By Charles Okoh
Nigeria was 64 last Tuesday. On that day in 1960, expectations were high and the country’s founding fathers had lofty dreams about a nation that was destined for the top with all the resources, both natural and human. However, 64 years later, it has been a dashed dream thus far.
In 64 years, leadership has completely failed the nation. Myopia and greed have left us in the middle of nowhere like a ship in the sea with incompetent crew and no compass.
You would think
that given our present realities we would have learnt a lesson or two but, no,
we are repeatedly making the same mistakes and hoping for a different outcome.
We have not been able to see beyond greed and selfishness and
yet to come to terms with the reality that we need to sit down and decide with
introspection what is best to do to address and recalibrate or redesign the
current structure of this union called Nigeria.
Nigeria is a country with several disgruntled nations held
together through deceit and falsehood where the laws have failed, institutions
completely incapacitated and obscured.
Except those who have chosen to live in denial, everyone knows
that we are not headed in the right direction but we all seem helpless and
unwilling to take the bull by the horns and speak truth to ourselves.
Yes, 68 years together is an achievement that is worthy of celebration,
especially given the drawbacks caused by a debilitating civil war, religious
and ethnic clashes, turbulent leadership, insecurity, crooked electoral
processes, increasing state of hopelessness and joblessness, activities of
armed gangs, a looting political class and vast majority of youths roaming the
streets aimlessly, dilapidated institutions and infrastructure, etc.
See why we have to thank God? How many societies have gone through
these and are still together? But that is where it ends.
Are we going to spend the next 68 years the same way? Nigeria is
better together but certainly not on the same terms and conditions we currently
find ourselves. It is not working and something needs to be done to address
these anomalies and fast too.
To pretend that all is well is to live in self deceit and
denial.
So, which way Nigeria?
Thankfully, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s Independence Day
address last Tuesday, identified some of these problems that have hampered our
development and march towards building that united, egalitarian and prosperous
Nigeria that our founding fathers dreamt of at Independence.
But it remains to be seen how ready he is to go the whole hog.
This is so because all our Independence Day broadcasts since after 1960 have
been very long in such promises and expectations but abysmally falling short
and hopeless in delivery.
On President Tinubu’s broadcast, he will be held accountable for
all promises made and assessed based on his ability to deliver on those
promises.
Whereas he may be given the benefit of the doubt concerning the
poor state of the economy and some wrong choices he may have made so far,
because there is no turnkey solution for the entire system, but his ability to
admit errors and correct them will go a long way to helping him achieve
success.
This will completely set him apart from his predecessor who
stuck to his gun and remained aloof while the entire country was on fire.
Sorry, he did more than that. At least, there was that iconic photograph
captured while picking his teeth.
President Tinubu
conceded that his economic policies have visited severe pains on the masses and
promised that there was light at the end of the tunnel. That expression again!
Everything has remained in the tunnel and we seem stranded in there since
Independence.
But, let’s keep hope alive.
Even though some of these measures have pushed inflation to a
multi-decade high of 33.4 per cent in July this year, before falling marginally
to 32.15 per cent in August, his policies too have seen a vast majority of the
population falling below the poverty line, but he expressed the commitment of
his administration to finding long-term solutions to the problems, noting that
the economy was already turning the corner.
He has about three years more for some of these measures taken
to manifest and prove sceptics wrong.
However, I completely disagree with the president that since
after our bitter civil war Nigeria has learned to embrace its diversity and
manage its differences better. If anything this is the greatest threat to the
country’s unity today. The political class has used this to further fracture an
already imperiled national unity and consciousness.
We have not addressed the imbalance in the distribution of
resources and appointments in all national institutions which in themselves
should have advanced and cemented the efforts towards a united Nigeria.
The cries of marginalisation and neglect by some sections of the
country are real and genuine. Papering over them is not the solution but a
conscious and deliberate attempt to address them is urgently required.
On security President Tinubu deserves some commendation thus
far.
He has also promised to eliminate all the threats of Boko Haram,
banditry, kidnapping for ransom, and the scourge of all forms of violent
extremism.
His claim that within one year, his government has eliminated
Boko Haram and bandit commanders faster than ever, cannot be contested. What
he has achieved in one year, Buhari could not in eight years of fighting
insecurity, because Tinubu clearly has no dog in this race.
So kudos must go to him and our brilliant and gallant troops who
were all the while encumbered by the narrow mindedness of Buhari’s leadership.
Also worthy of note in his broadcast, is Tinubu’s promise to
convoke a 30-day dialogue to empower our young people to participate actively
in nation-building by ensuring that their voices are heard in shaping the
policies that impact their lives.
Such policy solutions, he said, will address the issues such as
education, employment, innovation, security, and social justice.
What is not clear is the modalities for this conference and
selection of delegates. Will it still be another way of rewarding party members
and their cronies or will it be open to all irrespective of political
persuasions and affiliations, tribes or religious beliefs? Is it another way of
saying thank you to party loyalists?
So, as we celebrated another Independence Day, last Tuesday,
when will we be ready to address the imbalance, the miscarriage of justice,
primitive looting of public treasury, the unequal distribution of opportunities,
the deep-seated mutual and mistrust between ethnic nationalities?
Are we ready to address the problems arising from the
dilapidated state of infrastructure, poor governance, cronyism, tribalism,
nepotism, religious bigotry and failed institutions?
How ready are we to make our electoral process electronic and
deepen the adoption of technology and eliminate manual intervention to make it
less fractional, less contentious and more transparent as it obtains
everywhere?
The answers to these questions and more would tell the state of
our preparedness or not to build that united and indivisible nation of our
dreams and that of our founding fathers and our generations unborn.
May God help us.
*Okoh is a commentator on public issues
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