THE BITTER TASTE OF LIBERTY

David Diop, a Senegalese poet uses his poem entitled “Africa” to describe our independence as possessing a bitter taste after he chronicled our long-suffering experiences and plight through colonialism and post colonial era.

Nigeria is the landmass composed of the remnant of many ancient empires and kingdoms. The nation was thus forged from the anvils of hegemonic tendencies, human diversity, conflict and history.

Agitations for the independent state of Nigeria began in the early 50s by the likes of Azikwe, Awolowo and Ahmadu Bello. We got that liberty quite alright. But after fifty eight years, the question we should ask ourselves is: How does its fruit taste?

Barely seven years after our embryonic conception, civil war broke out! We went to war against each other; brother against brother in a senseless and preventable orgy of violence that was born out of immaturity and nationalistic infantilism. The war consumed more than two million souls. This despite the refrain of our then national anthem: “Though tribe and tongue may differ, in brotherhood we stand”. They stood in brotherhood alright! Brother stood against brother. Since then Nigeria has been struggling with whether it is a nation, or a country of nations. Until we resolve this issue, I choose to keep my fingers crossed.

But then another critical question we should ask ourselves is: Was our independence a conspiracy? Also, we should ask: Were we ready for independence when we demanded for it?

Of utmost sincerity, the people of Nigeria are bold, fearless and confident. It is a gift from Almighty God and it consternates our neighbours far and wide. Even when we’re wrong we tend to be confidently wrong! Looking at the population of Nigeria, that is a lot of confident people. Depending on whom you believe, Nigerians are either 140million or 170million. Nigeria is mostly made up of virile youths. 63% of her population is under 25. That is a blessing, if the rulers of Nigeria understand. But somehow our leaders have not been able to harness this virgin and active force, even after 58 years, or 104 years of existence depending on where you draw the line in the sands of history.

On this note I wish to state that one reason why the taste of our independence is bitter is that no leader has been able to harness the energy, creativity and ingenuity of the youths. Talents are daily wasting away while many youths have found solace in crime. When you look at the degree of creativity that many young people employ in perpetuating crime, you will weep for Nigeria. A nation that left the real substance and went about chasing shadows. A prodigal nation!

To move this ironic nation forward, we dance like a crab - one leg forward, four legs sideways, two legs backward. And so nations that were subpar to Nigeria at independence; nations like Singapore have overtaken her in development. For all its existence, Nigeria has been described as a nation with potential, and the young ones are asking, when will this potential become actualized?

Nigeria is a nation of strong people. Individually we are strong but collectively we are weak. Isn’t that ironic? Every Nigeria is a government of its own generating its own light, water and managing its own utilities. Why? The government had not been responsible.

Nigeria is indeed a study in irony. It is perhaps the most blessed nation on earth. It has 37 mineral resources! A nation called Canada has only five yet it’s described as the No.1 mining destination in the world. 15 years ago Nigeria was not even on the mining map of West Africa, not to talk of the world. The country is so rich that one of its constituent states sits on limestone. Now, on top of solid minerals God blessed Nigeria with petroleum resources. It is the 7th largest petroleum exporting country in the world. Even when 400,000 barrels a day are miraculously and consistently stolen - (the thieves are very exact you see) - the country is still so rich. Imagine somebody stealing $28m from you every day! That’s about $10bn a year. You must be very rich, or very reckless to lose that kind of money and not really care. And on top of all these God blessed Nigeria with a huge reserve of gas. The gas is even more plentiful than the oil. Nigeria is among the world’s top five largest exporters of liquefied natural gas.  

Of course one will assume, and rightly so that in a nation so blessed there will be no poor person but you’re wrong. The statistics are scandalous, and scary. You see there are four yardsticks for measuring poverty. There’s a measurement called food poverty, another called absolute poverty, another called dollar per day poverty, and then there’s relative poverty. By every measure of poverty, at least 58% of Nigerians are poor and wretched. Young Nigerians sometimes wish they were from a mythical and tiny city-state called Dubai. The people of Dubai don’t pay taxes. Yet they are exceedingly rich by all standard.

There are two classes of children born in Nigeria. Those born in mass transit systems who are thus known as the ‘Masses’; and those born with silver spoons acquired by all means who are therefore called ‘Silvesters’.

Silvesters are increasingly schooling abroad for obvious reasons, not in Nigeria. They are therefore expatriates. You see, those Masses, they tend to fail exams anyhow. Never mind the poor quality of teachers, ill motivation of the teachers and terrible learning conditions They’ve been failing for a long time; nothing new there. The Masses suffer to gain admission, they struggle through school because the learning condition is terrible, they waste their time in a visionless service program and go back to zero point: sitting at home and waiting for the miracle job or earning peanuts a job that robs them of their dignity and self-esteem. And the vicious cycle continues and revolves from generation to generation.

The Silvesters on the other hand cannot understand some of the plight of the masses because they are ‘based abroad.’ And when they do settle in Nigeria, the live in the high-brow areas of big cities that they could not see the suffering of the Masses. They don’t know the frustrations of sitting at home waiting for admission, for NYSC, for job and for money to marry. They don’t understand the pain of doing the job you don’t like because you must earn money to cater for your needs and fend for the family and younger ones. The divide is so wide and the line so think that these pains can’t be understood. Like my friend, Idris Suleiman once said, “Only God sees the tears of a man crying in the rain.” So when the Masses hear that some billions of dollars disappear or got embezzled, their heart bleed in regret. Why am I a Nigerian?

The questions we should ask ourselves now is: Why does our own independence taste bitter? When nations like Ghana are enjoying better standard of living. Why have our ‘Omo eleran’ settled for bones? Why are we so blessed yet so cursed?

Like the prodigal son, we must ARISE. We must go back to the dream of our founding fathers. Each of us must actively take responsibility for the greatness of Nigeria. We must all be Nation Builders. Re-building Nigeria is our collective responsibility. I’d always said that what bothers on our collective destiny requires our collective participation. No one must stand akimbo and say it does not concern me. You and I may survive this dispensation, but the big question is: Will our children survive it? Are we going to hand over a monstrous nation to the next generation? Won’t posterity ask us what we did in our own time to salvage Nigeria from total collapse?

I write on this occasion of Nigeria independence so that when history is written it will be said that when the future of Nigeria and our children was about to be mortgaged by the forces of totalitarianism and sheer greediness, some of us stood up to be counted.

Most importantly, we must all stand up to be counted. We must never settle for less. We must challenge the status quo. Yes, our background and environment might not have given us any advantage over life, but we must ARISE! We must start the long journey home!

But the decision is simple: We either arise or perish as victims of a failed nation.

Thank You.

My name is Taiwo Isola; I’m a Nation Builder.

I write. I speak. I curate ideas.