At the time the governor of Lagos State, Mr Babatunde Fashola, signed the Cremation Bill into law on June 10, 2013, many thought he was violating African culture that attaches much importance not just to the dead but also the spirits and the memories they leave behind. That attitude is based rigidly on the people’s belief system, their superstition, custom and tradition; a lot of spirituality is attached to the mode of burial of the dead.
Actually, in most African societies, human corpses are considered sacred and they mean a lot to a family and, indeed, a people. That was why a few argued, and rightly too, that cremating dead bodies was alien to the culture of the people. Moslems came up with the position that the policy was anti-Islam, that only Buddhism and Hinduism allow such practice. Even Christians declared it anti-poor and anti-dead.
Before that Lagos law, cremation was carried out in Nigeria only on the express wish of the dead as contained in his will. But the state government had its own argument which was how to resolve the challenge of mortuaries overflowing with abandoned corpses. It also cited the acceptability of the practice in other cultures. Then, there was no talk of Ebola virus disease (EVD). This disease, medical experts warn, renders dead bodies toxic. Patients who die of the disease become even more dangerous in death. Thus, cremation is about the only safe way of disposing of the corpse, for the sake of the living.
It is in this regard that even the worst critics of that law are beginning to commend the foresight and proactive inclinations of the Fashola administration. Ebola, we are told, has no remedy yet. And because the disease is even more dangerous when it succeeds in killing its victim, cremation becomes the only option in getting rid of it. In this prevailing scenario, we shudder to imagine what would have happened to Nigerians when that Liberian, Patrick Sawyer, came calling with his toxic waste. If there was no ready crematorium available at the time he died in the country of the Ebola disease, what would have happened?
The difference between one leader and another is the quality of thinking and, even more important, the propensity and dogged determination of the leader in question to act on the outcome of that thinking.
Governor Fashola is perhaps the greatest achievement of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu as governor of Lagos State under whom he served as chief of staff. Since he assumed office as the helmsman in that state, Fashola has consistently proved that he is ready made for the job. It is now a cliché to applaud the transformation of Lagos on his watch. Surely, his handling of the outbreak of the Ebola disease in Nigeria marks him out as being in a class of his own in the nation’s leadership.
