By Prince Chukwuemeka Osoagbaka Sr.
Six decades after independence, and twenty six years into what we solemnly call uninterrupted democratic rule, Nigeria has achieved something truly remarkable: it has conquered itself. This is no small feat. It takes a special kind of ingenuity for a nation to lose a war without a single foreign soldier crossing its border,to plunder its own treasury so thoroughly that future generations will study our methods with a mix of horror and grudging admiration. We stand today as a case study in institutional decay, a masterclass in moral bankruptcy, and a testament to the proposition that a people can, in fact, get precisely the leadership they deserve.
Consider the democratic process, that sacred ritual we perform every four years. We have just concluded a review of our electoral law, and the fiasco that accompanied it was, one must admit, deeply entertaining. Learned men and women gathered to debate the mystical properties of “transmission,” “transfer,” and “real-time” result collation, as if the credibility of the 2027 elections hinges on technical jargon rather than the simple fact that our Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has perfected the art of organising elaborate and expensive theatre.
The 2023 presidential election with its midnight result announcements and courtroom resolutions, confirmed what we all suspected: in Nigeria, voters propose, but the courts and the godfathers dispose. As Dr. Bitrus Pogu of the Middle Belt Forum dryly observes, our democratic institutions “have not developed to a point where we can confidently say democracy has come to stay.” One might add that at this rate, we never will.
But why worry about electoral integrity when our leaders have more pressing concerns? Across the country while citizens enjoy the fruits of no government assisted healthcare, no meaningful housing provision, and infrastructure that can only be described as nostalgic, our public officials are industriously building seven-star hotels, acquiring radio stations, and developing luxury estates. It is heartwarming to see such entrepreneurial spirit among those who took oaths to serve the public. Ministers, after all must have hobbies, and if their hobby is constructing personal empires while the systems they oversee rot, who are we to judge?
George Orwell, that old pessimist warned of a place where all animals are equal but some are more equal than others. How delightfully prescient. In Nigeria, the “more equal” animals are those who have mastered the art of what political scientist Jibrin Ibrahim calls success. As he puts it, “The bad guys are very successful.” Our youth gaze upon this pantheon of achievement and learn a valuable lesson: competence is a liability, integrity is for the naive and the end justifies absolutely any means. Why would a young person pursue honest enterprise when the reward for spectacular corruption is a ministerial appointment and the opportunity to transfer one’s “captured” influence to one’s children? It is what one might call intergenerational planning.
The sheer audacity of our public officials is you must admit, breathtaking. A sitting senator recently appeared on national television to complain with visible indignation, that presidential aides demanded bribes simply to grant him access to the President. State governors meanwhile, have elevated performance art to new heights, flagging off projects that exist primarily in photo opportunities while their citizens lack government funded housing,electricity,healthcare, potable water and access roads that do not double as obstacle courses. Sycophancy is now officially recognised as legitimate service and those who master it are duly rewarded with influence and access.
And let us not forget our anti-corruption agencies, those vigilant watchdogs that strike fear into the hearts of wrongdoers everywhere. Their primary function as far as one can discern, is to hunt opposition members with the zeal of bounty hunters while providing safe passage to allies. The Dasuki-gate scandal, in which billions meant for combating terrorism vanished into thin air, produced no meaningful accountability. The fuel subsidy fraud, a masterpiece of creative accounting, went largely unpunished. As one observer wryly noted, “The reward for corruption in Nigeria is that perpetrators are given better opportunities to ply their trade.” It is a career path like any other.
The judiciary once poetically described as the “last hope of the common man,” has been reimagined as the last bastion of the criminally rich. Niyi Osundare’s poetic indictment remains unforgettably precise: “My Lord, Tell me Where to Keep your Bribe?” When a senator must bribe his way to the President, and when courts dispense justice according to connections rather than evidence, the social contract that binds citizen to state does not merely fracture, it evaporates entirely. A generation of young Nigerians, with nothing to lose but their poverty, emerges into this landscape and rationally concludes that crime is simply another career option.
And so we approach another election, that quadrennial opportunity to redirect our national trajectory or alternatively, to further entrench the balkanisation of what Chinua Achebe once melancholically called a country. “There was a country,” he wrote, and the past tense hangs over us like a verdict. We have become a conquered nation, not by foreign armies, but by citizens entrusted with our collective destiny. The conquest proceeds daily, incrementally, through the normalisation of the abnormal, the acceptance of corruption as inevitable, the surrender to leaders who govern for themselves alone
Whether we can reclaim our sovereignty from those who have seized it from within remains as they say, a question. But if history is any guide, one suspects the answer will be as entertaining as it is predictable.
Hon.Prince Chukwuemeka Osoagbaka Sr was a member of Abia state House of Assembly ( 2011 – 2015)
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