WHY I’M UNREPENTANTLY NIGERIAN

Nigeria needs patriotic and purpose-driven leadership, writes

O. Jason Osai

I am of the generation of Nigerians that prayed to God in song to save Her Majesty, the Queen of England during Empire Days, hailed Nigeria from October 1, 1960, hailed Biafra for almost three years, returned to hail Nigeria again and, thereafter, implored compatriots to arise and obey Nigeria’s call. I was set back almost three years and lost many friends during those inglorious years of our national history. Irrespective of the fact that my guitar shielded me from going to the battlefield, I was perforated at 14 points by a warplane that strafed civilians against the rules of engagement and laws of war; as a result, I underwent seven surgeries in Africa, Europe and America to correct the damage done to my body. Yet, I am unrepentantly Nigerian.

Many in my generation graduated at the top bracket of sometimes 90 percent Caucasian classes of universities in Europe and America thereby debunking the concept of White supremacy; the generation whose essays were used as models in English 101 classes in which they were, in many cases, the only black; the generation that shopped in Manhattan, New York City and other world shopping districts with the Naira at a time it was superior to the dollar and at par with the pound; the generation that walked the streets of world capitals brandishing the green passport with pride borne out of the respect it commanded then; the hardworking generation that took advantage of the credit hour system of American education and earned bachelors’ and masters’ degrees in four years and headed home straightaway. For instance, immediately Olalekan Biobaku dropped his pen for his MBA, he rushed from Murray, Kentucky to Nashville, Tennessee and took the next flight to Nigeria; he did not wait for his certificate for he knew that, given the optimal efficiency of the American system, it will be sent to him promptly; and it was.

I am unrepentantly Nigerian. My generation rejected mouthwatering offers that followed the affirmative laws that came at the heels of Alex Haley’s epic movie, Roots in the 1970s. I am unrepentantly Nigerian. Nevertheless, I must confess, sometimes in my quiet moments I ask myself if this is the country I rejected the offer of American Dream come through. Now at the “Departure Lounge of Life” in this encasement, my brain cannot memorize a fifth anthem neither can my feeble lungs vocalize it. One of us who had the privilege of travelling all over the world and also travelling by road and low altitude aircraft throughout Nigeria once averred that “no nation on earth is more endowed than Nigeria”. This nation is so amazingly gifted it can be for Negrodom what London and Rome are for Caucasians, what Mecca and Medina are for Moslems, what Jerusalem is for the Jews and much more. It is therefore a colossal tragedy that millions of Nigerians go to bed hungry on a daily basis… the greater tragedy is that Nigeria is governed by a preponderance of idiots and tribalists instead of citizens in the Greek sense of these categorizations.

Fast forward to the current generation, Pastor Enoch Aminu says “in all the universities in America, Nigerians are top-notch”. Naturally, Nigerians are achievers, I am unrepentantly Nigerian. Granted that the centrifugal forces in Nigeria politics have ravaged the social fabric of the nation, the truth remains that what the nation needs is patriotic and purpose-driven leadership such as Lee Quan Yew dutifully demonstrated in Singapore, Nelson Mandela gracefully gave to South Africa, John Magufuli dedicatedly delivered in Tanzania and Paul Kagame is painstakingly providing for Rwanda.

I am unrepentantly Nigerian. In a 1995 academic article titled “The Inevitability of a Revolution in Nigeria”, I called for a revolution of our minds. In that piece, I offered that “if we are incapable of a peaceful revolution then there should be a bloody one; if it means killing every Nigerian from 45 years and above, I am for it as long as it ushers in the desired change.” You see, I was 45 years old at the time, which means that I was ready to die in that process. I am unrepentantly Nigerian, and I believe that we need a radical departure from our state of consciousness. Nigerian leaders must break loose from the stranglehold of the ossified creeds of organized religion, imbibe the consciousness of patriotism and wean themselves from the neurotic craze for acquisition of massive wealth.

Obviously, vesting the resources in the state governments will simply move the point of profligacy, pilfering and pillage from the national treasury to the State treasury. The enduring way forward is that government should give back the people their lands that it stole through dispossessional decrees and laws. The landowners in Zamfara State should mine their gold, the people of Igbeti should harness their marbles, the people of the Niger Delta should extract their crude oil and gas and the peoples of various communities in this prodigiously endowed nation should harness their natural resources and pay taxes; government should concentrate on its traditional regulatory role.

Granted, the above thesis will create systemic imbalances and socioeconomic disparities, these can be mitigated through a discriminatory tax regime such that the agricultural sector pays minimally while the other sectors pay objectively graded percentages. With this, government will become lean and unattractive for bounty hunters while attracting only those who desire to serve; the political firmament will become cool. Most importantly, the abundant productive forces of the nation will be invigorated towards a robust private sector in the tradition of Adam Smith’s economic classic, Wealth of Nations.

I am unrepentantly Nigerian. My plea is that “we depart from this gross thoughtlessness in the very serious business of governance” in the current global amphitheater, which is impenitently Hobbesian. Otherwise, I shall fill my aged lungs in readiness to sing nunc dimitis and, subsequently, a new anthem. Worrisomely, that may be tragic for the Black Race.

Prof Osai is of the Political Science Department,

Rivers State University, Port Harcourt