. It was the then young
military adventurist, Yakubu Gowon, who declared that the problem of
Nigeria was not money but how to spend it. From then on, everyone from
the military to the bureaucracy and of course the politicians and the
ordinary citizens became pre-occupied with how to cut a slice of the
national cake. Development was abandoned and every endeavour that must
go must be seen as a way to allow some set of people to take a share.
Ethnicity, religious bigotry and other divisive techniques were invented
as strategies to take a bite.
Many people today hold ethnicity
responsible for the many absurdities in Nigeria. What was supposed to be
our strength in diversity was now exploited for the benefit of the
unscrupulous few. It is part of the strategies constructed by the elite
to access the national cake. It is manufactured and manipulated to serve
a number of selfish purposes including being usually antagonistic to
others. Those who could not survive a nationalistic political
competition always have a chance to retreat to their ethnic cocoons in
search of dubious legitimacy, retreating into their ethnic cocoons as a
strategy to get access to the national cake. They did not just “invent”
ethnicism of a most roguish kind, they also created stereotypes around
them. For instance they say the Igbo like money; the Yoruba cannot be
trusted; the Hausa/Fulani people are religious bigots; the Ijaw are “kai
kai” drinkers; the Kanuri are “sponsors” of Boko Haram.
When
ethnicity could not serve their mischievous purposes satisfactorily,
they invented religion as another form of access to the cake. They
continued to drum it to the gullible that being adherents of different
religions makes us fundamentally different. No one bothered to explain
that the religions they cling tenaciously to were all imported.
Gradually, it started festering and the results are the hatred and
suspicion that have risen to their peak today. Some have surrendered
themselves as protectors and guardians of something that they do not
even understand. They have risen to slaughter their neighbours like
chickens and destroy their age-long interconnectedness and cohesion in
their communities in the pretext of pursuing a political agenda clothed
in religious garment.
All the violence that has been witnessed in
Nigeria without exception has its direct and indirect selfish political
agenda of the elite. Now, there are many examples but let us just take
one: The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta. At a point in
our history, MEND was the most fearful and dreaded group in the region.
Like Boko Haram, it was masked and some of us even believed it had
supernatural powers and was thus invincible. The members kidnapped,
robbed and raped – all as part of their own way to collect a slice of
the national cake. So, regardless of the atrocities that Boko Haram has
committed and amidst the senseless propaganda that those supporting and
funding them are trying to make the public to believe, I can reduce the
whole unfortunate exercise to four words – pursuit of national cake! No
one should interpret it beyond that. When the insurgents had frightened
people enough to get a larger chunk of the cake, it will come out, and
like MEND leaders, get their own share.
Now back to politics;
2015 is around the corner. The elite have another opportunity to unleash
another set of vampires on the unsuspecting Nigerian public. They want
to continue the sharing. But Nigerians have a choice, to allow them have
their way or remain alert. Since the 1970s, we have been allowing those
who are interesting in “chopping” our national cake to be at the helm
of affairs. But where are those who have the capability of baking more
cakes? When shall we allow them to take charge of our nation? My fear is
that one day with continuous “chopping”, there may be no more cake to
cut. We must remain vigilant. 2015 will be what we make it!
Photo Credit: Segun Awosanya
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