Wednesday, January 11, 2023

The Uncomfortable Truth of a Divided Nation.

The Study of Leadership and What Lee Kuan Yew Didn't Do in Singapore.
If we can obliterate ethnic influence, bigotry, and entitlement culture from the management of our national wealth and allocation of public offices, Nigeria will be on its way to greatness much faster than Singapore.
For instance, since the culmination of the Arab Spring, Egypt has been replicating and has repeated at a dramatic pace, the infrastructural wonders of Dubai, in and outside of Cairo. However, in Nigeria, we are still embroiled in debating which tribe deserves to produce our next President.
The late Mr. Lee Kuan Yew was not smarter than the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Sir Ahmadu Bello, or Dr. Namdi Azikiwe. He wasn't more patriotic than them, either. But he built a nation, governed a nation, and incubated a national character. Whereas in Nigeria, the leaders could only build tribal enclaves, energizing a culture of ethnic superiority complex.
The resistance to integration and nationhood of equal rights and justice began with Sir Ahmadu Bello. His abhorrence of what he termed "second colonization," motivated him to oppose Chief Anthony Enahoro's 1953 motion, slated for independence in 1956.
His demand for the postponement of our independence, until he was convinced the Northern Region had produced enough educated natives to take over from the white colonial masters was granted by Great Britain. And Nigeria is yet to move beyond that ethnic divide.
If the three regions were granted full sovereign autonomy separately in contrast to the qualified autonomy given them in the 50s, given the developmental stride and the GDP of the Western Region between 1953 and 1963, the region would have been ahead of Singapore and most European countries today.
Most devastating was the 1963 Treasonable Felony trial and conviction of Chief Obafemi Awolowo and some of his Action Group Party members. The Indictment and conviction signaled the collapse of the Making of an African Wonder on the West Coast of Africa. The 1966 military coup and the 2967 counter-coup, nailed the coffin of regionalism and the Awo Progressivism.
The Perils of Our Divide
Dr. Kwame Nkruma, working alone, was able to get independence for Ghana in 1957. However, Nigeria with three indomitable giants couldn't do it for Nigeria, until about four years later.
About thirty years ago or so, I was stupefied by a particular revelation I gathered while reading the Autobiography of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah. Kwame recounted how the perseverance and survival skills of Dr. Zik, while a student in the United States, became his source of inspiration when he was confronted with unbearable hardship in God's own country. I paused and reread the entire page. And in a state of soliloquy, I repeated to no one in particular: "So, our Nnamdi Azikiwe returned from America before Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, went."
Yes, Dr. Namdi Azikiwe of Nigeria did return from his studies in the United States of America before Dr. Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana left for the same United States of America for his studies.
Yet, the same Kwame came to his native homeland and got independence for his country ahead of Zik.
The two gentlemen, though fighting a similar war of political emancipation, were, nevertheless, bedeviled with different realities on the ground in their respective nations. While Zik had no unified nation and no country, Kwame Nkrumah had one, where national interest trumps ethnic affinity.
Since the end of the civil war in 1970, we have been discussing economic developments based purely on micro and macroeconomic terms and conditions.
Until we set aside political correctness and integrate ethnic and religious factors into our permutations, we will not make progress. In every government in power at Abuja, there's always a parallel administration headed by the Sultan of Sokoto, working with a few Northern mavericks, retired military officers, and intellectuals.
1. The killing of the proposed Free Education at all Levels by Dr. Jubril Aminu during the Obasanjo military administration on the argument that the program would not favor the people of the Northern region due to their aversion to Western education. Today, the educational gap he wanted to eliminate by opposing the free education proposal and frustrating poor Southern families from sending their children to school has widened more. Ask Dr. Gumi to tell you the number one grievance of the bandits - social inequality hinged on lack of education.
2. The passage of the Petroleum Industry Act and the 30% net profits of the NNPC Ltd that is set aside perpetually for the search for crude oil in the Northern basins. How can you explain taking 30% of the profit of the NNPC every year to search for crude oil in the Northern Basins? That's colonialism by other means. And it's a fraud. In other parts of the world, such funds are for green energy.
3. The disparity in the Recruitment and Promotion in the Armed Forces, the Police Force, as well as the Customs and Exercise.
4. The annulment of the MKO Abiola's Presidential mandate. There was no reason for it. It didn't benefit the Talakawas and the Almajiris. It was a monumental setback.
5. The disparity in the allocation of oil blocs in the Niger Delta that's scandalously in favor of Northern interest. That's the colonization of the South. But we're not complaining or protesting. But develop your people - do what they are doing in Saudi Arabia and UAE.
6. The reduction from 10% to 3% of the net profit of oil companies doing business in the Niger Delta as host community funds by the National Assembly. Mind you, the funding is not by the NNPC or the Federal Government. Yet, they rejected it and the PIB was held up in suspense until a section was clandestinely embedded in the PIA, granting a whopping 30% of the NNPC annual profits for the search for crude oil at some of the Northern Basins. See #2, above. That's not how to be one nation. That was callous on the part of the National Assembly members who championed the dilution as well as the stakeholders who instructed them to take such action.
7. The most uncomfortable truth is that only about 20% or so of the Northern population benefits or has the intellectual wherewithal to explore these so-called Northern Advantages. In other words, the curse of crude oil and the perils of squandering riches are more pronounced in the Northern part of the country than in the South due to, one, the sharing culture that is not sustainable, and two, Southern youths do not look up to the government for handouts. That's a major factor in the ongoing bandit's exploits.
8. Where is it written in our constitution that Southerners cannot head the Department of Customs and Exercise or the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory? That's not what Lee Kuan Yew did. He picked the best and groomed them for leadership positions.
Right now, the North is fighting the North and things are no longer at ease nationwide. Our problems are not covered in Business School. Can you name another country in the world where you have two different rates for foreign currencies?
We are the only country in the world where thousands of university-level educated youths are roaming the streets without a job, but we are busy recruiting barely literate criminals into our Armed Forces for the sake of maintaining numerical strength advantages. That wasn't what Lee Kuan Yew did in Singapore.
We are doing in Nigeria the opposite of what Lee Kuan Yew did in Singapore.
The first step is for the Hausa/Fulani to discard the sense of entitlement. It has not worked and it's not going to work.
Today, through President Buhari's umbrella, you have taken total control of our crude oil business, the NNPC, the security networks, as well as the Armed Forces. Be that as it may, never in the history of 1914, not even during the civil war, has any region experienced the magnitude of the bloodshed and instability that have been going on since 2015 in the Northern region of Nigeria.
Wealth and lucrative positions in government can not buy you peace of mind. Only unconditional love for the people, their welfare, and good government can entrench sustainable peace and development.
Gideon Odion Ataya
Like
Comment
Share
-

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)