As Nigerians from different tribes and tongues, today, join their compatriots all over the globe in celebrating the 54th Independence anniversary of their beloved country, the critical message expressed by the chequered state of Nigeria’s nationhood in the last one year, should not be lost to needless merrymaking and extravagant festivity. Whilst there is cause for thanksgiving and jubilation, this is more especially an auspicious moment for sober reflection.
On a day like this, the annual ritual of a parade of colourful attired school children, professional groups and trade unions garnishing the martial display of the armed forces as well as the drills of paramilitary forces will entertain. But as all congratulate themselves for courage and tenacity in fostering a precarious unity that has been threatened from every front, the Independence Day, otherwise known as the National Day, also signals another opportunity to ponder on the state of Nigeria as well as the nation’s future.
It is saddening that despite pockets of positive assurances in certain areas, the paradox of lack in the midst of abundance, impunity in the face of the rule of law, evil in the community of a good people is writ large. Nigeria has never been so vociferously optimistic in its national transformation, yet it has never been so deficient in terms of human capital and infrastructural development and even quality of leadership.
For example, since the privatization of the electricity and power-generation sector, the diminishing capacities of the new investors, amidst the logic-defying rhetoric of the government overseers, have made a mockery of a nation that seeks to be one of the most industrialized nations in the year 2020. The collapsing educational sector, a hangover from the protracted industrial actions in the sector, was further exacerbated by poor funding, regulation and lip-service to technological civilization.
At 54, Nigeria is still struggling to combat self-inflicted problems of leadership. Whilst the government machinery dishes out grandiloquent rhetorics against corruption, the process of leadership recruitment and succession management is an edifice built on corruption. In an escalating sequence of entropic political leadership, the ruling elite has turned power, incumbency, violence and money into instruments of statecraft, all to the forfeiture of character and moral probity. On its part, by electing to remain silent in the face of this decadence, or be cowed to submission by the pauperizing tactics of the ruling elite, the masses, like government seemed to have bound themselves by the fetters of corruption.
The inability of the ruling elite to fashion out sustainable policies for human development has plunged Nigerians into the abyss of poverty. With that raging poverty, low premium placed on life as well as apathy towards youth unemployment, the nation has, of course, been bedeviled by pervasive insecurity. The result is that the country, though a giant, seems tethered to a wheelchair whose wheels are made of the finest rubber of impunity and corruption.
With an inept, even confused leadership, and a followership already pauperized to submission, what cause is there for celebration?
Beyond the fanfare of this occasion, the government and peoples of Nigeria need to ruminate on forging a stronger, more united and more resolute Nigeria. To do this, all need to harness the gains from the heroic and patriotic Nigerians who have so far given their lives for the sovereignty of this country. In this regard, the young, brave soldiers in the trenches staving off the onslaught of the Boko Haram on Nigeria’s behalf come to mind. Also, the singular patriotism of Dr. Stella Ameyo Adadevoh, whose sacrificial act of preventing the Liberian Ebola carrier, Patrick Sawyer, from unleashing the dreaded virus on all of Nigeria, saved the country from a health catastrophe beyond imagination should be lesson for all Nigerians on this day. She personified the best of Nigeria and the best in the Nigerian. Adadevoh is a good place to begin in forging a national character if Nigeria would have a future. The patriotism and sacrifice of the soldiers now battling insurgency in the north east is the reference for all if Nigeria would be safe and if each Nigerian would be his brother’s or sister’s keeper.
The Independence celebration should also be a period to think deeply about the beleaguered and neglected citizens marooned in the north east of the country. In a country where one of the six zones that make up the federation is on the verge of excision, and millions have been cruelly murdered by insurgents, and scores of millions are going to be disenfranchised, Nigeria rests on the brink of a perdition if promises to end the carnage are not backed by timely action.
As the nation’s much talked-about centenary year comes to an end, and another election year approaches, this is the time for a systemic revolution that should upturn the tables of Nigeria’s national life. Nigeria cannot afford to plummet further, by remaining the crawling giant of Africa, and the beggarly, weeping boy in the assembly of nations.
Nigeria must demonstrate its coveted state of independence by exemplary leadership on the continent. It must demonstrate an ability to find home-grown solutions to its problems, provide basic human necessities for its teeming population, eschew corruption and respect the rule of law and place high premium on its human capital.
The report of the recently-concluded National Conference is not totally ideal but its implementation is a good starting point for a national rebirth.
Another chapter in Nigeria’s life must begin, and the time is now.
