Whither Northern Nigeria?

Over the course of the last quarter of a century of the ongoing Fourth Republic, since 1999, the practicing Northern politicians have all but systematically guaranteed that there are no respected elders or leaders of thought in the North anymore.

With that decidedly deliberate singular mission successfully accomplished, they likewise went on to systematically discredit the traditional institutions, alongside their respected rulers in almost similar fashion.

Thereafter, the same politicians equally dragged the Ulama, or the religious leaders, into the murky waters of their corruption-infested and morally bankrupt political space, such that the latter have effectively lost the respect and admiration of the population, along with their hitherto familiar age-old vice-like grip on the society.

Now, the long-abandoned masses are finally beginning to come to terms with the sad reality that the modern-day politicians are, in fact, the ‘real enemy’ on the ground, and are now beginning to explore a veritable means of exacting the dreaded proverbial revenge of the masses, by way of an unfortunate and ill-advised potential mass revolt that is always feared under such circumstances.

But the inexorable consequence of the actions of the politicians is that we no longer have the usual three-pronged fallback trident in the form of our respected community elders, traditional, and/or religious institutions in place to collectively rein in the aggrieved masses.

The teeming masses, as we all very well know – and we sure have them in their millions up North – are driven by their emotions, for the most part, rather than by any rational thought in their own reasoning and resulting actions. But, over the years, the politicians have progressively emasculated the familiar voices of reason that have always been relied upon to caution and make them see reason.

The Western-style democracy that we have now come to embrace for the entirety of the last 25 unbroken years of the Fourth Republic has obviously not been copied and pasted properly by our active politicians. This is particularly so here in Northern Nigeria, where the vast majority of the leading lights amongst its practitioners, with admittedly very few exceptions here and there, have largely turned out to be not only people without genuine leadership credentials, but also lacking in the required moral code that is essential for purposeful leadership.

To, therefore, formally conclude that our practicing politicians have been for us the equivalent of the proverbial bull in a China shop may not be far from the reality, truth be told; reason being that they have effectively succeeded in systematically destroying the very essence of the social fabric that has historically held our fragile society together and served it well for ages.

The final determination as to whether this objectionable act of theirs was by accident or design is still up in the air. But the fact of the matter is that they have slowly, yet meticulously, destroyed our social fabric, one strand after another. And we are all paying for such an unforgettable and unconscionable act of indiscretion on their part – all in the name of practicing their preferred peculiar and patented brand of politics.

Sadly, the chickens are finally coming home to roost, and our society has inexorably been the worse for it.

Hopefully, our politicians are now beginning to see and appreciate the full extent of the negative side of their continuing neglect of our gullible population that they have refused to educate and provide with life-enhancing skills, in the form of the latest rounds of the hitherto unimaginable violent reactions during the ongoing protests in some of our states.

The same thugs whose services you love to engage for your familiar shenanigans during elections, and those teeming idle minds you perennially manipulate for your electoral benefits every four years, can equally be induced to inflict incalculable damage on the larger society during these kinds of wild protests that may very well have been engineered from God-knows-where!

Talking generally this time around, our past false steps in the form of the continuing parental neglect for our children over the course of the last several decades are finally coming back to haunt and cause us predictable problems.

When parents in their millions fail to provide the required care, parental guidance and moral upbringing for the cherished children they have consciously brought into this world, it is only a matter of time before the entire society begins to reap its reserved comeuppance for such a profound neglect.

And when the inevitable begins to manifest, no one will be exempted from the wrath of these long-abandoned children, including our hitherto sacred places of worship, as we have just witnessed in the last few days.

May Allah SWT grant us the much-needed presence of mind and wherewithal to turn the corner at this critical and defining moment for all of us and make the necessary amends, before we all get consumed in the end. And every single parent has an important role to play in that regard, including everyone else in the neighbourhood.

That is what used to be the case when we were growing up; where your neighbour felt free to discipline you even before your own parents got to know about the specific nature of the wrong you might have committed to deserve the punishment. And the parents were very happy and appreciative of that, with no questions asked.

That way, our parents and grandparents collectively succeeded in putting the society in check with minimal fuss, and we need to begin to retrace our steps to revisit and reenact those good old practices, once again, in our own collective best interest.

 Usman wrote from Abuja