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Nigeria: A Land of Politicians By Michael Nwagbegbe The appeal made recently by Mrs Grace Olowu, the Chairman of Rivers State Chairman of PENGASSAN, to Nigerians as reported in The Guardian of Saturday, February 7, 2009 struck a cord in me. This was not the first time such appeal would be made by people of honest intention. What led to this one by Mrs Olowu was the senseless killing of a little girl and the kidnap of the girl’s younger brother in Port Harcourt. The latter’s release does not, according to Mrs Olowu, and rightly too, call for celebration. Rather, the Union leader, speaking for other concerned and distraught people asked Nigerians to join them ‘ and pray for the healing of our land.’ Her words there had a tinge of agony and frustration. Certainly, the problems plaguing Nigeria, including killing and kidnapping, demand divine intervention. Our land indeed needs healing, because it is a land of Politicians. The depleting ranks of committed teachers, inspired painters, diligent masons, honest and diligent mechanics and other professionals should worry any responsible government. We no longer have good plumbers in our neighborhoods. There are no more trusted carpenters in our streets. No more farmers of humble beginnings and quiet mien in our villages. All we have inside and outside the corridors of powers are politicians of various grades and ranks. Even the highly revered profession of law has been plagued by the new malady of partisanship. Every new constitutional issue attracts to its four corners men and women that are learned in law. These highly respected people have, because of politics, chosen to propagate views that neither advance the cause of justice nor strengthen the ideal of good governance. Hence we as a people agree that Nigeria is sick, but nobody has the will to apply a clearly proffered solution to the Nigerian malady. It is politics, politics every where. From the Presidency to the National Assembly and from the motor parks to the class rooms the story is the same. It is politics or nothing. We seem to carry overboard the saying: Every man is a political animal. Conversely, the increasing number of political aides, special assistants, senior special assistants, and political guides and media assistants of all grades should cost some honest soul good sleep. Those who pretend not to appreciate the depth of this descent to blind partisanship should attend the sitting of an election petition tribunal, the burial of politicians’ relations, the wedding of politicians’ children. I am not counting their birthday celebrations as items in this politics of the stomach and failure of governance. There is an army of supporters, men and women who could in saner clime be more productive to their fatherland as artisans than queuing behind a politician. Please, I am not against political patronage. Whatever patronage should add to the quality of governance, not detract from it. Such patronage should advance the country in concrete terms, not veer the strength of the innocent youths and the jobless to the precarious terrain of politics of the belly. For God’s sake, such patronage should cement the relationship among the people of our fragile federation, not divide us. But it is politics, politics every where. From the Presidency to the National Assembly and from the motor parks to the class rooms the story is the same. It is politics or nothing. We seem to carry overboard the saying: Every man is a political animal. The corruption of man starts with the corruption of language, Waldo Emerson said. So far, the saying you may bow and go has been admitted into Nigerian political language with all the ills it portends. Our National Assembly members charged with the duty of screening ministerial nominees, before camera men, tell such nominees who had been their colleagues through elections, to just bow and go. Whatever good example this style of screening adopted by our distinguished Senators would serve the public remains to be seen. It is crude politics in full glare of the world and nothing more. It suggests that the noble constitutional task of screening of nominees to high public offices has been reduced to a ritual without any benefit to the people. Nobody asks questions on the competence, professional background or health of the nominee. Is our President Yar’Adua innocent in the over politicization of every thing in Nigeria. I do not think so. We thought his government, the first to be led by a university graduate, would be different. Every one fault seeming monsterous till his fellow-fault came match it. What is the wisdom in sending ministerial nominees to the National Assembly without designating them for the particular posts for which they would be assigned? Or is it because Chief Obasanjo did the same thing? And our Distinguished Senators honourably accepted such style of politics that engenders mediocrity in the polity. What is the wisdom of acknowledging flaws in the last elections yet preserving the structures that made the flaws possible? The manner the President readily dabbles into partisan politics would continue to worry his admirers. The Zamfara episode is a case in point. Flying to Gusau to receive Governor Shinkafi to the PDP has reduced Yar’Adua to a PDP President. The Presidential Oath of office was to govern Nigeria according to the Constitution, not according to the PDP. The attitude of the Attorney General Michael Aondaokaa who has recently chosen to be a Presidential spokesman is equally troubling. Defending the President may well be a task for every appointee of the President. But not for the A-G whose office and qualification are provided for in the Constitution to open up on purely political issues. Can his none partisanship be guaranteed in the discharge of his duties? To speak on the likelihood of Yar’Adua contesting the 2011 election smacks of blind partisanship. This is far below the person and position of a professional like the A-G. Are there no Presidential spokespersons? On that issue there was Segun Adeniyi and others to speak on it. But typical of such Nigerians and other appointees that breed on politics, the A-G never drew the thin line between politics and decorum. You may say he is indirectly campaigning for Yar’Adua re-election! What of some of our traditional and opinion leaders? Their attitude have never been a source of national redemption and regeneration in this era of madness. Just as their elected compatriots soon forget their mandate, our unelected leaders unashamedly pursue narrow and selfish aims in the full glare of journalists. They have been running to Abuja to demand for some states. These demands by beads wearing chiefs are a sign that the current leaders in elective offices have failed woefully. They seem bereft of any idea to put things to shape. So far, no practical argument has been advanced on the economic imperatives of more states. All the reasons on the demands of states have been based on some uninspiring historical tales. Nobody has said that the creation of States would make job available for the teaming unemployed youths. Nobody, none that I have heard of or read about, has stated how crimes would be reduced when Nigeria is split to sixty more revenue sharing entities. The increasing suspicion among the various sections of the country will not abate when each of us get a state of our own. It is when our capability to wrought positive changes on the polity fails that we resort to politicize every aspect of our life. State creation has become an escape valve of all our failings as a nation. On corruption, we are united that it stands between Nigeria and her advancement. Yet, when a big man is called upon to account for his stewardship in any area he had presided and ran aground, such calls, either at the National Assembly or at the anti-graft agencies, are interpreted by his own supporters as political victimization. Such interpretations only lean on many previous experiences. We were witnesses to how administrative panels and some criminal prosecution were constituted and instituted for political purposes. Genuine cases of crime now pass as politics while the country ground to a halt in the hand of effete and lethargic leadership. Are the above examples not replicated in various measures in other sectors of our national life? Mother goat would certainly breed her kind, our elders would say. The tradition where the slightest issue in the polity attracts youth groups of various names in defence or in opposition is a sign that the country is sick. It was a common sight at the National Assembly complex during the Etteh saga. Youth groups of various names came out in defence of Patricia Etteh and her actions. The damage that show of solidarity caused the groups and the youths who put them together is better imagined than said. The young men have unwittingly been drawn to politics with all its benefits and worries. The present level of political awareness has no equivalent in our national history, yet no corresponding infrastructural development, peace and patriotism in the polity. The damage this has caused our national life cannot be cured by politicians alone. Nigeria needs prayer. A depressing scene is playing out in the Niger Delta. The youth groups there have grown in number with conflicting approaches that are at variance with the agenda of the heroes that started the struggle. Never say that I am against the struggle for justice and equity in that region. When a peoples’ struggle takes a criminal garb in the form of killing and outright harassment of the innocent it taints the struggle and denies it the support and sympathy of all honest being everywhere. We must at all times seek equity with clean hands. The people of Niger Delta need the goodwill and support of people of other regions to clearly propagate and actualize their demands within the context of Nigeria. While there is a silent yet unhealthy rivalry among the states of that cheated region, its people are yet to define an acceptable approach in their struggle. The case is worse when one views the positions of the elected leaders vis- à-vis those of the so-called militants. So confusing are their stands that one is at a loss on whom to lend sympathy or support. The elders of the region add a comic angle to the struggle by issuing statements that nobody listens to nor respects . Still all these make up to the politics in our land.While we pray fervently for the restoration of peace, responsibility in our government and patriotism on the part of the citizenry, it is necessary first that urgent steps, devoid of politics, are taken to restore the people’s confidence in government’s ability to solve Nigeria’s problems. A veritable platform for this is the Constitutional Review by the National Assembly. Sadly, that exercise has started with high-wire politics that seems to play down some weighty issues that agitate the minds of honest Nigerians. Some of these issues are : (a) the immunity clause,(b) local government, (c) citizenship and indigeneship,(d) true federalism,(e) the office of the Attorney General and Minister of Justice,(f) the minimum academic qualification for elective offices,(g) the creation of local government areas.(h) state police,(i) reducing the political parties to a recognizable number. If in Nigeria of 2009 vehicles are registered by a federal agency then we do not deserve any vision to get to 2020. Also, only less reputable specie of politician would deny that policing Dutse is not the same as in Benin or Lagos. What is the logic where crime is within the legislative competence of the state, yet police, an agency to secure the people against criminals, is constitutional placed outside the competence of the state? Will it not pay better that every state secures itself against its own criminals? We need to ponder deeply why we have more stakeholders, elders, leaders that wrought this failure of governance in all levels of government than we have true citizens who could pull this country to the path of sanity, prosperity and peace. We really need to ponder on the possibility of a greater Nigeria too. Reports are rife of some political movements in anticipation of 2011. Soon the whole atmosphere would be electrified with politicking, and all the basic issues which the present crop of politicians promised to address would be left unattended. We can still angle for politics and all the protection and security it affords. And yet, the appeal by Mrs Olowu needs to be taken seriously by all lovers of Nigeria. Our country indeed, needs healing. Michael Nwagbegbe Calabar.
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