2022/2023 is the climax of Nigeria’s 2019 political season. As happens in politics, especially in the developing world, transition means more than just elections. A horrendously unique breed, Nigerians have a peculiarly sickening political culture. We play politics with the mouth rather than with the head; we vote in cronies rather than those who can deliver; we frolic with oppressors and traitors and slickers rather than shame and reject them.
Politics being the only thriving mainstay of the country, citizens are all learning the art of the blessing-turned-curse. To survive, everybody (priests, professionals, security agents, everybody) now plays the game which -fortunately or unfortunately- requires only notorious skills. It is an interesting situation, over which patriots weep uncontrollably. Alas, an alarming majority of both the people and the leaders carry on as if this was the road to heaven on earth.
Nigeria is in dire straits. Educationally, medically, economically, professionally, socially, let alone politically, Nigeria is in trouble. No, please, I take that back. I meant to say that Nigeria is in deep shit.
The statistics are not just grim, they are also frightening. We produce nothing apart from dwindling oil for the international market but we consume everything therefrom. The worst is that almost all the 200 million of us are trapped in some kind of somnambulism. There’s troubling deafening silence as everyone seems used to suffering and enjoying it.
Nothing best captures this sad commentary the way our approach to politics does. In the build-up to and during elections, we put our tribe and religion and party ahead of country, state or local government area. We become immune to sound reasoning. We prefer mediocrity to excellence.
However, three to six months thereafter, we return to the trenches disowning and calling out the same bunch we only just brought in. This has been the Nigerian political trajectory, for only-God-knows-how-long. It is no surprise that this country and we the people have continued to remain far away from our promised land. Fellow Nigerians, shall we allow this chronic evil to torment us yet again in 2023?
That poser requires no answer. It is a call to action. Dear compatriots, let’s wise up; let’s be loyal to ourselves -at least for once. 2023 is our chance to refuel, recalibrate and relaunch with patriotism, with sense, with experience, with courage and with intentionality.
That mission should start with all of us imbibing an understanding of the concept called loyalty. Apart perhaps from clannishness, ignorance, injustice and religion, the other Nigerian weapon of mass oppression is loyalty. There’s an ungodly dirty tendency to dress up loyalty as acceptable slavery. Recently, at an Abuja event to mark a union’s golden jubilee, the lead speaker said something about the need for someone to be ‘loyal to the end.’
Loyalty is a virtue, no doubt. But, just as humility could easily be misconstrued as timidity, loyalty can easily turn into slavery. A loyal person who has no sense and no self-worth can easily become a slave but still go about giving sermons on loyalty. As we speak, there are near us far more slaves than loyal citizens!
How do you know yours is not foolish loyalty? First, you get treated like a human being rather than like some ape who’s just being favoured. Secondly, you enjoy loyalty too from those to whom you are loyal and can genuinely explain away occasional deprivations or delays. Thirdly and most importantly, nobody forced you to swear to any silly oath and you nurse no anti-loyalty sentiments that you permanently suppress so they don’t tag you disloyal!
Listen, if the twin vices of insatiability and ingratitude (which are the hallmark of greed) tint your loyalty: you are a disloyal person. That is, if someone to whom you are loyal remains accessible, fair and helpful to you: you are disloyal when you move away or connive with their opponent or in a different direction; except you had first explained your new reality to them. On the other hand, if you pooh-pooh a system or a table from which only leftovers or such other crumbs come to you: nature will asterisk you as a loyal person who showed courage. Courage is a necessary ingredient in loyalty: you need it to create balance, to keep sane, to remain loyal, to speak up, or even to stay alive.
The truth is: most of those we deem disloyal (because they dared to break free) are super loyal people who only showed courage or class or cause or all. If you choose to not remain tied to the apron strings of an unjust system, or of an abusive marriage, or of an overbearing godfather, or of a lousy relationship, or of an unprofitable partnership, you have displayed courage -not disloyalty. If you grow of age to now want what your one-time boss or benefactor also wants, that is growth -not disloyalty. If you break away from your predecessor for popular good -for the verifiable and proven good of the people- you commit no crime of disloyalty; rather we can say for sure that you not only have sense, you also fear God.
Nobody should be intimidated into depression, sickness or subservience in the name of loyalty. If you honestly believe that you deserve(d) better and that you didn’t and won’t get commensurate returns on loyalty, it is not disloyalty to not stick around a second longer. This contextualisation should empower many of our citizens to stand up and be counted in the next electoral window. Vis-a-vis 2023, you’d not run aground near the coast of disloyalty if you swam away from the leader or set-up that has been disloyal to you.
Moving on might sound too extreme but it is far better than staying put and whining eternally. Blind, slavish loyalty is sheer waste of man-hours, manpower and man-everything. By the way: this message is not for everybody; it is only for those who’d lose nothing if they went for broke. Last line: if you have been lying all along though, that the system or leader or relationship has offered you nothing when indeed you got so much which you succeeded in hiding away, your surname shall from this day forward be disloyalty; since loyalty didn’t fail you, you failed loyalty.
God bless Nigeria!
Those who give and tell (2)
This entry last week received a trailerload of reactions. Here are a few:
“The country is in trouble, given the loss and or abdication of values. Most can only reminisce on ‘there was once a time …’ but that doesn’t mean folks who know better should give up.” -Mr. Udom Inoyo, former vice-chairman, ExxonMobil Nigeria
“Your last two pieces were not only down to earth but also humane and artistically confounding. People give nowadays not only to be cheered but also to be notorious. The biblical exhortation of not letting the left hand know what the right is doing is neglected. Human socialisation contemporaneously adores the absurd. Etiquette and politeness are now laughable behavioural practices. I thank God Almighty for your commonsensical approach to features/columns writing. I enjoy reading you.”
– Prof. Akpan Hogan Ekpo, University of Uyo, Don, Economics/Public Policy & Chairman, Foundation for Economic Research and Training (FERT), Lagos
“Great article. This resonates. We are supposed to, as Christians, give as directed by the scriptures but when pastors who are custodians of Christianity breach it, what should others do? We are indeed in a cul-de-sac. Thanks for bringing this to the fore. I hope your fans, most of whom celebrate this indignity, will ‘share’ this article widely and make it trend for long!”
-Udeme Nana, PhD., Journalism Lecturer & founder, Uyo Book Club