Sir: Nigeria has to undergo a cultural reset, in the way of government – from the rascality of the old guard to a new order of accountability, prudence and transparency – before it can thrive. Otherwise, the country of youths (more than 70 percent of the population) abundant resources and limitless opportunities will, regrettably, perish with time.

Culture refers to the way of life of a people; their way of doing things. It is the greater determinant of prosperity than gross human and material resources and policies. Compare Nigeria or the Democratic Republic of Congo with Japan, for example. Empires are built on virtue but destroyed by vice.
[ad]
The first law in culture – as in heaven – is order, in the manner summed up in the Holy Book: “a servant cannot be greater than his master; neither one that is sent greater than he that sent him” (John 13: 6) Where this responsive and productive order is habitually violated, things will fall apart and anarchy would be let loose. Normally, the servant would be replaced. Similarly, in democracy, all over the progressive world, citizens are the masters while political office holders are the servants who must be responsive to their needs or be changed – by parliament and by free and fair elections.

But the case is different in Nigeria. We are saddled with a bizarre culture where political office has become a place of lordship and aggrandizement rather than service; where mostly unpatriotic and clueless office holders and collaborating businessmen have formed a predatory oligarchy and operate like gods, eating up the country’s resources and living in opulence while the people who, technically, hired them languish in penury, yet would not have the freedom to change them by free and fair elections.

Many countries had found themselves in that quagmire. But every one of them that made it – from France to China to Singapore, e. t. c – had to undergo a cultural reset, with a selfless leader in front. Nigeria can never arise to positive change without someone to lead the imperative cultural reset.

President Tinubu’s “Renewed Hope” agenda is bound to fail, contrary to the optimism of some people. He may be the smartest Nigerian politician, today, but, with all due respect, lacks the attributes for the cultural reset imperative to the transformation of the country.

By Emma Nwosu
[ad]