By: A G Abubakar

Society throws up a leadership it deserves. Better still, it elects a leadership that reflects its character. Life is about choices and outcomes. And, this holds true in all major faiths. The Qur’an says, ‘indeed, Allah will not change the condition of a people until they change what is within themselves.” (Qur’an 13:11). The Bible corroborates this and more, to the effect “that the sluggard who does not plough in autumn; he will seek at harvesting and have nothing.” (Proverbs 20:4). It went on to state in Galatians 6:7-8 that “…whatever a man sows, he will reap in return.” These divine injunctions simply meant choices have consequences.

The inability to make informed choices or to deliberately ignore taking informed decisions has been at the core of Nigeria’s existential challenges. Nigerians love to turn divine injunction on their heads, in preference for sentiments and emotions, then turn around to seek the Creator’s interventions. So cheap. So evasive.

Buhari represented a larger Northern sentiment of the time in 2015. Tinubu rode on a similar bandwagon, though with diametrically different consequences. Actually, Tinubu is proving to be a backlash. If Buhari was too laid back with a compromised vision, Tinubu lacked a sense of proportion and character. The two political actors might have achieved their ambitions, but the nation’s dream of greatness is neither here nor there. This is because the two deficits found between the duo – vision and character – incidentally are the main ingredients that drive national transformation. The two, unfortunately, have been missing. The question was; Why do Nigerians recruit leaders who are lacking in vision and/or character?

The answers lie in the jaundiced perception of issues and the degradation of ethical values. Years of poor governance had compromised the citizens’ vision as much as their sense of brotherhood and patriotism. The prolonged failure of leadership has simply turned segments of the society on each other, with little respect for the common good: Muslims on Christians, herders on farmers, the young against the old, the poor versus the rich, the minority slugging it out with the majority, etc. The nation has become one giant ocean of mutual distrust, rendering, every decision suspect, and every move, self-serving. As this disposition persists, every known guardrail of social and ethical values simply varnishes, leaving society bare, and vulnerable, especially its leadership recruitment processes, which had become highly ineffective with the concomitant negative impacts on life, property, and socioeconomic development. Today’s Nigeria is a two-horse race between a compromised leadership and a poor followership as to which one becomes the undertaker of the nation called Nigeria.

The rot in Nigeria might have been induced by leadership, which obviously takes the larger part of the blame, but the followership seemed to have learned faster. And because of the masses’ overwhelming size, they have succeeded in foisting anarchy upon society seamlessly. Here was a society where people do not see anything wrong in destroying or vandalizing public property, observing simple order of things in breach, taking advantage of each other in basic interpersonal interactions, hold each other accountable, and even take civic duties like elections for granted. Nigerians simply “enjoy” living in mess, often revealing their capacity to self-regulate.

For illustrations: nearly all the non-concrete guardrails on the highways are gone. Iron and aluminium structures stripped. Even the concrete demarcation is being chipped away in search of the stabilizing iron rods. Electric cables, poles and fittings, and manhole covers are not safe. In rural areas and city suburbs, schools, hospitals, and related public (even private) buildings are not safe. It’s common sight to see roofs, windows, doors, furniture, etc. gone, leaving the structures like animal shades/pens.

The latest tragedy was the bringing down of power towers along major arteries just to steal the installations. Though initially blamed on insurgents and terrorists, the unwholesome practice had been rife in the southeast and now catching up in the northeast. Many enclaves have been thrown into needless darkness because of these dastardly acts. As if not enough, it has now been allegedly reported that screw bolts holding rail lines in place are being stolen, putting rail travels at risk. But why are Nigerians so base? Many are quick to rationalize the ugly development on the usual alibi of poverty. Really? India, and China until the turn of the twenty first century were the poster boys of poverty in its extreme form, where people at time self-immolate out of frustration, but there was no history of this wanton destruction in their societies. Something must be wrong and peculiar with Nigerians!

The saga doesn’t stop with physical or non-living matters. It is in Nigeria that today, the observance of basic curtesy and etiquette had become a tall call. Even where an individual’s life and safety are at risk. The same clumsy mindsets characterize interpersonal relations in commerce and faith. To cheat is business. To insult each other’s ethno-religious backgrounds is piety and God ordained.

Taking turns to access social services, in the considered opinion of Nigerians, is to be unenlightened. To observe a traffic light for 60 seconds is a waste of time that should be circumvented even when heading to a meaningless or not so urgent destination. Traffic lights have literally been turned into a point of vehicular frustrations and even “death spots.” The story is worse when it comes to taking turns to access services at public functions and journeys. For Nigerians, simple queuing and taking turns is luxury. There has to be commotion. Pushing. Shoving. And fisticuffs. Nothing in the individuals says that it is not right, even those who have been lucky to be exposed to other climes, where they imbibed and were expected to be role models. That residual sense of right and wrong had simply varnished from the DNA of Nigerians. The citizens have simply chosen to operate a society that chocks itself – almost willfully.

Actually, one may be tempted to believe that there is something fundamentally not right with Nigerians and indeed the sub-Saharan peoples. Something that make them poorly capable of coping with the basics of “modernity,” decorum, and critical thinking. Historical experiences can not be discounted from the said peoples’ predicaments, but many parts of the world have strived and risen above similar experiences for good. Why not Nigeria? Why not Haiti, Sudan, DRC, Somalia? Or even the dwellers of the favelas/ghettos around some major cities of the western hemisphere? Why are they perpetually trapped and not the others around the world? Why did the people get mummified in terms of ideas? One hates to hear this, but in diagnosing the problems with Nigerians and indeed peoples of the sub-Saharan extraction, such factors as epigenetic and neuroplasticity – i.e., how environmental and historical experiences in a complex interplay alter people’s worldview/capacity – can not be totally discounted unless one wants to go the metaphysical way.

In parts of the North, it is a common practice for families to be hell-bent on breeding kids beyond their means, which inadvertently leads to the creation of huge pools of poorly adjusted youths. For lacking in proper socialization and parental care, this generation of youths has become the nation’s albatross, serving as easy recruits into all sorts of crimes and criminality. The insurgency movements, the armed terrorists/kidnappers’ ranks, are filled with poorly schooled (western and/or Islamic) young men between the ages of 18-35 years. The same goes for those involved in urban gangsterism, snatching handsets, and breaking into people’s houses. All of it is a consequence of bad choices. But as usual, those concerned Nigerians wouldn’t like to hear of it. They are quick to pass the buck to the government or even justify it through a warped understanding of religious scriptures.

Now, the paradox. If the government has been responsible for all the ills in the Nigerian society, it becomes instructive then for people to take their voting rights seriously. Hold their local elites to account. This is with a view to changing their conditions, but no, not in Nigeria. It is during electioneering seasons that all forms of primordial sentiments are inputted into the process. Religion, region, tribe, and other stripes wound are brought to bear, leaving the polity with fractured outcomes and outlook and compounding governance the more. Now is a vista to register and to restrategize for change, but like a possessed people, the same schism is holding sway. A typical lackadaisical attitude that brought Tinubu and his predecessor Buhari.

Maybe it is uncharitable to put serious blames on the people, especially against the backdrop of being serially handed the short end of socioeconomic and political stick. For, doing so is akin to holding a slave deserving of his master or share the blame for his oppression. A friend succinctly put the predicaments of the hapless masses in Nigeria’s leadership recruitment process as follows, “those who did not contest elections have won; those who lost elections have won; those who were not nominated have won; and those who won have lost.” Protests have been crushed with examplary force, or gavel of a compromised judiciary, not once, twice, but multiple times. And the blood so spilt used in writing warnings that says, “let him who is mad enough to throw his life away, oppose the outcome. Some did and ended up creating emergency widows and orphans as a prize for wanting to secure their civic rights.

Those who chose not to engage in the bloodbath simply restricted their campaigns and three or so corporate citizens – INEC, Security Agencies, and the Judiciary (Judges). No doubt these developments have the potential to create a feeling of despair and resignation. In enlightened climes, they serve as wake-up calls to do the needful; the quest for self-actualisation and fundamental rights. This inherent modicum of mindset seemed to be lacking among Nigerians, which invariably made them culpable in their own challenges and deprivations. A drawback so entrenched, it has impacted their capacity to make rational socio-political choices, and also resist injustices.

Elementary knowledge of economics and the economy would tell that Buhari left power when the economic fundamentals were barely holding. Joblessness, poverty, and security were all being interpreted more on paper than the quality of people’s lives. As for corruption, it was a way of life. Recall the AGF, the AG, the CBN governor, and many more. Ordinarily, Nigerians would have been circumspect in the recruitment of a successor. But that has never been in Nigeria’s character. The new leader should mirror its ugly content as a society. So, Bola Ahmed Tinubu (BAT) became the new kid on the block – a new sheriff in town with all baggage in tow. A president that can be likened to a dark matter and a dark energy, operating in fashion that only he knows.

Nobody is perfect in life, but PBAT’s imperfections were self-cultivated, which should have made the larger society apprehensive in recruiting him ab initio. Here was an individual who has every imaginable thing about him suspect except his breathing. From name, parents, village, schools attended, qualifications, business interests, and even his vision of “one indivisible and insolvable Nigeria” (curtesy, Zik), all remain guesses Regardless, Nigerians should not complain. For, as long as they keep doing the same thing, they shouldn’t expect a different outcome. That’s the law of nature and society.

It would, however, seem that Nigerians are condemned to repeat choices with adverse consequences in the future. Something true to type of Robert Kelly’s Followership Model (Kelly, R 1992) that isolated five followership styles based on a combination of engagement and critical thinking. They include exemplary, conformist, passive, alienated, and pragmatist. Exemplary citizens are characterized by active engagement and independent critical thinking, while the passive ones have both limited engagement and critical thinking.

The alienated, possessed independent thinking but limited engagement, and the pragmatist has balanced engagement and critical thinking, too. The conformist may engage actively but with limited critical thinking. It would appear as if Nigerians fall in the conformist group, with sprinklings of maybe the other traits. This, as they kept engaging but with limited attention, paid to leadership qualities with its concomitant repercussions on wellbeing, peace, and development. A case of sowing wind and harvesting whirlwind. Do Boko Haram, armed herders/terrorists, ethnic militia, twenty million kids out of school, etc, ring bell? They are manifestations of bad choices.

Attitudinal change has never been an easy task, especially in a diverse setting like Nigeria. However, the awareness as well as the acknowledgement of the need to do so shall be a crucial first step towards cultivating the culture of rational choice, and also for both leadership and followership to hold themselves mutually accountable. The leadership, by necessity, should take the lead in driving the process. This is to forestall a possible mass disaffection and its dire consequences. It is tantamount to naivety to take nationhood for granted. Let there be a rebirth on the part of both the leadership and followership for Nigeria to work and for all, too.
A.G. Abubakar
agbarewa@gmail.com