This House

My most fervent hope for the New Year is that I will start to read and hear more positive things about Nigeria and Nigerians. I was last in Nigeria in 1995 just after graduating from University College London with a B.A. in Philosophy. From the early 1980s when the military took over the running of government my educational career had been littered with casualties. I’m being deliberately vague with the year because the whole thing is a blur to me. However much I check the chronological facts, they very quickly become a blur. Despite my family background, much of my life has been a struggle. At my father’s nudging, my capable but rather shy mother went into politics in the late 1970s. She took to it with gusto however and was eventually elected Nigeria’s first female cabinet minister for one term in office. I can remember the day the military took power. It was the second term of the Shehu Shagari government.  The holidays were almost over and my dad came out of his room to announce there had been a military coup. He had heard it on the radio. All past and current politicians had been ordered to remain in their houses. This wasn’t really news to my mother. Word had come to her months before that plans were in the offing for the overthrow of the civilian government. A family friend had warned her to leave the country but she had refused. She had not been reappointed to office in the second term and had been the portrait of probity in the first so she had nothing to fear. Running would have been admission of a nonexistent guilt.

Security agents appeared at the house a day or so later and my mother was carted away to Ogun, her birth state. There’s no need for me to repeat what happened at the airport on my way back to England around this time. This is the subject of an earlier post. Clouds descend on me once more but I do remember visiting my mother in a guest house in Ogun State before she was moved back to Lagos to be detained with politicians who served at the federal level. My uncle (my mother’s older brother) was at the same guest house. My mother had served with the NPN political party, my uncle with UPN and this had led to a little friction within the family. During the first election period in which my mother had run for the senate (a race she ultimately lost), things had been bloody and a cousin of mine (the son of an even older brother to my mother) had been stabbed in the stomach merely for being related to my mother. Thankfully no vital organs were punctured and his innards were pushed back, his stomach stitched. The gods were smiling that day because just as the operation was completed there was a power cut. He survived.

During this same period my mother had been detained in custody on some trumped up charges brought by supporters of the UPN politician contesting the same senatorial seat. The frivolous charges were thrown out and she was soon out on the campaign trail once more. An awful lot of ballot irregularities took place. Election rigging and ballot box stuffing occurred on a wide scale. Ogun State was a UPN stronghold but the marginalised Egbado senatorial district (now called Yewa) was up for grabs. Let nobody tell you Obafemi Awolowo was not a great man. He was a great man and Nigeria owes him much. Great as he was, as a human, he also had his flaws. Let us therefore desist from hagiography and praise him (along with all great Nigerians) for his great deeds and forgive him his flaws. One of his more divisive flaws was his tendency to put the Ijebu first in all he did. As such, the development of the Egbado part of Ogun State was of little import to him yet none savvy voters were happy to sell their votes for spurious promises while shouting “Awo” all the way to the ballot box. There were many intimidation tactics employed throughout the election cycle but my mother campaigned to the end. In spite of intimidation, danger to her personal safety and the seemingly insurmountable task of winning her district for NPN she campaigned till the end.

Why am I writing about all this? I suppose because towards the end of each year I tend to reflect on my life and because it seems to me Nigerians do not reflect enough on the past. Note, reflecting is not the same as worrying. If Nigerians reflected more, there would be lasting progress. A friend of mine who visited Nigeria recently lamented the fact the country of his birth had been transformed into a gangster’s paradise. It wasn’t always thus and in spite of what many may think, not all politicians were corrupt. The trouble is the honest ones were not available in enough numbers to turn the tide against corruption. What’s more, it was the corrupt ones who were permitted to make repeated appearances. The honest ones mostly left the playing field disgusted by the ongoing plunder. Give Nigeria the most well-meaning head of state and it won’t make a blind bit of difference until there are dutiful people in enough numbers to serve. Once again, why am I writing about all this? Because many Nigerians fail to hold anything of abiding worth with esteem; because all that seems to matter to Nigerians is surface appearance; because the greatest gift I can give Nigerians is the truth.

Well here is the son of parents many will deem to be members of the elite saying to hell with appearances. Here I am standing up and proclaiming I did not live the life of a playboy in Europe. Here I am standing up and proclaiming my parents did not have mansions, yachts and private jets from any illicit gains. I struggled and suffered to get an education from the age of 13 onwards because if my mother wasn’t being detained by the military government back home, the economy was going down and the middle class going down with it. My “O” levels were only the first casualties of my academic career. I struggled and suffered because with all the uncertainty back in Nigeria, it was a supreme effort for me to pick up a book never mind absorb its contents. Studying architecture, I had to drop out for financial reasons. Next I had to drop the economics part of my Economics and Philosophy joint B.A. degree. The truth is I failed the economics part. I remember reading passages of text over and over again only to have other thoughts crowd out my concentration. I would read about game theory in my econometrics textbook but my mind would be wondering how I was going to pay the next rent or when my life would regain some semblance of order. I somehow got by with the aid of part time jobs, nightshift jobs, student loans, bank loans, support from friends and family (notably my mother) so I don’t want anyone going away with the false impression that I lived the life of Riley. And don’t you dare feel sorry for me because it isn’t sympathy I crave but national reflection.

In a gangster’s paradise – a Hustler Republic – things such as education, culture, art, the nurturing of industry are not deemed important. Sustainability, growth, humility, service… all such substantives are dirty words. All that matters is who makes the quickest buck regardless of how they do so. There is nothing to look forward to but a desert in a Hustler Republic because wherever the spirit of humility and service are lacking nothing is nurtured and nothing grows. In a Hustler Republic people’s only concern is how to build an empire of ego, power and money.

To repeat, my mother was Nigeria’s first female cabinet minister but even so, each time she either goes or sends someone to the post office to collect mail from her postal order box, hours of queuing ensue. Now if she were to have her own key, she could nonchalantly walk to her box, open it and take out her mail. She was promised her own key over two years ago but she’s still waiting to receive it. She could kick up a fuss of course but just how many things can one kick up a fuss about in a Hustler Republic? She could kick up a fuss and scream that favourite Nigerian fallback, “Do you know who I am?” but once you go down that road in a Hustler Republic you’ll never have a moment’s peace because every second, of every minute, of every hour, of every day, you’ll have something to shout about and end up working yourself into an early grave. Now if Nigeria were in the midst of its own version of the Cultural Revolution which proved so ruinous to China one could suppose her not receiving a key was a form of protest by workers against a past oppressor. Nigeria is ideologically neutral however and the truth of the matter is those in charge of issuing keys are probably just too busy to do their job. They’re too busy hustling and looking for ways to make a quick buck. If they reflected more they might consider what it says about them that they can be so unperturbed about neglecting to serve a past public official who strove to better her country.

If Nigerians in general reflected more they might consider what it says about their country when even a past cabinet level minister cannot get a key to her post office box because she’s not deemed immediately useful to the hustler mentality officials. They might lament the shame in the fact that this mother received a package of books and tea from her son only to discover the package had been opened and the tea removed. If it is illegal to post one small pack of herbal tea from Germany then by all means say so but do not illicitly remove the “offending” item then seal back the package as though it hasn’t been opened. Two months ago I sent one of my books to Nigeria. I wanted my mum to have a signed copy of her youngest son’s book before approaching Nigerian newspapers about possible interviews. Being a humble working man I saw no reason to expend some of my finite resources on an expensive international courier service. It’s been two months and I’m still waiting for a book that should have taken two weeks to arrive to be delivered. Perhaps the friendly post office official in Nigeria didn’t take kindly to a package containing a book but no tea.

As we go into the New Year my question to Nigerians is simple:

“Is this what you want, to live in a Hustler Republic? Is this really what you want?”

Because if you want your world to have any measure of beauty, any measure of spiritual worth, then you need to start carrying out certain small acts of moral courage. You need to start building an empire of humility and service which nurtures, grows  and rewards. I address Nigerians from all walks of life. Be you agnostic, atheist or deist you must accept that everything in life requires some degree of faith, some degree of trust. Without trust, even that paper so many Nigerians worship would become worthless because nobody would accept pieces of paper called money. Today, money is not held in the form of precious metals, it’s a promissory note in theory but in the absence of a Bretton Woods system or gold backing it is more accurate to say the paper we hold is fiat money. Even so, people trust in it because they have faith in the idea behind it – the financial system. Money is a fiduciary instrument. Look in the dictionary and you’ll find the word fiduciary comes from the Latin fiducia which means trust. I defy any government to issue paper money in a climate in which faith in the banking system has crumbled.

It is time to see Nigeria for what it is – a big house. How many of you would countenance someone coming into your living room to urinate and defecate? How many of you would allow yourselves to be bribed with a light bulb from a house when the whole house belongs to you? Then why would you allow someone to buy your vote? Why would you allow someone to exploit you? Don’t you know the whole of Nigeria is your house? Can’t you see that? It’s time you all started to hold this house in high esteem because for all I’ve said so far, I’m less concerned about past privations I’ve faced. I’m less concerned about the ingratitude my mother and other members of my family have experienced. What really concerns me is what it says about this house called Nigeria. If people as accomplished as my mother can face such difficulties and if a son from such a family can face such struggles, what hope is there for the humble subsistence farmer and how many fledgling Einsteins, Flemings, Goethes have we deprived of faith and trust before their geniuses could take root?  How many more Koya-Oyagbolas are we stifling and trying to snuff out with our indifference even now as their geniuses struggle to take root? Unless you wish to spend your life in a desert it’s time for every single Nigerian to stand up and say, there will be no more incivility, no more neglect, no more anguish in this house. It’s time Nigerians stood up to those of little faith who attempt to urinate and defecate in this house’s living room.

It’s time Nigerians started saying, “Not in this house, not in this house, not in this house because this house deserves luminance; this house deserves harmony; this house deserves abundance. With a little faith and a little trust we can begin to nurture our just deserts. With a little faith we can dismiss past grudges to constantly build an empire of spirit, humility and service. The time to build this worthy empire is in the abiding now. We have to build it in the eternal now so that this house, this fledgling house, this humble yet glorious house can rise to illuminate the world.