Fola Ojo
HE is my friend and brother. A man of substantial means and grit. He has a wide and broad network among Nigeria’s men of might. His name rings a bell in great circles in Nigeria; permit me to keep his identity to myself. My brother studied in England in the ‘80s. Immediately after his graduation, he packed his luggage and headed back to Lagos. If Nigeria is burning, my brother prefers to stay burrowed in the country of his birth. If it’s raining hails and blowing high winds, he’ll stay embedded in its shreds. Come hell and high waters, this guy loves Naija. That’s why I call him ‘Mr Nigeria’.
My brother knows there are a lot of things wrong in Nigeria. He knows Nigeria is under the siege of banditry and that the economy has gone comatose. He knows businesses are shutting down and the ones alive are doing so only by a thread of survivability. He knows nincompoops with big money are in control of the country’s vital organs and the wise are cheering up fools on the sidelines. He is aware of these and many things because he too has once rubbed shoulders with men in the acme of Nigeria’s government. He was hit big and bad twice by armed robbers who came visiting him at home in wee hours. After the second incident, he moved away from the house where he had been struck twice into another house he had built to sell.
He has access to at least fifteen nations around the world to do business and live. The more you complain around him about the country’s many ills and government operators’ many malfeasances, the more he voices his love and hope for a nation running thin on hope. He has vowed never to live anywhere else but motherland Nigeria even if offered cool money in cash.
Last week he called from a US East Coast city that he was in town. I asked how long he is staying this time.
I didn’t need to ask him why. I wasn’t surprised. I knew it was a matter of time. Don’t we all know why businessmen and professionals leave Nigeria in this season? Don’t we know why retired politicians who have stolen enough from Nigeria’s patrimonies and many others leave for London? When governors run out their tenures in office they relocate to Houston or New York. Many of Nigeria’s men and women in public service have legal residencies or citizenship of other nations. And their wives, husbands and children attend college in Europe and America. Why? Because many of them see no hope in Nigeria’s tomorrow.
The President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), has done a few good things for Nigeria in the area of infrastructure. Forty four years after Lagos-Ibadan Expressway was built, the fully-reconstructed road will soon officially open up for commerce and travels. Forty six years after the Lagos National Theatre opened, it will be reborn as a world-class Theatre and Creative Park for amusement. Fifty years after Niger Bridge was built, the 2nd Niger Bridge will be completed. Forty four years after the Apapa-Oshodi Expressway was built, it is undergoing its first full reconstruction. Thirty three years after construction began on Itakpe-Warri Rail line, it was completed in 2020. Twenty two years after construction of Nnamdi Azikiwe’s Mausoleum began, it was completed in 2018.
I understand why the unemployed or unemployables leave Nigeria for greener pastures abroad. I understand when young boys and girls surge to make adventurous moves to discover themselves in faraway lands. I understand when a man of means, who unfortunately is hunkered down by illness and sickness, seeks respite abroad. But when those who should rebuild Nigeria decide to dump Nigeria and head abroad, then government field is left to half-baked beings who run the show the way they know how. The results of that are staring us in the face today.
At independence, Nigeria’s population was 45.2 million, with a gross domestic product of $4.2bn. Our neighbour, Ghana had a population of 6.65 million and a GDP of $1.22bn. The gross national income per capita for Nigeria was $100, while Ghana was $190. By 1981, Nigerian GDP was $61.7bn while Ethiopia, for example, was $7.325bn. But even to the affluent Nigeria, Ghana is now considered ‘overseas’. Nigeria, a nation that has produced the wealthiest black man and woman on earth, is bleeding away talents and brainiacs to other nations and we don’t seem to care
According to the International Monetary Fund, Nigeria is still on track to becoming one of the 20 largest economies in the world. Nigeria is rich in treasures of the earth; rich in men and women with cerebral aptitude and rich in milk and honey flowing across every nook and cranny of the nation. During the belligerences of Liberia and Sierra Leone not too long ago, Nigeria had enough to commit over $3bn and hundreds of soldiers to help end the scuffles. But today, the country cannot feed her poor or keep her people safe.
In 2017, Buhari told us that help was on the way as the sum of N701bn was being infused into the power value-chain to free up the chain. We were told that a single line refinery which will be producing 650,000 barrels of oil per day is in the work and that by 2018 the largest single line fertiliser plant in the world will take off. I remember former Finance Minister, Kemi Adeosun, had also once disclosed that the Federal Government released N74bn to Ministry of Works; Agriculture also got the sum of N21.9bn; Transportation Ministry also got N22bn infusion. Despite the cash infusion, the nation remains stagnant. In spite of human assets and brainiacs in all fields making wave around the world and helping governments of other countries; Nigeria is still finding it difficult to get her acts together. When Nigerians come to America, we make it home. Why? Home is challenging, tough, hopeless and unsafe.
It looks like in 2023, we will have a new leader in the Villa. But what positive difference will a change in guard bring? Will the election launch out an automatic rejigger of everything ill with Nigeria? It is not impossible but it depends on the approach of who is leader. Let us be reminded, however, that a pig will remain pig even if dressed in a Hugo Boss suit and expensive gold and diamond chokers. The fundamentals of everything about Nigeria need to be revisited. From our constitution to how government is supposed to run, to the mindsets of the ruled, and the frame of minds of the rulers, there’s got to be a recalibration. If our flawed fundamentals that trigger why things aren’t working seamlessly, and why people are scurrying away from Nigeria are not addressed, the same issues of hunger, poverty, insecurity and other ills will still come up for partisan and ethnic useless debates twenty election cycles from the present.
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