YEJIDE: You said to us during one of your lectures in class that Nigeria is an experiment!
PROF: Yes; I don’t think the British meant it to last for sixty-six years. If they did, they would not have set booby traps for the fledgling nation. It was just for their administrative convenience.
YEJIDE: If the British had mischievous intentions, why have we not been able to correct the anomaly?
PROF: Booby traps! In-built Mechanism to fail. Impossible cultural and religious conditions.
OSEME: This is serious, with serious implications for the future governance in the country!
PROF: An impossible experiment that has gone on for too long, far too long, my dear. In the 1980s, the late journalist Dele Giwa once said Nigeria was ‘God’s experiment on the impossible. Or something like that. The breakpoint ought to have been the secession attempt in 1967 championed by Col. Odumegwu Ojukwu through Biafra. The other parts of the federation did not have the foresight or the will which Ojukwu had. If they did, Chief Awolowo would have led the Southwest out of the federation, whether by ‘omission or commission ‘. It is true that Awo had wanted a clause in the Constitution for secession of any part of the federation that was not satisfied with things, and the others opposed it. In that sense, he envisaged a situation that ultimately happened in 1966-67. But by this time other factors seem to have crept in. If the southwest had supported Ojukwu, they would have been light-years ahead of other parts of the federation. There would have been no civil war. Indeed, Awolowo saved the federation when he joined the regime of General Gowon.
YEJIDE: Do you mean Awo was wrong?
PROF: He was both right and wrong. Awo saw a prospect of leading the federation in some capacity, a dream which he nursed from the beginning, but was denied. Remember that he went to jail for treason, for plotting to overthrow the government of the day. He was tried by a court of competent jurisdiction and convicted. Later, Gen Gowon pardoned him. As Vice Chairman of the Federal Executive Council and a finance expert, he was the de facto Vice President of the country.
OSEME: He had to show gratitude to Gowon, who released him from the prison and granted him pardon.
PROF: At the expense of the future of the nation?
OSEME: Perhaps the release was conditional! Promise that if we release you, you will support our government. Remember sir, that Awo had great credibility; they needed him to stabilize things.
PROF: See the mess we are in. Sixty-six years after independence, we cannot claim to be one Nigeria. Some vagabonds in power believe it’s their birthright to rule Nigeria. To know that these fellows were not indigenous to Nigeria. They came in 1804 through Jihad and seized the Hausa states. Now they want to seize Nigeria. What nonsense! Some so-called jihadists have unleashed mayhem on the country. The fault lines created by imported religion, ethnic loyalty, and sheer lust for power have become more prominent. In some ways, the military managed our cultural diversities and ethnic sensibilities better than agbada-wearing politicians. At least they pretended to believe in One Nigeria.
OSEME: Yes, they pretended. But their years of misadventure in power derailed our march towards the entrenchment of democracy.
PROF: Maybe. But they didn’t bribe judges the way the political class is currently doing. A man wins an election to govern two hundred million Nigerians. He then proceeds to appointing men and women from his region to 95% of federal posts. Buhari did it; now Jagaban is doing the same thing. How do you build a united country by being unfair to other parts of the federation? The southeast is receiving the short end of the stick in all of this. The minorities are worse off, though they are the goose that lays the golden egg!
YEJIDE: Prof, you seem to be very angry this Monday morning.
PROF: Angry? Naaah! I woke up this morning to read that South Africans are expelling foreigners, including Nigerians, from their country. They have killed some, including a harmless bishop. Our government has not taken a firm stand against the killings in Jo’burg and Cape Town. There ought to have been reciprocity of some sort! We need to be decisive. And I wondered why Africa behaves like a cursed continent. Maybe the Hamitic curse is true.
OSEME: But you dismissed it in class, saying that the bible was used by early slave traders to justify slavery. You argued that it wasn’t Ham that was cursed. Now, are you…
PROF: Pardon me for digressing from the meat of the discourse. The Nigerian experiment has failed. ‘To your tents, O Isreal’ should be the clarion call now. We can return to our tents and rebuild the country on new and negotiated terms. Monkey dey work baboon dey chop!
YEJIDE: The situation in the country is precarious. The murderous herdsmen who go about maiming and killing innocent people are from an ethnic group. If you call them out, you would be branded or accused of ethnic profiling. We are in the 21st century if we must remind our barbaric brothers. No one in the civilized world herds cattle on city highways. Cattle are ranch-raised.
PROF: Politicians are kowtowing to the centre so that the attack dogs from EFCC would not be unleashed on them when they leave office. Even when federal roads are neglected in the states, the governors want to be good boys; so, they never complain. At least not openly.
YEJIDE: Why should a governor complain openly?
PROF: You are too young to remember when Tinubu, as governor, displayed posters in Lagos bearing at places where roads had failed: Pls bear with us THIS ROAD BELONGS TO FEDERAL GOVERNMENT!
OSEME: For real?
PROF: Just do a Google search, and you can read the details. It was democracy in action. The people appreciated his efforts as an activist governor. He took the federal government to court and won. He created local government areas, 57 in all, and when the FG kicked against it because LGs are in the Exclusive List in the Constitution, he renamed them Local Government Development Councils! Chief Obasanjo, as President, withheld LG funds due to the state for a long time. Tinubu didn’t budge.
OSEME: Now that he is president, why has he not removed LGs from the Exclusive List?
PROF: Waiting for the right moment perhaps. Maybe during his second term.
OSEME: Second term under these horrible conditions?
PROF: Forget that side. We must ensure that a 66-year-old nation acts its real age. Else, decay will set in.
YEJIDE: Has decay not set in already?
PROF: That is a topic for another day!