Ayomide
“I must say that today is a sad day for me. And I think it should be for all Nigerians when 20 leaders of the leading countries in the world are meeting and Nigeria is not there. This is something we need to reflect on. We have the population, we have the capacity and ability… what do we lack?” – President Umaru Yar’adua.
The past few weeks have not been good for President Umarua Yar’adua. Over two weeks ago, the media reported the diplomatic bloody nose death a Nigerian delegation to the United States, by Mrs. Hilary Clintorn, the American Secretary of State. Ojo maduekwem Yar’adua’s Foreign Affairs Minister had led a delegation, which had Professor Jibril Aminu in tow, to lobby for a state visit to the USA, by Yar’adua. Our president needs the photo-op with President Barack Obasma, to underscore the legitimacy of the regime and international acceptance in Washington.
It is obvious that our ruling regime lives in cloud cuckoo land of delusion; it takes ifself too seriously, and in the process believes the world shares its opinion of itself. It is rather like the absurd man in the proverb who walks around in a ragged shirt, but believes he is wearing the most expensive silken shirt! The American Secretary of State told Nigeria’s high officials to go back to Abuja and get the process of governance up to a level of acceptability to the Nigerian people. They were also reminded of the electoral challenges which dog the administration. Ojo Maduekwu’s team, like rain-beaten chickens, returned home unable to secure a date for a state visit to the USA, for President Yar’adua.
The American snub was still sinking-in, when the G-20 summit came knocking last week. Once agains, Yar’adua was left out in the cold! Something clearly is wrong; but the problem is not located in our stars. When Yar’adua said it was sad that Nigeria was not even given a look-in, in a gathering which brought leaders from developing as well as the advanced capitalist countries, our president asked Nigerians to reflect on the snub. We agree with him. He went further to remind us that “we have the population”; that is true at over 140million people. Mr. President said “we have the capacity and ability”. Well, that is controversial. Then on a final and perhaps, sad note, he asked “what do we lack?” now this is the biggest question indeed!.
I don’t know how our president has answered his own interrogation, and that might offer an insight into his mind set; but it is quite likely that his answers to the interrogations might be quite different from those that a rank-and-file citizen would offer, not to talk of the points at the top of the heads of those who organized the meeting in London. They knew “we have the population; we have the capacity and ability” and yet chose to ignore us! So, the question that our president chose to end his interrogation is very poignant indeed: what do we lack?””
The Nigerian people will answer the question without ambiguity, that we lack governance in contemporary Nigeria! Our country today resembles a less-than-air-worthy aircraft on autopilot, with a very inexperienced or incompetent pilot at the helm. The perpetual fear of the passengers is of a crash: what with the turbulence: the pilot’s inability and the state of the aircraft! And who can deny the fact that President Yar’aduahas resemhbled very much the pilot in this tale while Nigeria that is practically deficient in all the indices of good governance, is very much like the aircraft that we have described? It is clear to Nigerians, but clearer to those hwo organized the G-20 summit, that Nigeria is not on the radar of development which makes us a compelling presence in international gatherings to find answers to the problems which face the world today.
Let’s look at the basic issues; the world is still unhappy about the deformities which characterize our politics: the electoral process is not acceptable to those looking in from the outside, and they therefore question the legitimacy of our leadership. The controversial electoral reform did not gather the momentum that can instill confidence, because it seems that the government of the day is merely interested in a cosmetic venture that does not have a profound effect on the problems associated with Nigeria’s electoral system. If the regime is not seen to be a reflection of the mandate of the Nigerian people, the international system cannot be sure of its legitimacy as a partner. This one of the reasons why our country has dropped from the international circuit; it has nothing to do with the fact that “we have the population”. Of course, the world knows that! Is our population an active economic force able to affect the economic fortunes of the world positively? Or are we a nation of a handful of thieving, rich elite and the millions of potential refugees; ‘419ers’ and the desperately poor and hopeless?
If this is the situation in our country, and for crying out loud, it is; then why shall we be seen as part of the group to find solution to problems that face our world? If you are a basket case or are potentially a failed state, then you endanger the health of the international economic and security systems. Our state has become a most frighteningly inefficient contraption: it cannot deliver basic infrastructure to the nation (electricity generation has dropped to about 700mwts in recent weeks); it is unable to secure the most important resource, petroleum products! Bandit groups with formal and informal connections steal about 650,000 barrels of crude oil every day, under the noses of layers of complicit security systems of the Nigerian state. And whichever sector of national life that we examine today, we see the failure of the state and the incompetence of its operative. So, when President Yar’adua asked, almost with an angry exasperation “what do we lack”? he has the answers all around him!
In a sense, I feel sorry for President Yar’adua because it is under his watch that Nigeria is becoming increasingly irrelevant on the international scale. At least under the old despot, Olusegun Obasanjo, there were regular photo opportunities with the international political jet set, which the old dictator lapped up as signs of his, and the country’s acceptability. For Yar’adua, mum is the word on the international scene; and the invitation that did not arrive from the G-20, two weeks after the Washington snub of Ojo Maduekwu, tell the story of hwo irrelevant our country has become. Let’s be clear about this, we have truly become very irrelevant on the international scene in the same way that the regime does not generate much hope amongst the Nigerian people.
President Yar’adua was said to have been a left-wing activist in the past, so he should know a thing or two about radical political economy. If he hacks back to what he kearnt in his radical days, he will realise that he presides over a criminalized state that is built on corruption and systemic violence. The ruling elite prey on the state and hires criminal gangs to protect prebends; in turn, criminal groups also take their own share of criminalized economic endeavours! The state is very hollowand unable to perform its basic and historical functions, while the citizenry survives anyhow and sees the state as merely an unavoidable nuisance! This is the reality in Nigeria today, and it is no surprise that Ledum Mittee of MOSOP will say that criminal kidnap gangs have come to stay in the Nigeri Delta! The question that should follow is: where is the state? Our situation today would have intrigued the greatest musician Nigeria ever produced, Fela Anikulapo Kuti. Our neo-colonial state is a wretched vehicle, rather like the MOLUE bus on the streets of Lagos and you know something? “OVERTAKE DON OVERTAKE OVERTAK”, as Fela once sang!!! It is no surprise that Nigeria is not whelcome at serious forums while President Yar’adua’s IV for the G-20 meeting did not arrive; just as we were unable to secure a photo opportunity with President Barack Obama! 2006 JANUARY – DECEMBER ENDS H
