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On Soludo and the North By Oduogu Okpo
Some of our countrymen who reside in what we all refer to as Northern Nigeria have just proved me right once again. As soon as I read the comment made by Professor Chukwuma Soludo somewhere in Kaduna some time ago to the effect that Northern leaders should be held responsible for the poverty in the region, I knew that hell would be let loose on the poor and unduly bashed Govenor of the Central Bank of Nigeria. And like I had expected, all manner of reactions have trailed the comment. First the Northern Governors have come up with sarcastic response and the elders of the region under the auspices of the Arewa Consultaive Forum (ACF) have also responded in an expectedly mature manner. During my trip to Abuja last week, I bought Leadership and Daily Trust newspapers and I found them replete with all kinds of insults and tantrums on Soludo. And on the internet, it was total war on one single man and his comment.
This is essentially the main problem with Nigerians. The way a typical Nigerian will react to a criticism is, like one philosopher said, “to provide an answer to a question only by first knowing who has asked it”. Although every part of our country has its own share of the collective folly of our nationhood, including poverty and corruption. In Anambra, Soludo’s home state, there is poverty. Indeed as I look at the poverty figures again, almost 25% of Soludo’s kinsmen are below the national poverty line. Here in Abia, it is much worse than in Anambra, but in no way near the figures in the North. The poverty level in the North is peculiar and it requires a peculiar response not brick-bats. The earlier we all accept it and swallow our pride, then the earlier we can begin to honestly plan to confront it. It is in the nature of Nigerians all over the world to arrogantly present themselves much better than they are in reality. Solutions to life’s problems do not come in arrogance, they come in humility. Poor governance is the bane of Nigeria today. In all parts of the country, , there have been failed attempts at governance, but the situation in the North is not exactly what it is in most other parts of the South. This should be of great concern to all Nigerians if we still profess one country. Since after the death of the Ahmadu Bello, Sadauna of Sokoto (May God bless his soul) and after the era of the Aminu Kanos and Balarabe Musas I have hardly heard of any determined effort at purposeful governance in the North.
From the newspaper cuttings I made last week, almost every Northerner that has written on Soludo has poured invectives on him and called him names. Yet, not one of the commentators has offered any better statistic on the poverty challenge either in the North or in the entire country. It will be helpful for instance to know if what Soludo said about poverty in the North was not borne out by credible research or whether he only drew attention to a fact that most of these writers have conveniently chosen to ignore in the past. I also see a large dose of naiveté in the whole episode. Soludo’s critique of the Northern elite should have provided the needed opportunity for the same elite to put forward an argument for a special Federal attention on the poverty in the North. But none will have that. They will rather ask for Soludo’s head on a spike, or that he be sacked and/or that the position he occupies, that is, the CBN Governor’s seat, be delivered to them in fine leather. Not one person has offered any alternative source of the massive poverty in the North and how this can be tackled. The nearest thing to such effort was the conference organised some time last year by The Leadership newspaper on the De-Industrialisation of the North. Why is it that all the states that are contiguous to the sahel region are recording high incidences of poverty? Is in the geography, culture, people, governance, or just the accident of history? If the country became independent in 1960 and all the regions and states started sending their people to school and training them in the various skills, why is there so much differential in the level of literacy and skills between the North and the South?
I have read Ishaq Modibbo Kawu, Garba Deen Muhammad, Abubakar Sadeeque Abba, Kabiru Mato, and others, they are only lashing out at Soludo and none is discussing the issues raised on poverty. The writers enumerated above do not even understand what the average Northern person goes through. They appear to me to be the mouth-piece of the elite. They are the ones who insist that Soludo must be banished and that the North must control the CBN in order to eradicate poverty in the North.
When I was in service and even now as I make my business trips,I have met Northern young people who are angry with the state of the region. They are the ones whom we read were hailing Soludo at the Kaduna speech. They are the ones that will possess the courage and moral strength to confront the subject of Soludo’s speech and react to it in a positive sense. They have interacted with their age mates in Nigeria and abroad, they have decided never to accept a system that subjugates them without reason. They yearn for a system that will allow them to ask questions about stolen public money and a betrayed social contract. They are impatient with those who think that the way to grow is through government contracts and unproductive rent. They are well educated and world-class-skilled like Sanusi Lamido who has justifiably and competently taken charge of First Bank Nigeria PLC.. They are the new developers in Abuja. They are building factories and linking up with their peers in Dubai and Johannesburg. They are not asking that Government should go back to introduce regional banking so that they can use political links to steal from poor depositors. In a nutshell, they do not want to be spoon-fed.
This crop of leaders in the North will like to put the blame where it belongs – the elite. Danjuma said it, Babangida Aliu has said it. Norther leaders have failed their people! There is no other way of saying this in English. The main problem this time appears to be that it is Soludo who has said it. A man alleged by the same Northern elite to have impoverished the North through the bank consolidation programme. No politician, either in the North or in the South has had the effrontery to publicly say what Soludo has said. No traditional ruler in the North or South has had the gut to say so. It takes courage and forthrightness to tell truth. Part of the problem also appears to be that Soludo has told the truth repeatedly.
As I read through a copy of Sunday Trust I bought as I left Abuja last Sunday, I see its motto as “Truth is a Burden”. The burden of truth must continue to be on the Northern elite until they do something about the brazen looting of their people’s resources, whether there is a Soludo or not. There is a saying here in Aba that it is the cow that allows itself to be killed that has invited the butcher’s knife. How I wish that Minister of Agriculture Oga Ruma or Alhaji Sanusi Dagash could tell the Igbo political elite how years of stealing especially, our share of the Federation account, has forced our youth into yahoo crimes and our girls into prostitution. What of the ecological fund which was meant to close up the huge erosion gullies that litter the East and threaten lives and limb of our people.
Soludo’s Igbo kinsmen may decide not to forgive him for helping the North make a case for more developmental action, whereas there is also poverty in the South-East. I recall during the consolidation programme, the man ruffled feathers in the East when he virtually made available over N30billion to Bank of The North by way of debt forgiveness to enable the institution survive. I remember writing to insist on equal treatment for all the other regional institutions. I do not think any eyebrows were raised by the Northern elite. I also remember that the Nigerian labour congress declared war on Soludo for “subsidizing elitist mismanagement” of the regional bank.
So when I read from one of the writers that Soludo’s charge against the Northern elite was an act deceit, I mused. Why would Soludo want to play to impress the North? I understand he has a fix tenure which expires next year. Well, perhaps he might want to be retained for a second term. But what for? If what I read in the papers and on the net ia anything to go by, the hassles of the office are not worth it. If there are people who would want Soludo to stay on I, personally, am not one. The young man should go abroad and make money and fame. The real strength of this country lies in the destruction of its promising youth, those who have been sent by God to lift it up from the pit of rubbish in which charlatans, brigands and graded rogues have dragged it.
Thus, instead of calling for Soludo’s head, and addressing him in the most vicious expletives the swarm of writers should be grateful to Soludo. Iam worried about the North because this country will be playing the fool if we are expecting to reach the goals of Vision 20 20 20 with the level of poverty in the country.
Oduogu writes from 16, Nwala Street, Umule, Aba, .Abia State
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