That was what happened recently when, after ten days abroad, I came back to realize that the senate was still screening ministerial nominees. I had thought that we had some seriously urgent work to do here in Nigeria. I had thought that we were in the era of total transformation. But I was wrong. I listened to Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba talking about the rejection of Obadiah Ando as ministerial nominee from Taraba State. He talked about ‘lessons learnt’ from Obadiah’s rejection, saying, ‘Nigerians had just learnt a great lesson from that rejection and that lesson is that YOU SHOULD ALWAYS SEEK THE SUPPORT OF SENATORS FROM YOUR STATE’. Wow! So, in this era of transformation, what matters most is for transformational ministers to kowtow to the wishes and caprices of ‘SENATORS FROM THEIR STATES’?
The next NTA news item was still on the same Ndoma-Egba (he must have had a very busy day). This time, he was talking about legislative remunerations. And he was emphatic! ‘WE HAVE NOT REDUCED OUR SALARIES!’, he announced! I did another double-take. I thought Nigerians wanted them to reduce their salaries. As if to answer my questions, Ndoma-Egba offered an explanation; ‘What we have reduced is the overhead expenses of legislators. Our salaries remain the same because we earn the same as SUPREME COURT JUDGES AND MINISTERS’. Ha! Haba! Chineke mee! I exclaimed in three major Nigerian languages. What was this guy talking about? I had a guy who was two or three years my junior in university in the House of Reps up till recently. A few of the Senators will probably have left university same time as me (20 years ago). Why did this chap think it is justified for them to earn the same with Supreme Court Justices, who are old, wizened men and women, who still have to work like horses. What do they do in the legislative houses apart from debate inanities, dress flamboyantly and occasionally engage in fisticuff. For that do they deserve to be paid the same as ministers who oversee whole ministries? I think there is some mental disconnect going on over here.
Somewhere in the midst of the news came this beautiful female Senator from Taraba State – the same state as Obadiah Ando. She said something to the effect that Ando’s rejection is a victory (for democracy?), and that people should ask Ando if he did anything for Taraba in his first coming. Another ‘surprisation’ for me (apologies to Zebrudaya). So being a minister, in the age of transformation and Fresh Air, is about what you can do for your village? Where then are we going to find the national and global vision required to power Nigeria into its rightful place? Oh sorry, I forgot that we intend to dance our way into development.
I recently leafed through a newspaper left on my table after my long absence, and about 30 pages of that newspaper was dedicated to birthday greetings for Governor Liyel Imoke. I said to myself ‘uhmm, that is it!’. Welcome to status quo. I bet that nothing will change in the next four years and the government will look for whom to blame. We simply misallocate our funds. All those people falling over themselves to congratulate Imoke on turning 50, have taken the funds one way or another, from the coffers of the state. If we do not change the culture of self-aggrandisement, we cannot move an inch towards development in this country. If people in government know the task before them, they will know that this is a time like no other, for a great mobilization of the people, and for serious hardwork by all. This is a time to reorientate Nigerians like was done in Buhari’s first coming in 1983.
I have said enough about how the government places too much emphasis on the financing of musicians, comedians and Nollywood. We are a nation of entertainers – dancers, singers, actors. No one is producing anything. We simply import what we need from abroad. But what about the way we respond to changes in our environment? I ran into the definition of economic development by Walter Rodney as contained in his epic book ‘How Europe Underdeveloped Africa’. The definition itself shows that we may be our own worst enemies, not the Europeans. Hear; ‘(Economic Development is), a people’s increased capacity for dealing with the environment… which is dependent on the extent to which they understand the laws of nature (science), on the extent to which they put that understanding into practice by devising tools (technology), and on the manner in which work is organized’.
So, when I received a call from a relative in Lagos, castigating me for not calling them because of the flood, and saying that Jesus is in control, I couldn’t help but think that we are under-evolved as a specie. We have refused to know our environments and to fashion tools ourselves, to deal with the challenges thrown by our environment. We wait on God for everything. And allow other men who are wiser to play God in our lives. It is in that same Lagos that couldn’t withstand four days of rain that they are selling lands reclaimed from the sea at N400million. All the so-called ‘big-boys’ have invested heavily there. Someone then posted a blog, asking what if a tsunami happened in Lagos? My people will shout ‘God forbid!’ But let’s leave God out of it for a moment. Many of the now frequently-occurring tsunamis are caused by deep-sea underwater nuclear testing by powerful countries. Who knows if one day, when the tectonic plates of the earth, deep at sea shifts, the water will come our way? Will we call that an act of God?
Two things have distinguished great peoples from the not-so-great ones (like us). Those are DOCUMENTATION (the keeping of records and by extension, history), and INNOVATION (the use of creative thinking to solve problems peculiar to society). At this ‘transformational time’ in our history, it so happens that these two issues are not on the card at all. To cap it all, Nigeria won – for the third time in a row – the Big Brother Africa show, which is a celebration of idleness, perversion and nothingness. The winner, Karen, will be visiting the president by the time you read this. Talk about transforming Nigeria.
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