By CHIMA NWAFO

Despite Chatham House, London, being the sole consecrating authority of every Nigerian head of state since 1966, a former British Prime Minister, David Cameron (2010-2016), once said: “If the amount of money stolen from Nigeria in the last 30 years was stolen from the United Kingdom, the UK would cease to exist.” As if giving credence to this seemingly hypocritical father’s assertion, Nigeria’s one-time military president, Gen Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, is also on record to have said: “The death of a thousand good men is not as tragic as having an unfit man in a position of national leadership.”

By virtue of his background and the calibre of Nigerians he appointed into office during his term vis-à-vis so-called democratic or rather nepotistic presidents, there’s no doubt he is eminently qualified to make such evaluation. Self-righteous apostles of democracy and constitutionalism may choose to disagree, that does in any way alter the reality of his statement. Irrespective of one’s political learning or text book learning, the truth is unfit men in position of leadership (whether elected, appointed or a dictator) explains why 50 years post-civil war, Nigeria still wobbles in the throes of misrule, treasury looting, prebendalism, nepotism and mediocrity by a gang of power-grabbers who consider marginalisation of the vanquished a political achievement.

Consequences

Unfit men in position of national leadership is the only reason why Nigeria stinks in a quagmire of under-development. Unfit men in position of leadership at any level of public or private office is the sole reason why Nigeria is endemically corrupt and incapable of optimising her abundant natural and human resources.

With a broad-minded collection of technocrats and committed patriots, President Olusegun Obasanjo cleared the nation’s foreign and domestic debts, but unfit men in leadership demoted Nigeria from the largest economy in Africa to Number 4, making her Poverty Capital of the World, with over 30 million citizens (more than that of India and China combined) languishing in the cesspit of multidimensional poverty, even as they shot the nation’s debt to over N5 trillion in eight years; doubled unemployment figure, tripled inflation rate and cost of living within the same period; increased cost of fuel, which, in addition to corruption, led to the exit of multinationals and closure of local companies due to unbearable cost of production, hostile operational milieu and multiple taxation. Unfit men in power multiplied the nation’s security woes due to selective justice and religious myopism; recorded higher number of Out-of-school children as well as exit of skilled manpower, especially from the medical field.

As baton changed, the nation moved from calamity to disaster as a self-serving regime driven by propaganda emerged; within a year, it doubled the debt profile, crashed the naira value, hit the highest inflation rate in Nigeria’s history, thereby multiplying afflictions and hunger under the watch of a most uncaring Siamese executive and legislature, and their coterie of appointees and acolytes in MDAs, mocking the populace with their opulence and conspicuous consumption.

#EndBadGovernance Protests

As the depressed citizenry grapple with the crippling impact of the opaque subsidy removal, the Central Bank floated the naira despite inadequate food production, exacerbated by pampered bandits who hamper both farming and transportation of available farm products, thereby shooting the cost of living to an all-time high as if programmed to inflict more pain and suffering on the hapless masses. By December 2023, sounds of Ebi npawa-o began to resonate. But, rather than improve, things got worse. The hunger-induced outcry rose to a crescendo, leading to the widely announced nationwide #EndBadGovernance protest of August 1-10th. Did the “True Democrat” respect protesters’ constitutional right or listen to their plea? Unacceptable, of course!

So, the police rolled out their officers and men in unprecedented numbers, applied both legal and violent means to frustrate the protest. Notwithstanding, northern youths refused to be caged as they responded in like manner, came out en-mass and made their feelings known and their voices heard. There were killings and large scale arrests with some being charged with treason for sponsoring the protest. While an “implicated Briton” blasted the Presidency for inability to distinguish between Protest and Subversion, an appalled former Chair of the National Human Rights Commission, Prof Chidi Odinkalu, said: “Those who told us how they fought the military are now making us see the military as democrats.” The same “progressives” that “Occupied Nigeria,” with a big Pentecostal Daddy organising a 1 million-man march in abusive protest against a constitutionally elected President and his wife without repercussion, now tells us that protest against hunger and bad governance is an intolerable act of subversion and anarchy. Yet, the religious forces of ethnicity and bigotry are shamefully silent! Many South-South youths have lamented the palpable hypocrisy of the Pentecostal fathers. One, in a viral video, said: “…God is not a tribalist.” One Nigeria in deed, but double standards!

Ethnic profiling

A presidential adviser’s profiling of Igbos, linking Peter Obi and IPOB with the yet-to-be organised protest was a kite with a sinister objective to be executed in Lagos. Yet, neither the state, the the Police, the military, the Church nor the media condemned it as hate speech. Ditto #IgboMustGo hate campaign that surfaced on social media. However, the non-participation of the South East and Ndigbo generally took the wind out of their monstrous sail. As a result, what would have been another planned and robustly funded mayhem was averted.

Unimpressed, Senator Babafemi Ojudu said: “We are, therefore, surprised and disappointed that Igbos are still made scapegoats, and targeted as instigators of protests, as shown in several statements (such as the Igbo-Must-Go hashtag, and call by a certain ‘Lagospedia’ X(Twitter) handle) and videos trending online.

“This dangerous ethnic profiling is unwarranted, and must stop. It was such profiling that led to the millions of deaths in Nigeria from the 1950’s to the unfortunate civil war in 1967 to 1970. Elsewhere in Africa, it led to the genocide in Rwanda and the xenophobia in South Africa.

“We demand that the security agencies bring to book the purveyors of these hate speeches in line with the Cybercrimes Act.”

Compatriots, has anybody been arrested? No! Selective justice, one nation!

Despite superficial political denials in Lagos, investigations revealed that top government officials were aware of the threat. But after denials of complicity and the appeal to security agencies by the South East legislators in the National Assembly (not the Reps or Senate), there was neither an arrest nor caution, even though owner of the X handle and his followers were identified. Yes, such is what you get when leadership of state aparakchit is parochially selected and politically engineered to achieve a desired goal which, again, explains why insecurity persists. A recent report in New Telegraph disclosed that in one year, kidnappers in Nigeria collected over N1.048 billion as ransom!

Injustice

As a pundit offered in a recent post, “I dare suggest that if other Nigerian ethnicities who prefer political power understood Igbos, they would rule forever, and Igbos wouldn’t mind. Any Igbo will tell you: Provide a level playing field, promote law and order, and Nigbo will largely ignore politics.

“We don’t do well with kings and queens! Not being creature worshippers, monarchism and feudalism are strange to our culture. Respect is earned, not inherited. We only hate injustice with a terrible passion.”

You may ask: What about Igbo governors?

“The answer is simple. No one chose them. They’re imposed with guns every election cycle. They are vassals of Abuja. First, recall Governor Sam Mbakwe of Second Republic Old Imo State and current Abia State Governor, Alex Otti: they are examples of what happens when our will prevails in the choice of a public officer.

“With free and fair elections rather than gun and court imposed selections, none of these clowns will smell their respective Government Houses,” he affirmed.

Same philosophy also distinguishes Peter Obi from his peers across the country. He can live in Onitsha and walk freely into the market (and even Alaba in Lagos) with little or no escort. “His attitude is what our forebears built over thousands of years. Industry without excessive greed! A peaceful man with grit and a truck-load of bravery. Someone who pursues justice for all and uses public money for public good.

His erudition, persona and enormous investment in cognitive development manifest in the breadth and depth of his socio-economic and political articulations. No doubt, those qualities attracted free-minded youths and professionals nationwide who chose him as the arrowhead of their determination to recover the nation from the stranglehold of corrupt and greedy unfit men that have misruled the country into the dark alley of debt peonage, economic meltdown and unprecedented suffering and hardship.

•Nwafo writes from Lagos via chi_dafo@yahoo.com, +2349065225130.

Update news