Nigeria on the journeyman’s walk

By Sunny Ikhioya

IT is a new year. As usual, people have started appraising year 2019 that has gone forever. The new year ushers in a new decade of the twenty-twenties. But will it be the beginning of new realities? Will it be one in which our dream, as it concerns one united and prosperous Nigeria, will be realised?

Or are we continuing on the journeyman’s march that has been on since 1960? Journeyman, by the way, is the term given to a man who has completed his apprenticeship, but because he does not have the necessary wherewithals continues to serve as an employee under a master until enabled to set up his own business. That is the story of Nigeria: so much potentials, so much skills and human capital, as well as natural resources, but with no driver.

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Will the new decade usher in the very badly expected change given the way the country has been run these past decades? If our expectations are low, what is to be done? That will be our challenge. The first question, however, is: was the situation we have found ourselves today foreseen and foretold? If yes, did we listen?

It is said that knowing and identifying a problem is getting it half solved, but when we continue to remain in denial, how do we proffer solutions? The running of this country, with its estimated 200 million population, is in the hands of a handful of people, maybe, not more than 1000 in population. Consider the percentage and you will know the consequences of what a handful  caused for the country.

If their decisions are noble, the nation will enjoy bountiful progress, but if it is otherwise the people will suffer.

Nations exist to make positive progress; that is how it is in the world. The only thing that is constant is change and the change should ideally be for the better; if it is not, then something is wrong. If ours is not going the right way, then there are issues and these issues must be addressed before we can move forward. Our leadership must have entrepreneurial qualities to enable the country make profit in its business dealings and therefore survive.

Leadership must also be ready to accept when things are going wrong and reverse the decisions that are not making  the country, as an enterprise, to move forward. Where do we stand between these two? If we have not been able to move forward progressively, in other words, if there are so much discontents in the land and majority of the people tilting towards poverty, then something is wrong. The leadership must be sincere and open enough to accept the fact that these issues exist and must look into them before we can make progress.

Are leaders in government ready to accept this model? Are they ready to accept the fact that our present political situation is dysfunctional because we cannot conduct free and fair elections without bringing about deaths and disasters to the people?

Are they ready to accept the fact that, in the past four years or more, not one election in the country has been conducted conclusively? These questions are necessary because a peaceful polity ushers in an environment for growth in almost all aspects of the society and if peace is absent, then we are heading towards nowhere.

We cannot make progress in an environment where aircraft are used to chase out lawful voters, as it happened in the Kogi State guber election of 2019. Has our leadership operated in the ideal manner these past few years? We must be very honest in our appraisals and not bring in sentiments.

We must be able to pinpoint where our fault lies. When you go around looking for faults, instead of focusing on the challenges, you will never get a positive result. Check out the records: those who give excuses for their failures do not deliver on their promises. Are we now ready to focus squarely on our challenges? I believe that is the best way to start our revival.

The challenges of insecurity and all of its likes are the product of a foundation based on injustice. If a people rise up and say they do not want to be part of the union, then something is wrong and we must root out the cause of the rebellion. This is how true leadership is separated from the rest.

President Muhammadu Buhari promised the world that he will toe the path of true leadership when he came in, but along the way, he appears to have derailed from that path. Will he effect the necessary corrections so that a firm foundation will be set for the decade? It is left for him and his cabinet, but we must take note of the fact that no society is sustained on injustice, parochialism and nepotism; it is only a matter of time before such edifice will crumble.

When you begin to overlook the people and fill positions that are supposed to be shared equitably with your relations, you will think that you are doing them a favour; but you are only helping those you have sidelined to develop survival attributes.

The nation of Israel is on record to be the most abused, discriminated, brutalised and persecuted in the world, apart from the Black race. But where are they today? Adversity has made them to become ingenious.

When the president allows some people to read medicine with a JAMB score of 180, while others with 300 are rejected, what type of foundation is he laying? He should not forget that the future sustenance of a country will not be dependent on government alone as people are now being taught to be free and independent because of the situation such discriminations have caused.

This leads us to the proposed hate speech bill. We advise proponents to remember that those who introduced the guillotine during the French Revolution of 1789 all died through the same guillotine. Omoyele Sowore has just been released from detention, who will be next? Those who are guiltless among the Yes men of today, should cast the first stone. Robert Greene in his book The 33 Strategies of War, noted: “Civilized values are not furthered if we are forced to surrender to those who are crafty and strong. In fact, being pacifists in the face of such wolves is the source of endless tragedy”.

The choice is ours: with a transparent, peaceful, detribalised environment, there will be no need for the hate speech bill. The truth will always prevail, or else we continue on the journeyman’s path.

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