Try as much as it can, the din and fury generated by the increase in the official pump price of petrol from N86 per litre to N145 has not quite succeeded in pushing to the back burner the diplomatic row generated by the undiplomatic gaffe of the British Prime Minister, David Cameron, who, despite all evidence to the contrary, had categorised Nigeria and Afghanistan as the two most “fantastically corrupt countries” on planet earth.

On the eve of the anti-corruption summit of world leaders he hosted last week in London, the prime minister had, at a most unguarded moment, remarked to the Queen of England and the Commonwealth that he was expecting to play host to leaders of two of the “fantastically corrupt” nations – Nigeria and Afghanistan, a remark, thoughtless as it was, which has had the same tonic as sports in uniting Nigerians in the effusive display of patriotism.

Majority of our country men and women, home and abroad were almost united in condemning the British leader. I think the anger of my fellow compatriots is not exactly that the man lied but because he was undiplomatic.

It was impolite of him to say what he said when President Muhammadu Buhari the leader of Africa’s most populous country was visiting him and he was playing host. And to make matters worse, according to the cool-headed spokesman of the President, Shehu Garba, Mr. Cameron did not make a distinction between Nigeria prior the arrival of President Buhari on the scene and the current dispensation which has Buhari doing a yeoman’s job to see the end of corruption as we know it.

The reaction I find fantastically incredible is the one that sought to accuse the President of not standing up for Nigeria and get David Cameron to stew in his own juice by taking the battle back to him. I imagine that what these patriotic Nigerians wanted was that President Buhari, instead of playing the gentleman or living to the old truism that silence is the best answer for a fool, should have danced to the inimitable Fela’s evergreen hit song that goes like this: you be thief, I no be thief, you be robber, I no be robber, you be robber I no be thief, na you be thief, or sing his ITT tune, the so-called International Thief Thief and rant back at Britain as the chief thief of them all. Or President Buhari, they had wished, should have engaged this undiplomatic prime minster, known for his garrulousness, in what our “area boys” are best known for – the rofo rofo fight and then move on to remind his British hosts that they have a lot to account for our poor state of underdevelopment today. As our overlords, during the colonial days, they forcefully carted away our natural resources in exchange for a mere pittance like mirror. The popular Benin mask, worn by one of Benin’s most influential monarchs, Queen Idia, was forcefully taken away around the 16th century and has been kept in the British Museum in London ever since then. When Nigeria requested for its return for use during FESTAC 77, Cameron’s Britain flatly declined the request.

Those who wanted Buhari to demand an apology, instead of turning the other cheek, would have expressed joy to the high heavens, if our President had waved at Cameron a copy of Walter Rodney’s book How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, rated as a classical study in African history which has brought a new perspective to the question of underdevelopment in Africa, not excluding Nigeria. Buhari did not do that. He merely asked that all the stolen wealth be returned to Nigeria. That would be more tangible than an apology. And he displayed more maturity and was more diplomatic, too. There is no point paying back your host in his own coins.

But for me the most important point to note, if not the most fantastic, is the fact that President Buhari’s hands, like the hands of Justice Sowemimo in the treasonable felony trial of the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, were tied. While Cameron was ranting in London, Buhari’s hands were full to the brim at home with humungous cases of corruption. To contradict Cameron and say no, it is not as fantastic as he made it to look, is to live a lie or engage in inexcusable denial. President Buhari would certainly have disappointed many more people if he had condescended to that level to deny what he himself has proclaimed to the world. His legendary integrity and reputation for straight dealing, I am afraid, does not permit of equivocation or double-speak, talking from both sides of the mouth and dancing cocoma on the two sides of the road all at once. Not for anything in this world.

The truth, though very bitter, is that Nigeria is corrupt. But it is also true that not all Nigerians are corrupt. The few rotten apples among us have enough clout, enough influence and enough gravitas to make all of us look like thieves and robbers and crooked country men and women. And that is the crux of the dirty and the uncomfortable matter. Those who give Nigeria a bad name and make sinners of the rest of us must not be allowed to succeed. They have done incalculable damage to our image and national psyche to the point that I fear that all the perfumes in Arabia cannot wash the rot clean. It is better to admit this than to live a lie and indulge in hypocrisy.

That somebody else is corrupt is not a licence for you to be corrupt. That Britain and other developed world countries have their own share of corruption is simply and even foolishly a cold comfort. That corruption is a global issue does not mean it should be allowed to take root and cause more havoc. I guess our approach to this issue should be like the approach we took to the deadly Ebola when it crept into Nigeria and threatened to become an epidemic. Corruption is killing Nigerians in the fashion of the Ebola and other deadly diseases.

We are even beginning to lose count of the cases that have been uncovered. Every day brings a new perspective and a new dimension to the tales of corruption and graft, not to talk of their tragi-comic dimension.

Legends have it that in the days of President Shehu Shagari’s National Party of Nigeria, NPN, an administration that was touted as fantastically if not spectacularly corrupt, party chieftains had gathered in President Shagari’s residence to share money. But the saintly Shagari must have felt horrified if not scandalised. He did the next best thing. He took his kettle and went out for ablution. At the end of his prayers, but before he could say amen, they had shared the money.

I thought it was a complete fable, a story meant for evening time entertainment until I read the front page story in the Daily Trust of Wednesday May 11 and found something similar to the Shagari money sharing saga. The banner headline says: “Wali shared N950 million in my house – Shekarau.” According to the story, the former Kano State governor, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau has acknowledged that N950 million campaign funds were shared in his Kano house. But he said even though he was at home at the time, he was not in the room where the money was shared. Former Foreign Affairs Minister Aminu Bashir Wali said he collected the money from PDP headquarters in Abuja and took it to Kano where it was shared in Shekarau’s house. I guess the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, will keep us posted as they probe into the root of this and other similar bazar.

I ask: Is it not becoming more comic except that it is part of the national tragedy that has enveloped the nation? The reason we are where we are today is nothing else but corruption, described simply by Collins English Dictionary as dishonesty and illegal behaviour. And it is elastic in meaning and in scope from demanding for something in return for favour done or anticipated, stealing, kleptomania, and kleptocracy – the type ravaging African countries, cutting corners in weights and measures, jumping the queue to have some temporary advantage, document forgery and claiming to be what you are not. The list is endless.

But unfortunately for us, we cannot win the war against corruption if we do not tackle it holistically; if we content ourselves by narrowing it down to stealing, fuelled by greed and insatiable appetite for primitive acquisition. The larger society, traditional and modern, must get into the anti-corruption groove to make any meaningful success of this all important enterprise.