The Wisdom of Our Forefathers

By Okey Ikechukwu

Our people say that the difference between a blind man and one who is not blind is not the absence of an eye socket. It is also not even the absence of an eyeball in many cases. In the latter case, the eye socket would not be lacking in an eyeball. It is just that the eyeball in the socket is without vision, even as it stares at you with the fixation of a presumably seeing eye. Thus, blindness is simply the inability to see, physically or metaphorically.

There is also this other saying of our people, to the effect that a leopard hunter who, during his hunt, takes time off to smoke his pipe while close to the lair of a feared leopard, should please notify his ancestors to expect him at short notice before lighting his pipe. The most sophisticated lady who is being chased by a lion will not remember her catwalk in such a situation.

 When a land is in great thrall, largely because of a collective guilt that everyone is eager to deny responsibility for, the road to healing and solutions is not yet in sight at all.   When problems that had a long gestation, and which therefore took decades to develop and mature due to reinforced errors, neglect of what should be done and deliberate acts of mischief, are treated as if they sprang up only yesterday, then the people are not yet ready to take the path to self-redemption.

With the above thoughts in my head, I found myself in a dream. I was looking down at our fatherland and admiring its beauty.  Several leaders of yore walked past as I looked, apparently heading to some meeting, or gathering. Most of them had such impressive carriage and quiet personal dignity. Such bearing! Such poise! Such character!

“These are the living symbols of the traditions, laws, values and pristine wisdom of the land” I murmured to myself. Standard Bearers of right and wrong for the people and the nation! “This land is blessed”, I murmured again.

Then I turned to look at the women and the maidens. Many of them embodied flawless grace and unimpeachable womanly dignity! Like the elders, the women and the maidens, the young men and children, too, looked very diligent and alert. I smiled in admiration and took in everything with calm scrutiny.

I could then really see why most countries admired and respected our fatherland and its people many decades ago. It is only human beings that can make a community good or bad. No community is good simply because of its natural endowments, no! The people themselves, their ways of doing things and their sense of propriety, not what is in the soil or above the soil, are responsible for the image and reputation of any society. The goodness and badness of a nation is always and only traceable to the people. But back to the dream.

Then, lo and behold, I found myself looking at yet another profile of the same fatherland of ours. I shuddered in dismay and consternation. How could this be? The land had changed so much. All the natural resources were still there, no doubt. The fertile soil had not become any less fertile. Nothing had really taken away the ever-benevolent climate and peaceful nature of the people.

Yet, there was a smell of un-sanctity in the air. It enveloped the land in a strange, stupefying sort of way. It was possible to sense it all, tot smell and almost touch it. Yet, it was impossible to pinpoint what was wrong, or what the matter could possibly be. I was simply impossible to put his finger on it.

Then I felt, or heard, a voice whisper to me that our fatherland’s esteem was at its peak before bad leadership came upon the scene over 50 years ago. Baffled, I looked around, but saw no one.

Then my mind went to the well-known fact that many people in governorship, religious and traditional leadership positions today are actually doing very unusual things. They compete with supply contractors, professional road builders, and even pick pockets. They love conspicuous consumption. They love the looks on famished faces as they flaunt their material possessions. Oh, how they love the display!  And yet, what they are prancing about with, and showing off with, belongs to the people. Leaders indeed!

In the dream, and from my vantage position, I could see the faces of the people. They were watching their governors, their local government chairmen, their councillors and their ward chairmen and, especially, their lawmakers in the state and National Assemblies. Most of the people looked thoroughly perplexed, or generally distraught.

But some of the people seemed quite happy, if in some cases they had a pasted smile that concealed considerable inner personal turmoil. But, for the record, many were actually happy with the ongoing signs of depravity around them.

Looking still more closely in the dream, I noticed that it was mostly the shameless in these places, and especially also a large population of young people who were serving as Special Assistants and Personal Assistants, that were happy.  There were signs of debauchery everywhere. The ignorant among the populace celebrated what they were seeing. But many far-seeing elders, and even some not so elderly ones, were not impressed at all.

And time passed in my dream.

I turned and noticed that some groups of people were discussing in low tones in their little corners. Their concern was the problems in the land. None knew whom to blame. The young ones blamed the elders, saying that they had ruined the nation and their future. The elders blamed changing times and global trends, as well as the elder statesmen. The latter feigned outrage, as they indignantly declared that any insinuations about their complicity in the nation’s problems was baseless.

Untold misery, despondency and a dreary feeling of the spirit soaked the land through and through. And I found myself wondering about it all. Then, as if in response to my thoughts, the strange voice whispered to me again in my dream: “The people who are looking at the Federal Government are all acting as if there are no leaders at State, Local, Council and ward levels”. Agan, I couldn’t see the speaker.

Really? But it is true! No one is interested in asking what happens to the monthly allocations to these tiers of government. They are also not all too keen on doing the right things in their personal and professional lives.  They are not interested in listening to what any sensible person has to say. They have no idea about what is going on around them, because they are totally beholden to their self-replicating acts of folly.  They give themselves no time to see clearly, think clearly, or to find out what anyone thinks, or feels.

Yet they want change, they want a better society. They are willing to live in the best version of their country, and they are waiting impatiently for someone to create it. Just look at how politicians move from one party to the other, doing the very things a responsible leader should not do. Abomination, right? Perhaps not, really. It is now the norm. No wonder, then! Yes, no wonder!

The subsisting smell of sacrilege in the air, has its roots in decades of our nurturing of the wrong paradigms for social cohesion and responsible leadership.  The complaints, as well as the ominous silence, of some of the wise men and women at the state and local government levels today portends ill; and may yet beget the as yet unknown, unnamed and unseen.

I shuddered over and over again in my dream. Then other thoughts assailed me.

I found myself wondering how people in positions of responsibility could be so completely bereft of all native wisdom and good sense. Does a representative of the peoples need to be told that a sharp object, which is used for trimming the fingernails, is not good for cleaning the eyes? Does anyone need to be reminded that a sensible person does not invite the community to inspect every part of his body in the village square, just to prove that he baths with extreme care?

Who would be the beacon when people in leadership positions act as if they are at a drunken revel? What should the people do when what should be hidden from children is put on display in the Village Square and, sometimes, in the marketplace? Who will give the people a sense of the sacred when the officiating priest at a coronation ceremony is not sober?

Many more questions flooded my mind, but they were too many for me to consider at once. Yes, the questions were just too many! Then my mind went to some proverbs. Yes, proverbs again!

There is great wisdom in the saying that the friends and relations of a mad man do not find the latter’s behaviour in public amusing, or entertaining. But what do you say, or do, in a situation where those who should be custodians of the highest values in the land seem to be the mad men in question?

I stared about me in the dream. I thought of the proverb, which said that whoever revealed the identity of the person behind a mask had profaned the mystery of the masquerade cult. But here, today, those who should play the role of protectors of the sacred put their imprimatur on profanity everywhere. What do you do when supposed protectors of the realm now seem to have turned into Patron Saint of mediocrity?

Then the strange voice whispered to me again, saying that many who ought to speak and provide guidance at state and local government levels have had their voices strangulated by the favours they had received, and continued to receive, from various quarters. This latter group does not want to lose the advantages and privileges of the hour. I nodded, thinking of the wisdom of our forefathers.