Dear Nigeria,
Sorry I neglected to get in touch for so long but I’ve been really busy. Even now I’m pretty busy. An average day sees me starting work at 8 am and finishing at 9.30 pm since we teachers work when others can spare time from their 9 to 5 schedules. I can’t complain though because things were dry for a while on the work front. It’s very much a case of work droughts followed by work floods. Today I made a little time to write because yesterday I stumbled across certain chaps called Europe, Asia, America and World in a bar. They were saying the most horrid things about you old friend. And how their words hurt!
They hurt so because they were words of truth.
Hopefully you remember me from 1995 when I last called on you. This is Mogbolahan Koya-Oyagbola. I’m not sure if I ever told you why I changed my name from Oyagbola to Koya-Oyagbola a few years back. I did it as a kind of statement of defiance against my penurious state in England. It has served its purpose however and I have dropped the Koya in thought if not yet officially. “De” in Yoruba names is the affix for “come/arrive” and “ayo” means joy. Perhaps I’ll change my name from Ko-iya Koya (the refutation of suffering) to Ko-ayo-de Kayode or Mu-ayo-de Mayode (bring or cause joy to arrive) or Je-ayo-de Jayode (born eating joy on and before arrival). I’ll appreciate your thoughts on this as it’s a work in progress.
The last time we spoke in 2006 I told you about my brother’s intention to run for the federal senate. Following conversations with him I understood his motivation and intentions and hoped for his success. You on the other hand simply laughed your sad laugh, shook your head and said he didn’t stand a chance.
I nourished the delicate flower hope but in the end you were of course proved right in your doubts as hope’s petals wilted and blew away. It is a sad truth that boils down to this – Now only crooks and gangsters seem to get anywhere in that country and self interest is what motivates everyone. This is borne out by my brother’s failure to get beyond the primaries in the senate race. In spite of what many might think my family has never been a family of unscrupulous looters and power brokers. My mother was a civil servant then an entrepreneur before my dad pushed her into politics. As for my brother… to cut a long story short the primaries were rigged and older brother Oyagbola got a mere three votes. Anybody with some level of political savvy knows that even a dead cat with no name recognition polls more than three votes.
At least my mother got past the primaries stage way back in the late 70’s. Of course intimidation and vote rigging eventually deprived her of a senate seat so that a carpet bagger ended up winning in the Egbado senatorial district. Yet for all that she was given a cabinet portfolio for the first term and though I used to curse how that transformed the Oyagbola family into the struggling middle class (she was detained after the Buhari military coup and the army regime went on to destroy the publishing industry so mum’s bookstore business crashed) I can now walk with my head held high knowing your starving millions cannot point accusing fingers at an Oyagbola.
Anyway, I digress. My reason for writing is to reveal just how appalled I am by the moral bankruptcy of your so-called leaders. Not a day passes that I do not hear others sniggering as I walk into a bar or restaurant. I was in fact supposed to submit a short story to an anthology due to be published next year in New York and London. The deadline is June 2010 and the brief is to write uplifting stories about Nigeria. Though getting selected for the anthology would do wonders for my author profile and book sales I find I’m unable to think of anything uplifting to write – perhaps something a la Tolstoy showing the courage of the downtrodden masses. But would that be uplifting?
Nigeria, right now I am just so disgusted by what’s going on in your courtyard and I want to contribute in some way to help bring about change. I now live and work in Germany as an English language teacher so clearly I’m a man of humble means. I am certainly not in a position to make monetary contributions or to give on the ground support. I am also uninterested in affiliations with political parties because I’ve seen enough at close quarters to know that well meaning people like my mother and the late Aminu Kano don’t get very far. What I can do is be the voice in the Diaspora.
Feed me with information about what is going on and I can write essays and articles in wonderful, impassioned prose to better bring it to world attention. Having done the writing however, you will have to help me to get it into newspapers back home. My efforts so far have proved unsuccessful. The feedback my mother gets each time she approaches a newspaper house with something I’ve written is that the situation in the country is too sensitive to publish such a piece. Her response, like mine is, “If you won’t publish this now when the centre cannot hold and things are falling apart, when will you publish?” I’ve written to Professor Chinua Achebe and Professor Wole Soyinka at their faculty email addresses in the hopes of eliciting moral backing to get into newsprint. I daresay they are very busy men and so far I’ve drawn blanks. I fervently wish to be of service because I see gloom, doom, disaster ahead and I’m tired of this feeling of helplessness.
Nigeria, you don’t seem to realise how many fires are raging around you. But then that is hardly surprising given that your so-called leaders have pushed your head deep into the sand. There may well be some well meaning politicians left but quite frankly I’ve lost faith in the political process and short of electoral reform, I see another Somalia looming. I see it and it frightens me.
They say all it takes for evil to triumph is for good men and women to say and do nothing. I don’t know that I am good but I do intend to do something. Beyond just writing the way forward for me ultimately will be to set up or align myself with NGOs working at grass roots level to directly alleviate the poverty all around you through sanitation/healthcare, education and micro business projects. I’ve actually already devised a fairly detailed plan of where these projects would be located. I would focus on neglected communities within your easterly side (Borno State, Plateau, Taraba, Adamawa, Benue, Cross Rivers, Rivers, Abia, Imo, Akwa Ibom, Ebonyi, Rivers, Bayelsa and the marginalised Ketu/Yewa part of Ogun State where my parents are from). Then at least I would be able to see the works of my hands and the results at close quarters.
First thing is first – I need to continue in my efforts to make a name for myself as a writer so that I become credible to U.N. and donor agencies. If you’re wondering, “Why the east, he’s a Yoruba from the west,” that’s precisely the reason. To talk about ethnic loyalty in 2010 (I refuse to use the word tribe) is just such an insult to the idea of you Nigeria. I pray to be able to accomplish this to some degree so that by the time the leaping inferno licking at your heels finally consumes you I will have saved a few and also helped many to make new starts in other parts of the world if needs be. Then like Oskar Schindler, even if I lament not having saved more, I can at least try to assuage my guilt with the knowledge that I saved a few.
I am very serious about the proposals I’ve put to you so do please start compiling the information I need. If I’m unable to make my submission deadline because I’m too pained to write uplifting pieces then I can at least write rational critiques to stir the imagination. And while you’re at it, please send me a list of the most impoverished parts of the states mentioned above. I’ve made Oskar Schindler my role model and while I may not yet have the means to set up an NGO, as God is my witness, I hope to get there. I will get there; I am there!
I look forward to hearing back from you soon.
Mogbolahan Adegoke Babatunde Oyagbola (MABO)
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