THIS SO CALLED MISTAKE BY THE NAME OF NIGERIA (AND HOW TO ACCEPT IT)

“A nation that has been defeated and comes under the rule of another nation will quickly perish.” — Ibn Khaldun, Al-Muqaddimah.

If in being conquered by the Colonials, all the former tribes & kingdoms that made up Nigeria perished (which they didn’t), then in its aftermath, the British created something else; a hybrid monster of sorts. Our “nationalist” forefathers (some of whom were quite more regional than you think) were quite fond of calling Nigeria a geographical mistake due to the way it was formed. Lest we forget, what is present day Nigeria was once basically a business venture called the Royal Niger Company (which before then was a group of kingdoms; some independent, some enslaved by the other independent ones), which out of necessity for the British was turned into a country (to avoid the French swooping in. Even colonials fought each other, but arguably with more respect). It’s much harder to take over a country than it is a company. So yes, one can see how our forefathers who wished to be independent of each other called Nigeria a mistake. But for those of us who grew up in a post-independence Nigeria, this statement is somewhat annoying, for we just know Nigeria as a country, not as regions… that is untill the occasion, where we experience a racially ethnic conflict of some sort, whether personally or otherwise, which reminds us maybe we don’t know Nigeria as well as we think we do (which I’m sure every Nigerian has gone through at least once in their life). It doesn’t help that some of these divisional rhetorics are made by so called leaders with followings, FFK much, for example *coughs*?!

But sometimes great things come from mistakes. D.J Kool Herc accidentally created scratching and well, now we have hip hop (had to chip in my other love there). In destroying the sovereignty of so many of these kingdoms that existed and replacing it with what is now Nigeria, the Colonials inadvertently created the world’s populous Black nation, home of Fela Kuti and so many others. The only thing standing in our way really, is us.

This isn’t a pep talk, although I wish it was. But the point is if we can’t accept that we’re all in this mistake together, how are we suppose to solve it? First thing we should consider doing is getting rid of at least 35% of our current leaders (I’m not telling you how to do it, I’m just saying, but I won’t necessarily disagree with any method you pick as long as you don’t call my name. Joke!!!) and replacing them with the right people. Preferably people who want to make the most out of this mistake and not continue condemning it, because the people wai do the mistake from the beginning, they no dey here again o! Except if we want to talk about Shell and their other business ventures, but I’d rather wake up tomorrow. #2019.

LEADERS & THEIR LUXURIES (AND WHY BUHARI'S "YOUTH" COMMENT WAS ANNOYING)

“God is rich, but you are poor!” — Anonymous.

“And then we choose a select few of our people to be rich and privileged above us, only to be told we are lazy! It is well!!” — Abdulnasir Imam.

Leaders are afforded certain luxuries by the state, the reason for this is really two-fold. One is so that the leader doesn’t feel the need to steal from his people and become a usurper and two, by belonging to the "haves" by virtue of his office, it is expected the leader will gain some understanding and compassion for the "have-nots". Clearly, these two reasons (though not exhaustive) hasn’t stopped leaders (ours especially) from over-stepping their boundaries.

Perhaps even worse than a leader knowingly transgressing these lines which his comfort affords him not to, is when the leader becomes too blind by the luxuries to not know when he does. Case in point, President Muhammadu Buhari’s statements on the youths of Nigeria (or a section, as the presidency claims) at a Commonwealth Business Forum in London.

Honest mistakes can be made by a leader and should be forgiven, but something repeated, in this case, the president’s repeated gaffes have to be questioned. Even if we were to eventually forgive President Buhari, it will take a while. I mentioned the luxuries afforded to leaders for a reason and it is quite clear that the ones we afford Mr. President has made him blind to the realities on ground.

Just to be clear, we shall go over what the president said and did NOT say. For starters, in defense of the president, he did not say, “lazy”, but sometimes you don’t have to say a word to mean it and according to the president’s handler, he was referring to a certain group among the youths and not in general. Regardless of whether he was referring to Northern youths or those from the Niger Delta is at this point, I think, besides the point! But if that is the case and we are trying to defend Mr. President here in order to be fair, he sure picked the wrong group of Nigerian youths to showcase to the world.

We shall break down his statement and I’ll explain to you why it’s problematic in almost every single way. Here’s what was exactly said, “More than 60 percent of the population is below 30, a lot of them haven’t been to school and they are claiming that Nigeria is an oil producing country, therefore, they should sit and do nothing and get housing, healthcare, education free.”

Let’s look at that statement bit by bit, for starters the president acknowledges that more than 60 percent of our population (conservatively) is below the age of 30, that’s a powder keg waiting to explode under the wrong guidance. The fact that it hasn’t happened, should make Mr. President happy. Two things can make a country great: 1. A great government and 2. A great population (think of the effect of losing Africans during the slave trade had on the then existing African kingdoms). 

Nigeria has a great population by almost all accounts, in number and in brainpower. We unfortunately have not had that much of a great government since independence. Almost every government that came to power sans the first Republic, managed to come and go barely holding it together and thus leaving the masses for the most part to their own devices. The military was successful in succeeding each other due to force and having a group feeling (respect) for each other, possibly before their feelings for the masses. Unfortunately that hasn’t changed with civilian governments. The force is gone, but that group feeling to care about only the people on top is still there. So consider that a population of youths (some more than others) that have grown up under these two different types of government to not have gone haywire and Mr. President should be thanking his lucky stars.

Mr. President goes on to say, “a lot of them haven’t been to school and they are claiming that Nigeria is an oil producing country, therefore, they should sit and do nothing and get housing, healthcare, education free.” First of all, I don’t think that there are many Nigerians below the tertiary age who don’t want to go to school. You are either privileged enough to go or financially incapable. In some places, due to culture (and a misunderstanding of religion) young children are discouraged from going to school and such thinking is further enforced in the name of religion. All of this has nothing to do with the child, but the environment and privilege he or she is born into. So if a lot of us haven’t been to school, Mr. President, it’s because we’re unable to, not to mention the lack of orientation about its importance in certain places.

Mr. President goes on, “and they are claiming that Nigeria is an oil producing country, therefore, they should sit and do nothing and get housing, healthcare, education free.” I don’t know about you, but the fact that Nigeria IS an oil producing country, should allow me to make some claims. What I am not doing, is sitting down doing nothing, while making those claims. I want what is due to me, so if I work and put in enough effort, I get reciprocated for it, so I can pay for my housing, healthcare and the education of my unborn children. But first, where is the housing? Mr. President stays for free in Abuja and I don’t know if he’s ever tried to buy a house here lately, I can tell him it’s not easy. Where’s the healthcare he claims we want for free? Even when we have the money for it, it can cost an arm and a leg. Where’s the education? These are things that should be affordable as an oil producing nation, but they are mostly not! If we can’t get a job, we can’t pay for these things and last I checked, most of the really good jobs are taken by children of privilege, children most likely like the president’s!

Lest we forget, Mr. President, your generation, our parents’ generation have a narrow view of what a job is so when one of us wants to do something that doesn’t sound nice for them to brag to their friends about, we are discouraged from making something of ourselves. So to please our parents and their generation, we all end up vying for the same white collar jobs that now tell us we need x degree and x amount of years of work to be even considered. Why won’t people just go and sit home and watch Big Brother all day and/or praise Yahoo boys, but the truth is most of us don’t just do this! Because, despite Mr. President’s words and despite their generation’s view of what work is, we still go out there trying to survive. We should be applauded for that, for we are certainly doing all that without the luxuries that we (yes, we) have provide for Mr. President by supporting him, whether through votes, taxes or our mere existence as the citizens of a nation he came to serve!

And that’s why his statement hurt… regardless of who he was talking about!