OF NIGERIANS, HARAMITES, PDP, APC, MONKEYS AND FISHES

It was from Dr. Samuel Koranteng-Pipim that I first heard of 'offering a monkey solution'. The impressive Prof. Pius Adesanmi had doled out a whopping 2,500 cowries on my behalf, to attend as his guest, in a seminar organised in Lagos by Bamidele Ademola-Olateju's Circle of Hands. It was here that the keynote speaker, Dr. Pipim, a Ghanaian sage based in the U.S. retold Retired Archbishop Kwasi Sarpong's story of offering a monkey solution.

In the story, a group of monkeys sought to help some fishes they saw struggling in a raging flood. Jumping from the trees, and with much difficulty, they caught the fishes one by one and placed them on dry land. Soon, motionless fishes piled on the shore. Turning to each other, the monkeys said: “See, the tired fishes are sleeping and resting. But for us, they’d all have drowned! When they wake up, they’d be very grateful that we’ve given them salvation.”

Probably, the well-intentioned but misguided monkeys failed to realise that the fishes, who could not survive for long on dry land, have all died. Strangely enough, in saving the fishes, the monkeys caused the fishes to perish. One can only but reiterate Dr. Pipim's caveat that Nigeria should beware of well-intentioned but misguided solutions to her national challenges.

Pray, do we really need a Ghanaian thinker, or a graduate from Cambridge or Harvard, to remind us of our penchant for offering risky solutions to problems? The signs are everywhere in Nigeria - ominous, foreboding signs. Many sectors or areas of our national life that have been so beset.

A ready case study is the education sector. Successive Nigeria leaders looked the other way as the public education system tragically collapsed. Instead of finding germane and long-lasting solutions, our leaders sold school-operating licences to the highest bidder, and commercialised education. What do we have today? Shylock individuals, churches and mosques running the show in the education sector, from crèche to the tertiary level. And the aftermath? Outrageous school fees, miracle-examination-success-centres, and ultimately, graduates who could barely write and pronounce their names. Nigerians are now shipped to countries such as Sudan and Ukraine in search of quality education. Tell, can you confidently send your child to any community or public school in Nigeria today?

It is saddening that our line of horrible leaders have failed, refused and neglected to adequately harness our enormous human, natural and capital resources through building lasting infrastructures and institutions. Instead of growing our people and infrastructure, we choose the risky and inglorious option of brazenly turning our country to a begging nation in the guise of attracting foreign investments, foreign aids or foreign partnerships. Nigeria is now a dumping ground for substandard European and Asian goods, obsolete technology, and semi-skilled expatriates.

Dr. Pipim likens Nigeria's beggary mentality to the 'west chewing our food for us and spitting into our mouth to swallow'. And I add that, like goats and camels, we unabashedly regurgitate the food, and chew the cods. Yes. Goats, camels, cod-chewers - that's what the touted biggest economy in Africa has become! As an aside, one wonders how the over-bloated statistics the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy (what a title!), Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala readily brandishes and hysterically sermonizes on puts food on the table of impoverished ordinary Nigerians toiling under the scorching oriental sun of Upper Iweka, or on the slums of Makoko, where one out of four three indigent teenage girl is, so they say, ‘carrying’ an unwanted pregnancy. One again wonders whether this aberration had been brought to the attention of Dr. Oby Ezekwesili, formerly of the PDP hegemony, but now of the #BringBackOurGirls franchise.

It is no secret that every Nigerian yearns for a peaceful democratic country, where social justice, religious tolerance, equality and mutual respect reign supreme. Regrettably, the ruling PDP and the opposition APC have offered us just the opposite. In their desperate bid to retain and/or takeover power for their selfish ends, they have literally sworn an oath with the devil to ensure that they continue to suppress and hold the rest of us down, like the mythical succubus and incubus. With their acerbic utterances, body language and iniquitous posture on national issues, they have almost certainly succeeded in dividing the country along ethnic and religious fault lines.

Pray, could someone tell Lai Mohammed, Doyin Okupe and Olisah Metu that their highly-divisive verbal warfare over almost every nothing, including a trivial issue as who ought to take the credit for the containment of Ebola virus disease in Nigeria is most puerile, infantile, and childish.

The Federal Government and our gallant soldiers are striving to contain insurgency in the North Eastern part of the country. As our military might is being unleashed on these evil lots, we should also be mindful of the after effects of the war on residents of the terror-ravaged areas. When this war against these agents of darkness is won, as certainly would be the case, measures should be put in place to rebuild the affected areas, and mop up arms that might have gotten into wrong hands. And, institutions must be established to rehabilitate and resettle those displaced from their towns and homes, so that we don’t throw away the baby with the bath water. In the interim, the government should put urgent measures in place to cater for the displaced, maimed or wounded, especially those from Mubi in Adamawa Sate where terrorists have reportedly captured about five local government areas.

I align myself with Dr. Pipim’s analysis that with a population of over 170 million, Nigeria should be one of the most powerful countries in the world, just like China. Like the USA, Nigeria ought to be a very secure nation, and play a leading role in dislodging terrorism and guaranteeing security in Africa. Like Israel, China and Russia, Nigeria ought to be ahead of the rest of Africa in educational development. Like India and Germany, Nigeria should be ahead in provision of quality healthcare. But alas! Instead of finding lasting solutions and putting institutions in place to address our myriad of problems, we are impaired by greed, ethnicity, tribalism and religion.

In our bid to usher in another newly elected democratic government come 2015, the PDP and the APC must be careful not to offer us the well-intentioned but misguided monkey solution of over-heating the polity, thereby destroying the very essence and fabric of the country they desperately scheme to swoop on its commonwealth. Change is desirable, but before we change Nigeria, we all have to change ourselves, and our mindset. And, to borrow the words of Dr. Pipim, 'zeal without knowledge is risky and destructive. In the face of danger, ignorance in action is as dangerous as stupidity or inaction'.

Let the house rat broadcast this to the bush rodents: If ‘big-brother’ Nigeria suffers herself to be engulfed in crises and conflicts, the rest of West Africa would no doubt be destabilized, doomed. Imagine the unlikeable scenario of over 170 million Nigerians becoming refugees; all our 'tiny' West African neighbours would definitely not be able contain us. This is unimaginably scary, bloodcurdling. Hence, those who drum for war - the haramites, the APC, the PDP and Nigerians must all think! In their well-intentioned but misguided quest to give us political, religious and economic salvation, they should be mindful not to destroy the rest of us, just as the ignorant monkeys did the fishes.

-          MAURICE CHUKWU, Legal Practitioner, Lagos. mauricechukwu@gmail.com

A WARNING FOR MGBALA AGWA

And I begin with a sigh of disgust:
This cannot happen in Akama.

Macabre drumbeats being beaten
Furiously
Dangerously
Clandestinely
And Akama is desecrated.

Nnem Ochie can no longer breathe
The air is fouled with the scent of ogiri Agadi-Nwanyi,
Dirty lucre and Janjaweed idiocies.
Have I not put a knife on the soul of kindred spirits?
And was Abame not wiped away?

Yes.

I hide in Okeofia at dusk
I beat the drum of Kata-Kata, the harbinger of all strife
I wash my palms with filthy oil lucre at dawn
I eat kola-nuts with elders and younglings at noon.
Yet, am I not the one suing for peace at Werima, and at Douglas House?

Offspring of Akama,
I hold ogene onye-oma-ekwe before cockcrow,
Bitten by the morning dew, and by igirigi ututu
It is my shrill quivering voice you hear:
Foreboding
Forewarning;
Bear in your strife-stricken bosoms
That Abame is no more, wiped out,
Forgotten
Yet, you sue for strife

Chei!

I fear
I fear for Mgbala Akama,
The desecrated land of my forebears.

A LEGACY OF REVOLUTION IN HISTORY AND HUMAN THOUGHT

A Review of ''Agwa Socio-Cultural, Political And Economic Contemporary History:  Challenges And Prospects''

In 1955, Chinua Achebe in the famous book ''Things Fall Apart'' told the story of the complex and dynamic and qualities of Igbos in Umuofia. Unknown to him, he was preparing a recipe for one of the greatest revolutions in the history of Ndigbo, Achebeism has since become a doctrine of historical, socio-political and economic action for the mass of the Igboland - to the rest of the world.

This is the manner of men of social conscience. While others sleep and dither, they ponder the history, predicament and agonising problems of society and avidly search for practical and humane solutions.

Hon. Raymond Anumaka, in a breath-taking, intellectually ravishing and scholarly dogged and ponderous study, has produced a work that may well acquire the rhetorical, polemical and philosophically explosive dimension of Achebe's oracular exposition-''Things Fall Apart'' Although historical and not entirely economic, Hon. Anumaka's work may yet crystallise an  economic perspective through which the development of Agwa clan, his main theme, may be attained.

Hon. Anumaka is a socio-cultural historian, educator and farmer of great renown who has also had a successful sojourn in the political arena where he gained a meteoric rise to the position of an honourable member of the Imo State House of Assembly in the second republic. The author, in this monumental work - "Agwa Socio-Cultural, Political and Economic Contemporary History: Challenges and Prospects" - has given a deeply philosophical, poetic and practical expression to this constant and perennial craving of Agwa people for identity and a meaningful life, and relief for all for those thirsting for identity around the world.

In this ten chaptered book, Hon. Anumaka tackles with intellectual zest, ruthlessness and audacity the old age history, culture, traditions, economy, religion, politics and the developmental evolution of the ten towns in Agwa clan. He traces the descent of Agwa clan to Akuma, the first son of Agwa who migrated from Ihiagwa in Owerri West LGA, and points out that Nekede and Ihiagwa share the same descent with Agwa.

From Hon. Anumaka's accounts in chapters one and two, one learns the peculiarity and complexity of Agwa clan before and after the arrival of the Europeans. He includes a detailed description of the justice codes and trial process, the social and family rituals, the marriage customs, food production and preparation  process, the process for shared leadership for the communities, religious beliefs and practices, and the opportunities for virtually everyman to climb the clan's ladder of success through his own efforts.

In chapter two, Hon. Anumaka attempts to blend the oracles, customs, traditions and natural law of Agwa clan. From the Owu festival, to 'Iro Mmuo' coupled with the elegant philosophical rationalism of the prestigious Nze na Ozo title, Hon. Anumaka distils and invokes a nostalgic feeling of the sacredness of the 'ekwe nri' and/or the shrill cry of 'maranu ekwu o!' often associated with the 'iba n'ulo ukwu' of Ndi Nze. To the author, to sustain the Nze na Ozo institution which is gradually going extinct, there is need to jettison fetish practices associated with the title to encourage Christians to embrace it more.

After a vigorously courageous exploration of the doctrines of the ofo, the ala, the echele owu, the chief priests and an exhaustive treatment of the postulates of the early white missionaries, their new religion and the holy fiats of the Bible, Hon. Anumaka laboriously extracts from the interstices of Biblical injunctions and traditional religion a theory which posits that ''Christianity did not introduce to us the idea of knowing God but rather introduced a new method or channel of worshipping considered better.'' For he submits further that "our forefathers knew God and worshipped him using the instrumentality of lesser gods and spirits''. To the author, while the Bible replaced the ofo, catechists replaced chief priests, church buildings took the place of shrines, and consequently, Agwa people ''lost their identity and were conquered spiritually''. He however concedes that ''the whiteman also brought with him western education and better ways of doing things.''

The author  recounts with accustomed ease the agricultural products from Agwa clan. For the author, our yam species of agammiri, ji ocha, okwuworugbo, esonso, nkuokpu, and  ogbaragada have remained distinct both in taste and demand throughout Igboland. The  author however, bemoans the neglect of agriculture, insisting that before the discovery of oil, palm oil and palm kernel served as Nigeria's export products produced from Igboland. He invites the entire Igboland to imbibe the policy of cutting down old palm trees and replacing same with new ones. The author endeavours to lay down a solution and calls on individuals, corporate bodies, and governments at all levels to invest in the development of agriculture through technological development. The novelty of the proposition here is that mechanized agriculture would take youths off the street and crime, reduce unemployment and earn foreign exchange.

To the author, the quest for education in Agwa started in 1963 when Ferdinand Obodo secured admission into the prestigious Fourah Bay College, Sierra Leone. He goes on to give an account of the initial lack of enthusiasm on the part of Agwa people to keep the academic fire burning. He however rightly observes that lately, there is a new zeal and enthusiasm in seeking tertiary education by Agwa people which, for the author, ''is the road for the search for a new social-political and economic order in Agwa clan''. But the author adds a socio-cultural tincture when he submits that Agwa people no longer hold the belief that ''the best legacy one could bequeath to their children is a huge barn of yams and other food crops.'' And as such, priests, professors, doctorate, master's and bachelor's degrees holders, from almost all fields of endeavour, now abound in Agwa.

A very polemic question raised and to which concrete answers were attempted most vigorously is in chapter eight. The author raises the question. "Is it possible for the entire Agwa to develop without a central Union?". The author takes heed to revered English jurist, Lord Denning's dictum that a judge cannot simply fold his hands and blame the draftsman. So, he proffers an answer to the question he raised and concludes that  "... a formidable central union in Agwa clan would galvanize and serve as a catalyst for the speedy development of the clan''.

While Hon. Anumaka's view may sound revolutionary and almost iconoclastic, it must be conceded that it is consistent with the sub theme of his book ''The Challenges and Prospects'' of the Agwa clan. This is not out of place in a period of extreme arbitrariness and volatility in Agwa clan. More so, at a time when tangible government presence has continued to elude the clan owing to our diversified town unions and the tendency to disagree, and still continue to be disagreeable, as to the locus of prospective governmental projects. This divisiveness of ours gleefully oust dividends of democracy from Agwa, and successive governments are only too happy to wash their hands like Pontius Pilate. By and large, Hon. Anumaka's standpoint is a standing and clamant challenge to the moral conscience of  Agwa people.

In chapter nine, Hon. Anumaka yet again delves deep into the realm of history, philosophy, truth, and exploration of space in an attempt to search for the underlying truth about autonomous community, ezeship institution. According to the author, from time immemorial up to 1978 - the inception of  the reign of late Eze Stocken Okorie and late Eze Ejimmaduekwu, who ruled Obudi-Agwa and Uwaorie Autonomous Communities respectively, and then to the present era of HRH Eze (Dr.) I.O. Asor of Obudi Autonomous Community, HRH Eze Charles Ukwu (deceased) of Mgbala Autonomous Community, HRH Eze Chima Azubuike of Ubah Autonomous Community, HRH Eze Sylvester Onuegbu of Mbano Autonomous Community, and HRH Eze (Dr.) Saviour Utazi of Umuofeke Autonomous Community, the author observes that Agwa clan is privileged to have had progressive ''set of traditional rulers who have not lost focus of their primary roles as the custodians of customs and traditions of the people'' and ''have made significant progress in the area of peacekeeping ... in Agwa clan''.

In the last chapter, the author makes a clarion call with a view to addressing security challenges in Agwa. For the author, ''security is pivotal to development, and the Agwa community should explore several means to see that insecurity is reduced even right from the immediate family circles'' He therefore calls on well-meaning individuals, corporate bodies and the government ensure the establishment of a well-equipped and properly manned ultra-modern police division in Agwa.

It must be stated that the genius of the Hon. Anumaka lies in his ability to neither make the book about himself nor a controversial rabble-rousing bugaboo. For he successfully and dexterously recreates the past and marries it with the present. The reader will find the work scholarly enormous. It ranges over all the broad spectrum of disciplines. The historian, the jurist, the philosopher, the religionists, the agriculturists, the economists, the astrologers will all find the book stimulating and educative.
Despite a few typographical and syntax errors owing to the printer's devil, Hon. Anumaka has provided not only the socio-political history of Agwa clan but a legacy of revolution in socio-political history and human thought.

Barr Maurice Canice Chukwu.
Dr. Olu Onagoruwa Chambers, Lagos
08032332734

THE ACCIDENTAL PROGRESSIVES – By Maurice Chukwu

 

Maurice Chukwu

Nigeria is a country that has the unenviable reputation of almost all its leaders having emerged by accidents. Some of the leadership accidents have been minor and caused little disruption, whilst others have been devastatingly ghastly.

 

The first accident in 1959 was minor, just like a minor surgery: Sir Ahmadu Bello leads the NPC to win a plurality of the parliamentary seats. And, suddenly, he develops cold feet at leading the country, devolves the position of Prime Minister to his deputy and, accidentally, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa becomes the Prime Minister.

Then comes the first ghastly accident which has affected the country ever since. On 14 January 1966, Major Chukwuma Nzeogwu leads a group of revolutionary soldiers to terminate the civilian rule in a bloody coup d'etat. Through accidental out-manoeuvrings, Aguiyi Ironsi, originally slated for assassination, becomes the country's first military Head of State.

Yet again, another ghastly leadership accident occurs: On 29 July 1966, while Ironsi was at Government House in Ibadan, troops led by Major Theophilus Danjuma and Captain Martin Adamu storms the building, seizes Ironsi and his host, Lieutenant Colonel Adekunle Fajuyi, and subsequently, shoots the two men. Lieutenant-Colonel Yakubu Gowon becomes the Head of State. 

The next accident was minor; no bending of bumpers, no shattering of windscreens, and no bloodletting! On July 29, 1975, General Gowon is overthrown whilst at an OAU summit in Kampala. The delightsome Brigadier (later General) Murtala Muhammed steps in and, fine-boy-athlete Gowon, dragging his tail behind, sank into Tom Cruise’s Oblivion. Thank goodness, he survived to become the praying mantiss (sorry, prayer warrior) he has ever since become having supervised that genocidal civil war: “Oh Lord, there’s too much blood on my hands, it’s Ojukwu that provoked me, please forgive …!”

The next accident was regrettably ghastly: On February 13, 1976, Lt. Col Buka Suka Dimka leads an abortive coup attempt and Murtala Muhammed is killed in the process. The Supreme Military Council appoints Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo as head of State, and he completes Muhammed’s plan of transfer to civilian rule by handing power to Shehu Shagari on October 1, 1979.

President Shagari himself has also emerged by an appalling judicial accident when, on September 26, 1979, the Supreme Court mixed up logical reasoning in Awolowo v. Shagari, and declares that the phrase “... in each of at least two thirds of all the states within the federation’ means ‘in each of at least two thirds of all the votes within the federation”.

One would have thought that the return to democracy would signal the end to the endless leadership accidents. But did it? 

On December 31, 1983, Major-General Muhammadu Buhari (has he now upstaged Theodore Roosevelt as the father of all progressives?) stages a successful military coup, overthrows civilian President Shehu Shagari and becomes the Head of State, dragging the nation back into military dictatorship. General Ibrahim Babangida would later overthrow Buhari's regime on 27 August 1985 in a bloodless military coup that relied on mid-level officers that Babangida strategically and ‘Maradona-ly’ positioned over the years.

After cancelling the June 12, 1993 presidential elections believed to have been won by late Chief MKO Abiola, Babangida resigns and appoints Ernest Shonekan as Interim President on 26 August 1993. On 17 November 1993, General Sani Abacha sacks Shonekan in a palace coup, forcefully dismantles the remaining democratic institutions and brings the government back under military control. He accidentally dies in office on June 8, 1998, purportedly on the charmed laps of alluring Sunita ladies freshly imported from India. As an aside, one wonders how avant-garde high-life-pop genius, Flavour N’abania would describe those 100-watts baby oku ladies!

After Abacha’s death, Maj. Gen. Abdulsalam Abubakar was sworn in as the country's Head of State on June 9, 1998. Abubakar immediately conducted elections and transferred power to Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo, who accidentally emerged from under the noose of Abacha’s blood-thirsty hangmen to become President on May 29, 1999 on the platform of the PDP.

Now, the military have had their fill with leadership with the accidents thereon. And, civilians have taken over and the leadership accidents continue.

On December 2006, former Governor Peter Odili of Rivers State, (oh how they have ruined that beautiful Garden-City State, turning it into the Rivers of Babylon and of mindless ego wars!) who was widely expected to emerge as the presidential candidate of the ruling PDP for the April 2007 election, suddenly steps down on the eve of the primary election for Umaru Yar'Adua, who at the time of his nomination, was an obscure figure on the national stage and, could not have won the nomination under fair circumstances. And, Baba was somewhere in the farm laughing at our folly of not expecting the usual accident: I dey laugh o…

In accordance with the order of succession in the Nigerian constitution following President Umaru Yar'Adua’s death on 5^th May 2010, Vice President Goodluck Jonathan was sworn in as President on 6 May 2010, becoming Nigeria's 14th accidental Head of State. And since then, it has only been about ‘good luck to me, good luck to you, good luck to everybody, good luck Nigeria eehh!!! We all danced and rejoiced, but are yet to smell the promised ‘breath of fresh air’.

Now, another set of recycled politicians and soldiers who have been highly involved in the macabre dance of denying Nigerians the enjoyment of our collective commonwealth; have gathered once more in a bid to continue these maddening leadership accidents, albeit, in another guise: Yes, I mean the progressives!

Progressive politicians advocate a level playing field through strictly enforced employment laws, progressive taxation, universal health care, liberal social laws and environmental regulations and restrictions for the common good. In other words, the progressive believes in improving society. However, anyone would be for that. It depends on what each person believes to be a better society. 

But who are these Nigerian progressives? They are everywhere - in their mansions, in their private jets, in the Senate, and even in obscurity! Some of them, I learnt, suffer from diarrhea of the mouth! Let’s meet just two of them:

Achike Udenwa was governor of Imo State from May 29 199 to 29 May 2007. In December 2008, late President Umaru Yar'Adua appointed him Minister of Commerce and Industry. He left office in March 2010 when the then Acting President Jonathan dissolved his cabinet. Throughout his time in office, he never did anything meaningful in Imo State. In a manner of speaking, he bled the Eastern Heartland to death. All through the period of his political relevance; he was a die-hard member of the PDP. Then the accident occurs: After his unsuccessfully bid for a seat at the Senate, he loses relevance in the PDP, decamps to the CAN (now APC) and becomes a progressive! Now, he wants to deliver us. O ma se o. 

Yet another accidental progressive:  Mallam Nasir el-Rufai was a former DG of the BPE and former Minister of the FCT, Abuja from 16 July 2003 to 29 May 2007. He served as a member of the National Energy Council under the Umaru Yar’Adua administration. He was one of former President Obasanjo’s most trusted apologists. He was ever-visible. He was everywhere; a PDP man through and through.  Suddenly, and accidentally too, he loses relevance, decamps to the CPC (now APC) and becomes a progressive! Now, he desires to deliver us from the hawks.  Then, to invest a kind of immortality on the word ‘accidental’, he publishes his author-biography and aptly captions it, The Accidental Progressive (or is Public Servant?). Haba, Mallam!

The word “progressive” works like a charm in Nigeria. But does it have practical content? In today’s context, it may be that progressive politics seems to be a stance taken by mavericks that have lost relevance in the ruling party. Late Afro beat maestro, Fela Kuti (oh dear! We miss Fela) must have had a song or two on these progressives, who, having bled us to death in the PDP now scheme to continue doing so in their new-found progressive garbs. One only hopes that the leadership accident that would be orchestrated by them would be a minor one. Anyway, Nigerians are used to having our political leaders emerge by accidents. Ironically, the best hands never get to rule. Ask the revered trio of Zik, Awo and MKO.

*Maurice CHUKWU, Legal Practitioner, Lagos, mauricechukwu@gmail.com, 08032332734