And now, the bomb cometh!

The political temperature of the country notched up several degrees when the bombs went off around  Eagle Square at the most epochal moment in Nigeria's chequered history. We were celebrating 50 years of independence inspite of our disastrous outing as an independent nation when some wicked persons hell bent on throwing this country into utter confusion struck with deadly effect. While it may be dangerous to speculate on the reasons behind the bomb blasts that shook Abuja to its roots on 1st October, it is cold comfort that the federal government has given us a clue as to those behind it.

The brickbats are flying between government spokespersons and 'highly' placed individuals as recriminations set in. The truth may well lie anywhere between the antagonists or outside them. However, one thing is clear and that is that unscrupulous politicians are trying hard to gain political capital out of the unfortunate incident. And this is callous to the extreme. Reports have it that about 14 persons or more lost their precious lives. Wasted. Their families are grieving, children left fatherless, wives made widows and relations mourning their hearts out. Yet, politicians opposed to the government of the day are 'strategising' on how to blame the government squarely for the incident. Decency requires that we respect the grieving families and the dead and not embark on wild speculations just to gain cheap popularity.

There are very obvious questions to ask security agencies and operatives why the attacks were not nipped in the bud even after intelligence reports had reached them from foreign security agencies. It calls to question the capacity and the ability of our security agencies to respond to security breaches. The entire security apparatuses are defective and inadequate. If we take the Nigeria Police for instance, this institution has all but outlived its usefulness. While I agree that an inefficient police force is better than none at all, Nigeria  is too large, too important a nation to tolerate a lax and inefficient police force. This is the only police force in the world still employing archaic and ineffective methods to fight crime. Detecting crime is beyond their competence. Their so-called 'stop and search' is a clear smokescreen for collecting tolls at checkpoints. The commercial gains to be made from these illegal activities is too huge to let go. This is the reason it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than to get a policeman to concentrate on his duties if that place is not a checkpoint. There is a crying need to overhaul our security agencies. This will include providing them with modern day training on how to combat crimes including terrorism. It would entail equipping them with sophisticated communication systems and of course superior offensive and defensive weapons. Lastly, the remunerations for security agents must be improved upon. It is heart rending to hear the kind of salaries they receive. Is it any wonder then that they cash in on the slightest opportunity to extort money from citizens?

The challenge before the Goodluck administration is to fish out the perpetrators of this heinous crime and give them a dose of justice. It is time for deterrent measures to be put in place to deal with Nigerians who commit crimes with impunity. This presupposes that nobody should be considered to be above the law. If highly placed persons are involved in this shameful act, they should be made to face the music fully. This is not the time to play politics with the precious lives of Nigerians.

Nigeria at 50: Where is the smile?

Aside the symbolic significance of our independence at the landmark age of 50, there is nothing golden about our circumstances or existence to warrant celebration. We honestly would not tolerate, much less celebrate a grown man of 50 behaving like a child of 10 or be seen mocking about confounded by life unable to perform the most perfunctory adult duties. It has been our lot to celebrate our independence every year with the backdrop of an under-performing nation perpetually in search of self discovery.

A lot of eminent citizens with better perspectives and intelligence have endeavoured to dissect our national malaise in incisive and well researched articles, speeches, addresses, etc. More often than not, these discourses do not resonate with the government of the day and so nothing concrete is done by way of sifting any constructive ideas into some national redemptive agenda. Government people are notoriously afflicted with a sensitive and suspicious bug when it comes to criticism. To them no criticism is constructive, there must be some hidden dark motive somewhere. These leaders habitually put the wrong foot forward in the mistaken belief that they possess all the answers. Sure enough, after 50 years we are yet to start on the path of civilisation or nationhood.

We have had leaders in this country with itchy, kleptomaniac fingers unable to resist primordial instincts of primitive accumulation. They are richer than some states of the federation and yet are not satisfied. We have had leaders in this country whose democratic credentials were so woefully deficient, yet plotted and suborned others to perfect plans to rule ad infinitum. Yes, we have had leaders in this country whose agenda for the country was so promising at first we jumped for joy only to be taken for an expensive ride - a rigmarole that was painfully unending that nobody could stand straight any more from giddiness. Eight years of nationhood was wasted on policy flip flops, experiments - political and economic, a culture of settlement and naked oppression, assassinations, a jaundiced structural adjustment programme that failed woefully and when that purposeless regime out-dribbled itself into irrelevance, it came to an abrupt and ignominious end. Thankfully.

And so, from that post civil war ruler with his long, interminable handover agenda down to the brief but illegitimate pseudo-government that prided itself in its 'interim-ness', precious time was lost. We missed the boat. The chance to create a forward looking, modern society and a truly federal nation-state sustained by a diversified product base was squandered on the altar of greed, ethno-religious bigotism, unmitigated corruption, instability and wastage of unimaginable proportions. The country was left floundering in the flush of petro-dollars begging to be utilised for sustainable development. In the absence of a sincere political will to appropriately utilise national resources, some smart Alecs specialised in siphoning our commonwealth to private pockets and coded accounts around the world. Mindless looting of public funds coupled with conspicuous consumption was the order of the day. Little wonder that these leaders, soon after leaving office, retired to unspeakable opulence right next to their impoverished citizens living in abject poverty and squalor. A well fortified palatial hilltop residence became the fashion. These architectural masterpieces were perhaps what was needed by our ex-leaders to truly "look down" on their downtrodden neighbours! Is it not a shame that even the man who ruled for just six months was able to splash out a magnificent hilltop residence?

However, there were bright and promising spots here and there but as we all know, those leaders were cut down and their well meaning administrations brought to a sad end. Significantly, there is a general consensus that our real problem as a nation is the failure of leadership, pure and simple. The most distinguished author, Prof Chinua Achebe in his seminal handbook, "The Trouble with Nigeria", reinforced this belief in no uncertain terms. But are the leaders listening? No. One leader after another, comes along to do worse than the one before him. Our search for the ultimate Nigerian leader has not met with success 50 years on. With elections around the corner, there is the hope that if Nigerians are truly allowed to elect their leaders, if every vote is made to count sans rigging, then a Nigerian leader may emerge who owes his ascension to the voters and not to some band of riggers and devilish oath-administering god-fathers who see government as an extension of their private businesses to be exploited to feed their bestial greed. That will be the day, that will certainly be the beginning of national redemption.

For now, even though we are not smiling, let us cling audaciously to hope as I wish every Nigerian Happy Golden Jubilee!