He cuts the image of someone torn between two loyalties:
one to his good self (simple, modest, gentle and guileless),and the
other to his primordial constituency. With the latter, he is emboldened
and empowered as he acquires the guile needed for engagement with the
increasingly hostile world. In that frame, loyalty to the country does
not feature, and if it does it is only in a transposed context,one
mistaken for the other.
In a national space where enduring and strong institutions do not exist, and are not encouraged, the stage is set for anything goes; it’s an open-sesame for looting spree and unbridled corruption. Minister after minister is exposed for recklessness and impunity in the abuse of office and mismanagement of resources. Pretty mesdames sway hips embroiled in scandals of armoured state-of-the-art automobiles purchased at mind-boggling and improbable sums, or of the flow of oil into thin air; oil that would a million lives have nourished. The helpless and hapless president withdraws into his own world of succour in liquor, waiting and hoping for things to ride.
Then one we know but needless to mention, whose past deeds (and non-deeds) should’ve made him bury his head in shame, to be heard from only at the risk of being stoned to death, jumps up, a troll, playing his customary Mr. All-knowing and Mr. Innocent rolled in one self. He finds his voice and cocks his head as he unleashes an 18-page unsolicited “save-the-nation” missive, full of vitriol but typically totally self-serving. Nonetheless, even in the evil he portends, unintended good doth reside, for the alarm of an evil does not get ignored simply because it is raised by an evildoer!
Then into the morass jumps another, a madam sired by the former, one bearing his looks but possessed of far higher learning. When I first learnt of her 12 or more-page missive to her cranky father, I was dismissive of it. “O, well, what else would you expect of a dysfunctional family,” I had said. For was this not the same family from which the son had charged the father, even as a sitting president, of indecent affair with the daughter-in-law, adduced in court towards a plea for dissolution of his marriage?
In a national space where enduring and strong institutions do not exist, and are not encouraged, the stage is set for anything goes; it’s an open-sesame for looting spree and unbridled corruption. Minister after minister is exposed for recklessness and impunity in the abuse of office and mismanagement of resources. Pretty mesdames sway hips embroiled in scandals of armoured state-of-the-art automobiles purchased at mind-boggling and improbable sums, or of the flow of oil into thin air; oil that would a million lives have nourished. The helpless and hapless president withdraws into his own world of succour in liquor, waiting and hoping for things to ride.
Then one we know but needless to mention, whose past deeds (and non-deeds) should’ve made him bury his head in shame, to be heard from only at the risk of being stoned to death, jumps up, a troll, playing his customary Mr. All-knowing and Mr. Innocent rolled in one self. He finds his voice and cocks his head as he unleashes an 18-page unsolicited “save-the-nation” missive, full of vitriol but typically totally self-serving. Nonetheless, even in the evil he portends, unintended good doth reside, for the alarm of an evil does not get ignored simply because it is raised by an evildoer!
Then into the morass jumps another, a madam sired by the former, one bearing his looks but possessed of far higher learning. When I first learnt of her 12 or more-page missive to her cranky father, I was dismissive of it. “O, well, what else would you expect of a dysfunctional family,” I had said. For was this not the same family from which the son had charged the father, even as a sitting president, of indecent affair with the daughter-in-law, adduced in court towards a plea for dissolution of his marriage?
But to the woman’s missive I lent my heart, for her cry was pitiful – a
merciless disrobing and disavowal of a father, one even she had once
eloquently pleaded for the country to make president.
Then a running theatre ensues; theatre of the absurd. Someone said the madam’s letter was a forgery, another shot up to declaim the disclaimer. Yes, it was written by her; no it wasn’t; yes, it was; no, it wasn’t…and the denials and counter denials are still running!
The mess of an equally dysfunctional country continues with large decampment (I-don-port o!) from one party to another ahead of the 2015 general elections and warlords and opposing warlords swearing to set the whole country ablaze rather than lose the oil (honey)-pot. Insecurity – from mindless kidnappings through heartless armed robberies to senseless terrorism of Boko Haramists – and poverty rule the land.
There are no groups of elders in the land, elders who can be counted upon as repositories and guardians of the best values and development of the country. None. What a big mess!...
Then a running theatre ensues; theatre of the absurd. Someone said the madam’s letter was a forgery, another shot up to declaim the disclaimer. Yes, it was written by her; no it wasn’t; yes, it was; no, it wasn’t…and the denials and counter denials are still running!
The mess of an equally dysfunctional country continues with large decampment (I-don-port o!) from one party to another ahead of the 2015 general elections and warlords and opposing warlords swearing to set the whole country ablaze rather than lose the oil (honey)-pot. Insecurity – from mindless kidnappings through heartless armed robberies to senseless terrorism of Boko Haramists – and poverty rule the land.
There are no groups of elders in the land, elders who can be counted upon as repositories and guardians of the best values and development of the country. None. What a big mess!...
Nearer home, the example that still resonates in the Nigerian with
relish is that of Ghana’s Jerry Rawlings who at 31 staged a coup d’etat
in Ghana in 1979 and went on to execute a number of top-ranking Ghanaian
political leaders in what he described as a purge of Ghanaian society
of all the corruption and social injustices bedeviling the country. Many Nigerians still wonder if a Rawlings treatment may not be the answer to their own country’s stagnation if not retrogression.
To be continued...
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