An open letter to my dad

An open letter to my dad 

By Clem Oluwole 

(First published on March 21, 2013).

Good day, old man. I am deeply pained to pen this missive to you because I know it would disturb your peace.

When we were growing up, you inculcated in us the virtue of honesty. You did not spare the rod in getting us to tow the path of moral rectitude. I will forever remember the treatment I got in your hands the day a piece of meat disappeared from the family soup pot. The proof of the theft was the yawning gap the stolen piece of meat left behind because the oil had partly coagulated. I protested my innocence, arguing that if I were to pinch meat from the pot, I would have cleverly rocked the pot to even the surface. You were to apologise to me later upon discovering that the culprit was a house rat when I drew your attention to the tell-tale footprints the thief left on the floor which you traced to its hideout under your wooden bed.

The first litmus test of my upbringing came years after you were long gone. I was elected as secretary-general of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, Benue-Plateau chapter, in the mid-seventies. We ran a vibrant union during which I caught a vision to organize an appeal fund to raise money for our activities rather than going around cap in hand for funds to pursue our mandate. The occasion was a howling success.

A few months after the exercise, agitation began to emerge from some quarters that fresh election must be held because the exco was dominated by non-indigenes of the state. My social secretary was so pissed off by the development. One evening, he pulled me aside and said: “Clem, we have to do something fast. The agitators have their eyes on the cash in the union’s coffers. Since our exco inherited nothing, we should clear the account and let the agitators also start afresh.”

I dissolved into a guffaw which he mistook for acquiescence. But I told him that I would not soil my fingers even if we had a million naira in the account. And that I would rather be referred to as a murderer than a thief. This was because I could hinge my action on self-defence. But as an embezzler of public funds, there would be no excuses at all. He took a long look at me, shook his head and hissed away.

My social secretary was a Nostradamus who foresaw the Nigeria of today. Yes, he knew what would become of this stupendously rich country a few decades after. But there I was… a stark illiterate who could not read the writing on the wall as written by malfeasance. Dad, it was your fault, yours entirely. But for the path you chose for us, I too would have booked a place in the bandwagon that ferries thieving big shots from wealth to wealth. I am sure you are regretting now. Only if you had known what the future held for your fatherland, the brazen thievery by those entrusted with our common purse which has become a way of life, you would have allowed me to take my destiny into my own hands as I grew up.

Dad, whenever I think of the likes of Cecilia Ibru, Bode George, Tafa Balogun, Lucky Igbinedion, James Ibori and, lately, the governor-general of the Ijaw land, Dieprieye Alamiesiegha, I become envious of their backgrounds… the kind of upbringing their parents gave them that eventually transformed them into multi-billionaires. In and out of jail, they rank among the thieving heroes that are worshipped by Nigerians today. It is not just enough that they steal; they now cart their loots to failing states like Sudan of all places for safety.

Dad, I still remember your motto: A good name is better than silver and gold. That time-honoured axiom no longer makes any sense in this country. This is simply because it pays to be a big-time thief on this side of the divide. You can steal anything and get away with it. A typical example is the (controversial) state pardon granted to Alams, an international felon, who was arrested at the Heathrow Airport in September, 2005 by the London Metropolitan Police on charges of money laundering. About one million pounds in cash was found in his London home. Another one million, eight hundred thousand pounds were located in one of his (numerous) bank accounts.

He was initially remanded in prison, dumped in the same cell with a mad man. The Britons must have thought that he must be “a mad man” to have looted so much. He was later granted bail but he jumped bail in December, 2005, escaped from London with forged document and disguised himself as a woman and sneaked back to Nigeria. At the time Alams fell, he had stolen several billions of naira from the coffers of the Bayelsa state government. He was consequently impeached and his deputy, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, succeeded him. It was the beginning of the latter’s meteoric ascension to the apogee of the nation’s political office. Today, and propelled by ethnic jingoism, he is in a pole position to grant forgiveness to his benefactor and damn the consequences. Dad, I envy your generation. Ours is doomed.

In the past couple of weeks, majority of Nigerians and a section of the international community have been thrown off balance, alarmed by the state pardon granted to Alams. The general consensus is that the anti-corruption war has been lost, at least for now. Don’t you think so?

I rest my letter here and continue to rest in perfect peace.

Between Nero and Jonathan

Nero was the despotic emperor of Rome who presided over the burning of the ancient city in A.D. 64. For seven days and seven nights, citizens of ancient Rome watched helplessly as their city burned. By the time the smoke vanished, over 70 percent of the city had been reduced to rubbles. Of the million-person population, an estimated half was made homeless by the inferno, while several thousands were roasted alive.

Reports later emerged that some men seen fanning the flames claimed they were under orders. As a result of the tremendous losses, the Roman people, feeling the effects of paranoia, looked for someone who might be responsible for the fire. They blamed their emperor - Nero.

Some rumours speculated that Nero himself had started the fire. But perhaps the most interesting hearsay that emerged from the great conflagration was that Nero had played his music while Rome burned.

In the face of such charges, Nero searched for a scapegoat for the flames. He chose the Christians and persecuted them ruthlessly, torturing and executing them in hineous ways. Despite this public spectacle, Nero still found himself blamed for the fire.

The idea that Nero played his music while Rome burned is odd. But a mad tyrant who preferred to play nightingale rather than offer succour to his traumatised people isn't unbelievable, because Nero was unquestionably cruel.

A few days ago, President Goodluck Jonathan made a face-saving visit first to Yobe and then Borno. Expectations were very high. Aside from the vexed issue of amnesty for Boko Haram insurgents, many had expected a presidential succour and expression of sympathy for a people whose territories have been so relentlessly ravaged by bombs in the past three or so years. They got nothing of that sort. Rather, the president gave his hosts the length of his tongue and declared, to the consternation of the optimists, that the perpetrators of the dastardly act were ghosts, ignoring the fact that the Borno state government had opened a window of negotiation with the insurgents. The president also betrayed his insensitivity to the plight of those who are at the receiving end of the Boko Haram’s cruel butt when he declared during the visit that he would not fold his arms and watch his security operatives mowed down. As the president and commander-in-chief of the armed forces, he has the responsibility to ensure the safety of lives and properties of ALL Nigerians.

If Jonathan were truly sincere about the resolution of the crisis by peaceful means, as it was the case with the Niger Delta militants, he would leverage on the dialogue mechanism put in place by the Borno state government. The groundswell of the president’s rigid position on the amnesty question appears to be heightening hostilities in some volatile locations. The Monday explosion at the New Road Motor Park in Kano killing scores of passengers, as dastardly as the act was, is a direct response to Jonathan’s declaration of “ghost reference” to the group. Ghosts are harmless.

It is gratifying to note that pressure is being piled on the president from all angles to embrace the dialogue option. As I have always argued in this space, the war against the insurgents is not winnable because the environment is not only quite suitable for their operations, but also because we do not have the capability to contain them, until the situation gets totally out of control and endanger our survival as a nation.

It is said that when two elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. The innocent Nigerians and his security operatives who are being mowed down daily in these volatile areas constitute the grass. So, he must listen to the voices of reason or be perceived as our modern-day Nero who revels while a part of the country he governs burns.