The return of trouble – Part 2

Nigeria Stolen To The Point Of Collapse

In 1949, the in-coming government of China, led by the Communist Party of China, promised China’s disaffected groups “land for the farmers, independence for all minorities, freedom for intellectuals, protection of private property for business men and women and higher living standards for the workers.” Going on to 70 years the Communist Party of China has not been able to fulfil its promise to those groups. Compared to Nigeria these promises are being fulfilled by Nigerians for Nigerians.

Land for farmers, we have it. Independence for all minorities, it is available. Freedom for intellectuals is abundant. Protection of private property for businessmen and women is not lacking. As for higher living standards for the workers the sky sets no limit. In fact, Nigeria “gbawa laye!” Nigeria affords us all and every opportunity we can dream up. Yet we are stealing our country to the Point of Collapse. And the political leaders as well as the religious leaders deceive us by predicting that recession will end on such and such a date. And like the debtors that they are they think those dates would never arrive. They say all is well when all is not well.

Chinua Achebe feared that our thieves would steal so much that the owner would notice and there would be trouble with Nigeria. Well, master story teller, not only has Nigeria noticed Nigeria is being given change by the thieves, loose change from massive thefts. Nigeria is supposed to be satisfied with loose change. Yet loose change is not enough for what needs to done for us to have land for farmers, independence for all minorities, freedom for intellectuals, protection of private property for business men and women and higher living standards for the workers.

It is not just that farmers do not have land to farm, farmers don’t want to farm, period. Minorities would be a majority if they united their efforts but the buying of ammunition has prevented them from recognising the common interests to have with one another as well as with the majorities. Intellectuals do not know what it means to have freedom of speech, freedom of association, freedom of thought, because they too no longer “k’awe, naira niwon nka!!!” Businessmen and women, politicians and lawyers do not want protection for private property, they want licence to do what they like in the country. Ki Nigeria gba won laye! Finish.

As for higher standards of living for the workers it is no longer the age of today I dey waka, tomorrow God go give me bicycle. Tomorrow I am riding a bicycle, day after tomorrow God will give me okada. Next week latest, I will have keke napep. So, step by regular step I will also make it and become someone in my village, in my town and in my society.

What is wanted urgently is a Great Leap Forward. Chairman Mao boasted that China would overtake Great Britain and the Soviet Union in less than five years sometime in the 1950s. To that end he declared the Great Leap Forward. Every piece of iron, every oven available became the crucible of the great Chinese industrial revolution. What followed this folly was disaster, which led to the great famine in which millions died.

And still greater disaster in form of the cultural revolution followed. Group rose up against group, class against class and youth against age. Urban populations fought against rural area dwellers until finally Chairman Mao died and sanity was regained. 1976. The forty years since has seen China arrive at its desired position as the biggest economy in the world next to the United States of America through waka, bicycle, okada, keke napep and pleasure car, step by step development.

A hundred years ago, Russia was at a critical point. It’s soldiers were being slaughtered in the battles of the First World War. Prince Yusupov, one of the richest and at the same time one of the most corrupt men in the country thought it was the fault of one man Rasputin. Rasputin was a country boy with mystical powers who controlled the Czar of Russia and his wife the Czarina. The prince arranged his murder. He put cynide in a cake and invited Rasputin to dinner. The religious mystic ate the cake and drank the poisoned wine and came to no harm. The prince then produced a revolver and shot Rasputin. Rasputin fell and rose again, powered, according to the prince, by Demon. Finally, after shooting him many times, the prince drowned Rasputin who finally died. But his death did not prevent the fall of the Romanoffs and the coming into being of the Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union would also collapse in its own time, before our very eyes from an inability to follow from small steps to huge leaps. And when things were not well and the leaders said all was well, all those who claimed otherwise were declared people of smelling mouths. Today the signs of collapse are all over the place but nobody is putting two and two together and looking for solutions. Houses of prayers are collapsing and miracles are invoked for the high ups who did not perish. Roads disappear and bridges are not found where they should be. Airports have been abandoned by jet fuel and aircrafts have been swapped for witchcraft. All that would be safe abandon Nigeria and anything Nigerian.

Where in the world does a thief return mere change from what he has stolen and the change is accepted by those in authority, those in government? Someone steals N26b, gives back N2.3b and the government accepts this as change. What infrastructure can you build with change? Where will the farmer find land, the minorities get independence, intellectuals appreciate freedom, business men and women enjoy protection of private property and workers get higher living standards with this small change?
“It’s also said that these fools,
Upon reaching the ocean-shore
And having seen the sky
Was reflected in the blue tide below,
Believed that the sea
Must be Heaven, and in they plunged, With faith in God, And all were drowned.