TIME TO GROW UP @53 Another National Day celebration, the 53rd in the series was marked last Tuesday across the Nigerian nation, understandably in low-key fashion, obviously in view of current, challenges on all fronts. Usually, times like this call for sober reflections and stock-taking, to see how well Nigeria have fared as a nation. The point as to whether Nigeria has anything to celebrate or not often yields to the argument that since the Nigerian state remains as one, that is something to celebrate. True, the nation has survived threats of disintegration in the shape of a 30-month civil war; political turmoil following the annulment of the June 12, 1993 Presidential election, coups and counter-coups, sectarian violence and the on-going war on terrorism, etc. However, based on the current global realities, it is no longer enough to point to the corporate survival of our country, in the face of the challenges of nationhood, as the main achievement worth celebrating over and over again as we have been doing in the last couple of years, with little else to show case. Indeed, to rejoice every now and then over the existence of a nation beside anything else, is to admit a self-defeatist stance of stagnation, in the midst of a fiercely competitive global economic environment. We should never succumb to the deceitful argument of the corrupt ruling elites who try to justify their hold on power by saying, “well; we have kept the nation together all this while. Nigerians now demand much more than that. We ask our rulers to up-the-ante, and take this resource-endowed nation into the league of vibrant, performing economies, where it rightly belongs. In the 56 years since oil was discovered at Oloibiri in the Niger-Delta, we have earned $800 billion, twelve times more than what the American government used to rebuild Europe after it was devastated by the Second World War. Buried in our soil is 100 trillion cubit feet of natural gas, much of which is flared daily. We have 35 billion barrels of oil reserves; and despite producing two million barrels of crude oil per day, 70 percent of our people still live below the poverty line. The reason is not far-fetched. According to Transparency International, Nigeria is ranked 172nd worst in terms of international financial corruption among 215 nations surveyed. It has been estimated that half of our oil revenue since independence has been siphoned by the governing cabal, who funnel such black money into private bank accounts in Switzerland, the United States and Dubai. This economic sclerosis accounts for our failing infrastructure, as no investment is made on them because our oil revenue is shared among our ruling elites who recycle such funds abroad. As we mark 53 years of independence, our elected politicians must be asked what they want us to celebrate, when 112 million Nigerians live on less than $2 dollar per day in an economy in which many Governors own private jets, even when the nation has no functional national airline, or other basic infrastructures. Enough of rejoicing over the status quo. It is time to grow up. The leadership paradigm must shift. It cannot continue to be business as usual. Our state governments say they cannot pay the national minimum wage of N18,500.00, but our law makers are ranked as the highest paid in the world. So high are their wages, that they are too scared or ashamed to disclose the figure. For more than three months now, our university lecturers have been on strike over welfare-related issues and failure of government to fund education. Top government functionaries say if the demand of the lecturers which is put at about N98 billion naira are met, state operations would be paralyzed. But government is able to pay our legislators and the bloated wage bills of Presidential aides. The issues here are very complex. No one should expect any serious development by a government which spends two-thirds of its national budget on the executive and legislative arms. Based on this financial profile, and with rampant corruption going on under the watch of President Goodluck Jonathan, the present stagnation should not be a surprise. Let the ruling cabal act fast to redeem this country by providing honest, progressive leadership, otherwise, the Arab spring type change may not be far way. Arab dictators were secured in the thinking that they could oppress their people forever without much resistance, until the tsunami came from nowhere and blew them away overnight. Some of the Arab dictators like Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi was killed in disgrace, while others like Tunisia’s Ben Ali and Yemen’s Abdallah Saleh fled into exile. Syria’s Bashar Al-Assad is still fighting the battle of his life. Our elected politicians should learn from the bitter lessons of these guys and sit up. Where the leaders allow the people to initiate change, mob rule normally follows, and such abnomalities come with grave consequences. It is better to change the power paradigm from the top, than to allow the masses reach the point where, as is the case in Egypt presently, they launch a revolution they can’t manage. Nigeria is too big to allow such a dangerous scenario to play out, after all what we’ve been through at 53.
Posted on: Mon, 07 Oct 2013 20:29:53 +0000
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