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A season of anomie in Nigeria

By Yahaya Balogun
06 April 2017   |   1:11 am
Apology to Prof. Wole Soyinka for the above title. It’s unarguably a season of anomie in Nigeria. If William Shakespeare were to be alive today, he would have effortlessly written a book on Nigeria’s political conundrums. Nigeria is so unfortunate to be saddled with corrupt men and women of dubious characters.

Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose

Apology to Prof. Wole Soyinka for the above title. It’s unarguably a season of anomie in Nigeria. If William Shakespeare were to be alive today, he would have effortlessly written a book on Nigeria’s political conundrums. Nigeria is so unfortunate to be saddled with corrupt men and women of dubious characters.

I watched Nigeria ChannelTv news recently, I saw the show of shame being displayed in the NASSty house in Abuja. Members of our National Assembly are nothing but political bugs and a big embarrassment to the nation. What are the criteria used to get these people elected into this national monument? Peruse the manuscript of Governor Ayodele Fayose in Ekiti, it is a compendium of political comedy. Browse through the political archives of diarrhea-mouthed Femi-Fani Kayode, and Google the opportunistic buffoonery of Senator Dino Melaye. These corrupt and unserious individuals share the same vainglory and political opportunism.

Meanwhile, in retrospective, how my people in Ekiti end up with Governor Ayodele Fayose is a mundane mystery. Why is Governor Ayodele Fayose not taking a cue from Governor Akinwunmi Ambode’s revolutionary government in Lagos State? While Ambode is busy commissioning laudable projects in Lagos, my governor, Fayose is busy patronising Buka with regurgitation of Ponmo. The hogwash of our governor in public forum is not only childish, it is a big embarrassment to the people of Ekiti and Nigeria in general.

In utter astonishment with pungent question: Is governor Ayodele Fayose now the spokesperson for palm wine joints in Ekiti? Is he the information commissioner or the caretaker of food joints in Ekiti State? What manner of chief executive of a state is our governor in Ekiti? Is he a leader or a ruler or a motor park chairman? All these disturbing questions may remain unanswered as long as Fayose’s shenanigans remain unchecked. The most troubling issue is that good people look askance for these corrupt people to fester and flourishingly destroy our image. Nigerian leaders certainly need psychiatric test, because political watchers are stupefied by the shenanigans in our polity today.

How many phases will Nigeria pass through before it gets its acts together to meet the 21st century challenges or align with the rest of the developing world? Has the remaining political elders in Nigeria asked themselves how Nigeria is ebbing into lower nomenclature among the comity of nations?

The spirits of Adekunle Ajasin, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Ladoke Akintola, Chief Bola Ige and other deceased political elders will be in some heavenly tremors now. They look down on Nigeria from the cosmic world with regrettable stances.

There is certainly some restlessness and sadness in their graves to see what they have existentially laboured for in Yourubaland sauntering into a hall of defame. Most of the disciples of late Chief Obafemi Awolowo have betrayed him; his unique and progressive principles.

In those days, Yoruba political elders are known for their charismatic display of intellectual prowess, not the current vainglory and opulence. Today, what we see is the crude, garrulous and grotesque grandstanding of the political entrepreneurs and their political neophytes soiling the landscapes of Nigerian polity. While other nations are transforming the lives of their people through good governance, Nigeria is still figuring out how to govern her own people in this 21st century democracy. Once there’s “money for hand”, it is a nauseating “back for ground” all the time.

The bane of Nigerian underdevelopment seems to be the symbiotic relationships between the leaders and the people they lead. Instead of fighting the political cancer that has metastasised their lives, Nigerians are used to fighting the solutions that can cure their intractable problems. Because of few dollars to their pockets or palms from these politicians, people continue to mortgage their own lives and the lives of their children. For want of instant gratification and the fear of unknown, I hope Nigerians will not completely consume their cakes before they have eventually have them. It might be too late if this abnormal situation in Nigeria is not brought under normal control. We are in the midnight of our journey to the future. What we do with it at this moment existentially counts!
Balogun writes from Arizona, United States

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