The legend of King Rehoboam BY ENO IKPE 08023560727. sentinelres 2 @ gmail “This is my last anniversary celebration with you (as governor of the state) but I’m challenging Akwa Ibom children, the future belongs to you, not your elders. Your fathers have done their bits, don’t look at them. It is time to do positive rebellion, rise up and protect your future… Watch them, don’t emulate them. These lines were credited to the governor of our dear state, Chief (Dr) Godswill Obot Akpabio CON and I believe that he was correctly quoted. And I listened with stunned amazement as he was addressing school children and wards still under watch by their parents and guardians, elders. The future belongs to them, not the elders. True words, as the Igbo would transliterate and interject (eziokwu) “Watch them, don’t emulate them”. Is that right? But even for the right, the children should not emulate the elders? All these free counseling because of some elders who disagree with the governor’s succession plan, as if his plan has been vouchsafed impeccable by God Himself, as if the governor can do no wrong. The questions can go on without end. I am reminded of what I once heard one of the popular television evangelists in Uyo who has also recently wended his way to the bossom of the governor, tell his predominantly youthful congregation: If your father tells you anything contrary to what I tell you, disobey your father. He did not specify whether it pertained to ecclesiastical or other matters. With such teaching, is it any wonder that disobedience of biological parents by their children is on the ascendency, since these children now find in their churches some farcical “daddy” and sometimes “mummy” to whom they owe greater allegiance, especially if they are “prophets” and “apostles” And yet these would criticize the Catholic for designating their ministers “father” This is by the way. This essay is entitled “The Legend of King Rehoboam” not as if the authentic Bible story of King Rehoboam is a legend, but I chose the title purely for poetry. This story is one of the most pathetic chapters in Jewish history; that the kingdom of Israel divided over the uncouth, unguarded, callous, ill-advised, inflammatory reply to a simple request, of an incipient king on the advice of his peers. It is found in 1Kings 12. The synopsis of it is that on the day Rehoboam, son of Solomon was crowned king of Israel, a group that had been estranged against his father Solomon and had fled to Egypt for the duration of his reign, returned on the advent of Rehoboam his son as king and merely entreated that he should make the yoke on them lighter than his father burdened them with and they would serve him. He asked them to go back and return for an answer after three days. He sought advice from both his elders and his peers. The very apt Living Bible commentary on this event has it that “Rehoboam refused to listen to the advice of his elders, preferring instead the advice of his peers. In doing this, Rehoboam cut himself off from the vast experience that his elders had gained over the years. As a result of Rehoboam’s placing this foolish confidence in his peers, the people of Israel rebelled against his rule”. To thy tents oh Israel, the people exclaimed and the kingdom of Israel divided. The rest is now history. What, if one may ask, is this spiraling tendency to play the youths against the elders in this terminal stage of the reign of (King) Governor Godswill Akpabio? Writing on “Another of Governor Akpabio’s Uncommon Tactical Error” I had tagged this tendency a potential land mine. The more I think of it, the more convinced I become of the obvious futility of this development as a political expediency. Elders are in types. There are some who, as Edmund Freud said of his father, had stopped living long before he died: This was not because of any physical debilitating ailment, but because he had shot his heart and mind to new ideas, lapsed into indifference about everything and anything around and about him. Such elders as we find here are the complacent and the contented, who feel that they had done enough for society, whereas the fact is: so much to do, so little done, as a sage once lamented. On the other hand, there are elders, in the words of Geoffrey Letham “to whom the past is not fixed but is always open to new interpretations as fresh experiences are added to it. The old patterns have to be changed to accommodate the latest information and new wholes have to be formed. Similarly with life, the individual who is expanding psychologically is always achieving new synthesis, much as science does, and he is continually becoming more and more himself as he climbs the infinite spiral of progress”. Why then are the elders of Akwa Ibom State expected to stop living before they die, all for political convenience and space? Let the youths note that only an elder who has misapplied his youth as many youths are doing today for obvious reasons, find old age a regret, ageing and old age a burden. This shows rather too soon physically, psychically. For others, it is a delightful harvest time. Let it be conceded that some of the elders may have been the accomplices who in the days past had helped to create the causes that are today’s effects. This is because, in the words of Elizabeth M. Duffie, culled from “Sunrise magazine of June 1964, “no individual, dictator or tyrant included, has ever seized the reins of power single-handedly with all the rest, mere spectator victims. Everyone has had a hand in it to some extent.” The relevant reference of this to our contemporary situation in Akwa Ibom State is too obvious for restating by me in this short essay. Even Jesus the Christ spoke so authoritatively about His Father’s house with many mansions, because He was not speaking from hearsay. He came from there. So these elders know what exactly they are complaining about because they had once been part of the system. “The initiative which prompts the decisions and actions of many public figures is the product of a large store of memories of previous experiences - their own and those of others - which can be linked in a meaningful way with the present situation… The principles on which you can base your answers (to critical issues) are to be found by reference to the past, just as much as in today’s trial and error. By making use of the knowledge our forefathers gathered and applying it in such a form as to fit today’s changed environment, we can face problems with stout hearts. This does not mean that we should dwell the past, but only that we should look to it for anything that will make our way more certain”. The predominance of youths in politics and governance in Akwa Ibom State has perplexed both. Let us compare the regime of Arc (Obong ) Victor Attah in all of eight years with the present one of Governor Akpabio, “government of the youth, by the youth for all” as they are heard swaggering, barring physical transformation which is relative to the funds available. Right from the days of nationalistic struggle in Nigeria, it had never been a gerontocratic affair. This is acknowledged. Youth were fully in active participation, but the elders called the shots and shouted the order, fire, and the youth obeyed. If the current slogan is that the youth have spoken, it then means that the elders should hold their peace, their views are inconsequential, forget their rantings; they have expired. Ibibio forebears had a saying translated to mean that when a war breaks out, the first order is: kill the elders. When the war gets messy and heated, the order is: find the elders to wave the palm fronds. Governor Akpabio and others who listen to him should, please, note. Finally, no man goes to war at old age. No recruiting Regimental Sergeant Major (the dreaded RSM) would even look at him twice. So, let the youths go to war and let the elders philosophize on warfare for the benefit of the youths if they care. The elders had themselves seen wars and they know what it involves. Unfortunately, as far back as 1964, someone had observed that “the wrong kind of idealism is being nurtured in the minds of today’s youth; that it appears that the youths of democratic powers have a waning patriotism” At no other time in the history of democracy have youths of this state been so disoriented, filled with warped ethical values as in the present administration of Gov. Godswill Akpabio, and there is no end in sight. Even so, since today’s youths will be the elders of tomorrow, just as the elders of today were yesterday’s youths, there has got to be an equilibrium, a synergy between the youths and the elders as happens in all civilized polities even in Nigeria, if there will be tomorrow.
Posted on: Fri, 10 Oct 2014 00:46:20 +0000
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