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Anatomy Of A Nigerian Politician By Prince Charles Dickson Jos, Plateau Nigeria
A lot of realignment is going on, so much happening in the political landscape. Odili from being one of the President's blue blood is being hunted at the eleventh hour after being thrown away, the IBB scenario has gradually played out, and the opposition is getting into a marriage of compromise. For one, the PDP convention has shown a mirage of the more we look the less we see with Yaradua, the ANPP has shown a case of "if we didn't know better" by throwing up Buhari. The AC is likely to throw up Atiku, which would complete the cards.
Obasanjo has rewritten his own bible to sound like he who Obasanjo is for, only Obasanjo can be against, the Nigerian politician in the last couple of days again has given credence to the illustration I would give before I go far.
Two men met, the AC/ANPP and struck up a conversation. One was telling the other about some family problems he was having with one of his many kids. After a while the other guy said, "You think you have family problems? Get a load of my situation. A few years ago I met a young widow with a grown up daughter and we got married. Later, my father married my stepdaughter. That made my stepdaughter my stepmother and my father became my stepson. "Also, my wife became my mother-in-law of her father-in-law. Then the daughter of my wife, my stepmother, had a son. This boy was my half brother because he was my father's son, but he was also the son of my wife's daughter, which made him my wife's grandson. That made me the grandfather of my half-brother.
This was nothing until my wife and I had a son. Now the sister of my son, my mother-in-law, is also the grandmother. This makes my father the brother-in-law of my child, whose step-sister is my father's wife. I am my stepmother's brother-in-law, my wife is her own child's aunt, my son is my father's nephew and I am my own grandfather. sheeesh!
These days when one wakes up, the first thing I do is to call colleagues, friends and foes alike to find out if we are still safe, if our politicians have not sold us back into slavery. I try to find out if we are still Nigeria and Nigerians. You do not want to blame me for that. The opposition is trying to put up front and yet then swim in the same mistakes of those they want to change. The fact is simply put; there is something about the Nigerian politician. The ruling party is terrible; the opposition is an abridged version of terrible
When I use the term the Nigerian politician, I use it from the perspective of not just an individual but a bunch that includes the leadership, leaders, citizenry and the led. There is just something about us that is just not right or that we are not getting right, we all acknowledge that there is a problem but we simply cannot stick to an all purpose solution, so round and round in circles we go.
Besides it takes guts to be this truthful, the other day in a monologue I talked of the press and how there was nothing good to write about. The moment we think we found the role model...oops they do the usual… "let us down", look at how the Cadbury drama has ended with one of our corporate saints Bunmi Oni being disgraced.
Only some days back I had gone to pick my son from school and we were nearly brushed off the road by the convey of the Deputy Senate President, he had a convey of about ten cars, plus a detachment of mobile policemen and I could only wonder who wants to kill this man and why all this power play.
I asked my companion in the car, do you think that this man would want to leave this luxury as it had become...No was the emphatic answer. Today that scene is replicated everywhere, our selected or rigged in officials go about town feeling like demi-gods that they have become. I know of a politician that drives in a convey of 20 cars, not to another state but to Sunday service and you guess where the church is...at the government house, a 4 minute walking distance from his official residence.
Our politicians would and indeed do anything to retain power and to remain relevant that is why a distinguished Senator wants to become an extinguished Governor irrespective of the seemingly demotion, all that matters is the power, the money, the madness that comes with the office.
In Ibadan in less than a year, Akala has moved between being Deputy Governor, to Governor, then Deputy again, while now he stands as the PDP's umbrella bearer for the same office come 2007. My friend in Bauchi, whom I respect for at least having while eating worked for the people Adamu Mu'azu also caught the bug, he was confused between being a Senator and being President. However one looks at it, it is simply the lack of principles, a lack of will, lack of morals and purpose and it remains the bane of Nigeria politics and politicians, it is the story of underdevelopment of our 92 years of existence as an entity.
It is in this light that I ask despite their shortcomings, Awolowo was a Western champion, and Zik had his own ulterior motives and the Sarduana who rather than deploy his enormous political goodwill and leadership skill to the whole Nigeria chose to sit put up North. These men were men indeed, today Mallam Aminu Kano is respected even though he had no oil, kerosene or gas well, he had no shares in either blue or red chip companies.
The Nigerian politician claims on one hand that his people wants him to serve yet he breaks the bank vault, borrows money at cut throat interest, sell his birthright to a godfather and promises heaven on the road to hell. Interestingly when the becoming becomes unbecoming we are witnesses of the end product and they successfully keep us busy with analysis, which do little in changing the fact on ground.
That the Nigerian politician is a crook is obvious, but then when a people chose the path of silence they pay the price. Without prejudice will Ya' adua be better than Buhari, and then will Buhari be able to face the 'realities' of time, how will he managed 'some' of the crooks that make up the ANPP. Atiku, Kalu, Utomi are just to make up numbers and its the bitter truth. Ironically politics in Nigeria and by Nigerians is illusionary and subject to political geometry and arithmetic beyond the ordinary man. So we may want it, but do they want it, it is all about what they want. The Nigeria politician is always looking for avenues to explore the masses, not that they have to look far because we give them quite a number of them and so they openly exhibit gross greed, use our collective sweat to secure the good life and not blink an eyelid. After all what can we do.
For the Nigerian politician every elective position is a chance to come and chop, that is why they move from one party to another, one ideological bloc to another, and mind you the ideology is nothing but where the money is. Sometimes one does not blame them, have you ever seen a rejected or dejected politician, one that has been outsmarted, see him without the so-called paraphernalia of office and you certainly would feel pity for that politician, and then you would understand why they are ready to die for the position.
The Nigerian politician is an expert in his own type of mathematics where 2 plus 2 never gives 4 on the contrary, it could yield as much as 6, 7 and 8, while in cases you may have a task in getting back 1. Our politicians lie with straight faces and bother less about what the people think. In Nigeria, the politician learns the art of lying is a skill, he is required to lie as a principle and he does it even to the admiration of the devil and without a heart. So they play politics with health, education, water, roads, agriculture, transport, they conceive their own gods and sometimes it is difficult book marking them from local touts.
The nature of the Nigerian politician makes it pertinent that we lack an opposition because we all play the politics of the stomach, its all about what we will chop...so its a compromise, concession and still we do not get a consensus. Rancor reigns supreme, the voice of the nays are loud yet we say the yahs have it. Everybody is related one way or the other and hardly has anything different to offer. We cannot spot the difference because the difference is the same. We need Almighty's grace and mercy to free us from all the mess that we have entangled ourselves with. The anatomy of the Nigerian politician and our political landscape is a spider's web only Almighty Allah can save us.
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