SORRY FOR NIGERIA



By GEORGE ELIJAH OTUMU

IF my eyes no deceive me, and na true be dis man ear dey ear, Politicians and Soldiers make meeting; our country dey want repair, dem dey take life say, dem no no, na dem spoil our country so, as dem dabaru am dey go, so my people dey follow o, I Sorry, sorry o, I sorry for Nigeria, I Sorry sorry o, I sorry for Africa…

The above hit track titled ‘Sorry, Sorry’, from an album ‘Black Man Know Yourself’ released by Femi Anikulapo Kuti, a-two time Grammy award nominee and heir apparent to Abami Eda, Fela, deeply captures the plethora of problems and constitutional crisis that nearly set the most populous black nation in the world on fire. Femi’s song decries the disaster of Nigeria and by extension, Africa's sad and bloody political history caused by sit-tight leaders who would rather ‘die’ in power than allow the constitution to have its way.

In Nigeria, leadership and firm control of power has become a ‘do or die’, in a bid to remain relevant in the corridor of power. Take the instance of the bedridden and ailing President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua who had been wired up in a life oxygen machine and hidden away in one of the floors of King Faisal Specialist Hospital, Jeddah in Saudi Arabia. Turai, a power drunk woman who married Umaru Yar'Adua in 1975, and had five daughters and two sons could go any leght to hold onto power, inspite of the dying health of her ‘beloved husband’.

Turai has been so desperate to bark-out orders at the corridors of power that she gave out one of her daughters, Zainab, in marriage to Usman Saidu Nasamu Dakingari, Governor of Kebbi State, a man with many wives. The First Lady, as Turai enjoys being called got into her head to the extent that she barred immediate brothers and sisters of the sickly president from having access to their ‘brother’. Turai has forgotten that Yar’Adua may be her husband, but he has become a public property, the moment he emerged President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. And by law, Nigerians are entitled to know everything regarding the lifestyles and helath of their leader. Nigerians cannot be kept in the dark anylonger because it is their right to know, not a privelege or favour at her terms.

Nigerians felt sorry for themselves and the country, when information reached us that King Fahd’s palace potocol are the ones exclusively empowered by the King of Saudi Arabia to determine who sees Yar’Adua. Only recently, facts revealed that there was nothing of such, but doctors, under the strict instructions of Turai had been barring Nigerians, no matter how highly placed from seeing Yar’Adua, who had lost 30kg weight and becomes dehydrated.

The situation is even made worse by the relocation of Michael Kaase Aondoakaa, the deposed Attorney General of Federation and Minister of Justice who had to relocate to a permanent hotel in Saudi Arabia, where he coordinates campaign to ensure that Yar’Adua holds onto power at all cost, under the strict supervision of Turai.

Aondoakaa by all his actions has become the worst Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice since the nation’s independence. Also, he has become the most loathed and ignoble member of the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, for turning law and logic upside down. This former law officer swore to uphold the constitution and not loyal to Yar’Adua. Posterity would surely judge him.

Almost all the phasets of the nation’s economy is crumbling under power failure, yet all our four rifeneries have refused to function optimally because of some ‘cabal’- powerful forces in the corridor of power who are direct importers of generators into Nigeria. On several occassions, fumes from all these generators have killed families, while the health hazard associated with the ‘carbon’ emmited from the exhaust of the generators are instant killers.

Yar’Adua promised to declare a state-of-emergency on the power sector immediately he came to power, but time has only proven that it was all halucination of Aso Rock. May be Yar’Adua had forgotten that while he was governor of Katsina State, Turai normally lightened lantern and candle whenever Power Holding Company, held back electricity.

How about food crisis in the country? Farmers are now denied funds by financial institutions to grow plantation and crops for the country, while few chief executives looted their banks dry, in the face of inflation. Many homes in Nigeria today can hardly boast of three square meals, even as their parents forcefully embrace fasting for divine solution to their problems. United Nations recently confirmed that Nigerians live on below 100 dollar per day.

As a way of survival, many of our pupils now hawk either ‘pure water, garri, palm oil or bread’ in the morning early before they go to their schools. And in the course of this, some unlucky teenagers, particularly girls are abused and made pregnant by irreponsible adults, that have wasted their lives away in their childhood. Today, the society is faced with so many deliquents and moral decadence by way of prostitution, armed robbery, militancy and kidnapping which has become the order of the day. What manner of country are we living in? I am sorry for Nigeria.

Our tertiary and secondary schools are not immuned from this social crises, where cultism and hooligalism has become a way of life. Painfully, most of our youths of today, expected to be the future leaders of the country are daily distracted by the crisis plaguing the nation.

My eyes are moist in tears each time I encounter graduates of the nation’s institutions who are bus conductors and ‘okada riders’. Will you blame them? They have to survivie.

But, how did Nigeria allow herself to become object of ridicule and butt of jokes in foreign circles and among Western cartoonists? Greed, corruption, kleptocracy and lost for power by leaders led Nigeria into this mess. From all indications, I am sorry for Nigeria.

Otumu, Associate Editor, Scroll Magazine wrote in via elijahotumu@yahoo.com