No oppressive government started out brazenly oppressive. It has been a case of one act of dishonour per time, then two per time, then dishonour and shame become the norm. This is where the current Nigerian administration is headed. The government does not get credit for its ability to orchestrate evil and look away pretending to be even holier than the Pope. It used to be a pastime of the military but like it was in that era, intimidation has since become a tool in the hands of the Goodluck Jonathan-led government. Most of the suspects treat power like the man who never had the mental capacity to deal with any amount of money above N10, 000. If you give this man, say, N10 million, he’d not stop his splurge until he spends it to the level of his mental ability. This is where most of today’s power players, including the President have found themselves. Take the President for instance, his capacity appears not meant for the rigorously mentally tasking job he is bestowed with. He did not at anytime train to lead at this level. Now, he has the power he never imagined and most of what he has done point the President in the direction of the man described above.
If one must ask, what was the government trying to achieve by banning the documentary that mirrored the Nigerian society as it is today? Fuelling Poverty, a documentary by Ishaya Bako, is a 30-minute audio-visual of realities that Nigerians have come to be used to. It tells the story of Occupy Nigeria wrapped inside the bigger story of corruption, poverty and the curse of governance in Nigeria. If you needed a movie to answer the question, “How is Nigeria doing today?,” Bako’s certainly does. Two major feelings are evoked after seeing the documentary; you either give up on this country or you feel the rage to do something about the mess. Irrespective of your emotional stance, the movie certainly communicates the truth of Nigeria’s current predicament with hunger, poverty and bad governance. This was further emphasised by the fact that on the day the movie was being banned, four journalists of Leadership newspapers were also arrested for the publication of documents the government deemed untrue. This is coming on the heels of shutting down media houses and arresting a few other journalists between December 2012 and now.
Now that the movie has been banned, will the Nigerian government show the same vigour and patriotism with which it used in banning the movie, in fighting corruption and well, banning poverty itself? Over the months, this government has shown great efficiency in dealing with mundane things while displaying a now characteristic sickening incompetence at matters that matter to the state. It was smart at knowing that Dr. Frederick Fasehun of the Oodua People’s Congress was a man who could be easily won over. After making N2.4bn available with promises to fix that amount every month under the guise of protection of gas pipeline, Fasehun has since lost his voice in defence of this administration. That the government was smart enough to reach out to this person says a lot about its ability to come up with disruption ideas. Does it surprise you that people like Fasehun waited for over a quarter century to realise an Obafemi Awolowo political party needed to be resurrected? Do we need to connect the dots here or do we need to be told to watch as the story unfolds? From all indications, this is just another way government is by itself sowing the seed of discord.
The government is currently obsessed over how it would grant amnesty to felons responsible for the killing of thousands of Nigerians. Nothing has been said about the victims, it has been all about the men who maimed, killed and unleashed terror on the masses. One begins to wonder, whether being a good citizen has since become a crime in Nigeria and that being a criminal earns you cool naira points. The immorality of this government would not let it see beyond a cash-and-carry mode of settling disputes. You cannot buy peace; you build it through justice, equity, and true democracy. You cannot continue to trim the branches of a tree and expect to have the tree eventually vanish. If we want to deal with some of our nation’s fundamental problems, we must begin to deal with the root causes of these problems.
That we think we can solve every problem by throwing money at it would be our undoing. In the wake of the nationwide flooding, the President came on air to group the flooded areas according to severity. A committee was set up and money was immediately dictated for each area. Even though the money read aloud by the President would not have solved all the problems of the villagers who suffered farm losses and the loss of their homes, it would have been heart-warming to know that all that billions at least went to the people who needed the money. What is the morality behind a grandstanding that does nothing but expose yet again the inability of our government to do the right thing the right way?
Finally, how does the President pretend to fight corruption after his action to pardon Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, a fugitive? This was not just a convict but also a man who had escaped justice in another country. What morality would drive the President to say something like, “Our fight against corruption…”? If it was ever fought under Jonathan, the war against corruption ended with that action. Except we say, “some thieves are more equal than the others,” the government now has no moral right to arrest, prosecute then convict someone for the very same crime Alamieyeseigha is enjoying a state pardon for. This would amount to a waste of state resources because, of what use is this anyway if we already know that every criminal would now look to have his pardon after conviction? What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
These are trying times for Nigeria but it is not the end. What we cannot afford to do is to look at all these challenges and assume that others caused them. Somehow, someway, we all are responsible for what our country has become. This is the only country we’ve got and we must make it work. That the government has banned Fuelling Poverty does not mean Nigerians cannot still see it. It is available on Youtube. We must not limit ourselves to the failings of our government. We can do better; we can by ourselves show the world that the fact morality is a scarce commodity in the country’s seat of power doesn’t make it dear in the Nigerian society
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