Outside the Box by Alex Otti
“Bombs kill terrorists, Books kill terrorism.
Missiles kill extremists, Mindfulness kills extremism.
Guns kill supremacists, Goodness kills supremacy.
Law restrains cruel people, Love reforms cruelty.
Sarin cripples the malicious, Service cures malice.
C4 impairs the prejudiced, Curiosity treats prejudice.
Violence can be revolution no more.
For all degradation kindness is the cure.”
― Abhijit Naskar.
‘To jaw jaw is always better than to war war’
– Winston Churchill
Nigeria has always been a country that seems to move from one
existential challenge to another. Sadly, these challenges are mostly
self-inflicted and man-made, and they are often completely avoidable.
From the Amalgamation in 1914, which people blame for the continued woes
of Nigeria, the struggle for independence and its eventual grant in 1960
and the declaration of a Republic in 1963, it has always been one
conflict or another. Some of the notable events are the military
incursion in politics in 1966, the declaration of civil war in 1967,
which ended in 1970. There was also the civilian rule from 1979 to 1983,
several coups in between till 1999 when civilian rule was finally
restored. In the wake of all these, it has been one contentious issue
after another. Other than the civil war era, no period had been more
challenging to the corporate existence of Nigeria, than now. Boko Haram
started like a joke in 2002 in relatively far away Maiduguri. Not many
people paid serious attention to the crisis until it became a full
fledged conflagration engulfing states in the North East. The sect has
wreaked havoc on the otherwise hapless citizens and thousands have been
killed and many more have been injured and displaced. They claim to be
fighting to dethrone the government and institute an Islamic State in
the country.
While that imbroglio was on, herders armed with AK47 have been causing
mayhem in the North Central and Southern parts of the country. They
enter the bushes in the excuse of grazing their cows and not only sack
farmers but are also known to kidnap, kill, rape, and alienate their
victims from their lands. There have been allegations of complicity by
the security officers as the perpetrators of these crimes are hardly
apprehended or prosecuted. As if these were not bad enough, banditry and
insurgency have grown in occurrence and have frankly, assumed a life of
their own. Traveling by road has become one of the deadliest risks for
anyone to take in many parts of the country. There are numerous stories
of this category of criminals taking over highways and killing, maiming
and kidnapping victims at will for ransom. The unresolved issue of the
Chibok girls who were abducted in 2014, remains a major turning point in
terrorism and criminality in the country. In the mid-2000s, kidnapping
was introduced in the country by the Niger Delta militants. After the
amnesty and rehabilitation programme by the government, this vocation
died down, only to assume a very dangerous dimension lately.
In the South East, other than isolated cases of banditry and other
crimes, the rising incidence of attacks by “unknown gunmen” seems to
have overshadowed every other crime. The hotbed of these attacks has
been Imo State, with Ebonyi, Abia and Anambra States rapidly following.
These gunmen attack police stations, correctional facilities, INEC
offices and other government agencies, killing, maiming and sacking
workers and releasing prisoners. They have even attacked a few private
properties, setting them ablaze in their rage. Because no one has been
apprehended, it has not been easy to identify the motive or objectives
for the attack nor the identity of the attackers themselves. The
military and other security agencies have stepped in and the tales from
the South East about how people are brutally treated and sometimes
killed without any tangible reason by security agencies have made people
begin to avoid the area.
While insecurity has dominated our current national discourse, another
challenge seems to be taking over from another flank. This is the
consequential ethnic conflagration in different parts of the country. It
must be stated that ethnic disagreements are as old as the country
itself. The Civil war itself had an ethnic coloration and the human toll
was recorded among a particular part of the country. However, the
country has managed to remain together in spite of these harrowing
conflicts. The rhetoric coming from the different major ethnic groups
seems to suggest that everyone wants to go on their own separate way.
Ethnic militias, which had been hitherto latent or non existent, have
found their voices and new impetus. Some of them are claiming
responsibility for attacks that they may know nothing about. Others are
being blamed for attacks which they may as well not be involved in.
People at different fora are talking tough and threatening hell and
brimstone. It does not matter if they are influenced and motivated by
Fake News and products of propaganda and disinformation.
People no longer feel safe along the road or even in their homes. Some
people are resorting to what a man of God referred to as ‘Plan B as
airports are filled with countrymen and women, who want to ‘check out’
like the Andrew of those days. There are palpable anger and fear in the
land!
The reasons for the persisting anger can be understood from the
contradictions in the polity. They can be categorised as political,
structural and economic contradictions. On the political front is the
management of our diversity. With a landmass of 923,000 square
kilometres, over 300 languages, different religions and unequal income
distribution, Nigeria is a classical model of a diverse society.
There is a strong and plausible argument that the present government has
not managed our diversity properly resulting in lopsided appointments
and marginalisation and domination of some sections of the country. Even
though there is no evidence that sections of the country that have
dominated political power have fared any better, for the sake of equity
and fairness, a deliberate rebalancing and sharing of power will
certainly help to de-escalate the tension.
Before the 2015 general election, the Government of President Goodluck
Jonathan received the report of the Constitutional Conference which it
had set up. The report could not progress to the National assembly to be
passed into law. That report attempted to suggest some form of
restructuring that would have addressed some of the sore points of the
1999 constitution. Even though some of us disagree with the suggestion
of creating additional states, there was the strong point of enshrining
in the constitution, the equality of the component parts of the country.
We had argued, and continue to argue, that legislating away the states
and its expensive structure would serve us better than the multiplicity
of states. We need to divide the country into a maximum of 6 regions,
granting each of them autonomy and having them compete like was done in
the past while taxes are paid to the centre.
Some have advocated a return to the 1963 constitution which, we are
told, worked relatively well for the nation. Whatever structure we
choose, one thing that is agreed is that the 1999 constitution was not
the people’s constitution. We therefore align with the view that this
National Assembly, which has the mandate of the people, should draw up a
new constitution that would work for us. We deserve a constitution
which, when it says, “We, the People…” would not be denied by the
people. Even if the National Assembly does not achieve any other thing
within the remaining two years available to it, it will do the nation a
lot of good by giving it a new, and truly the peoples’ constitution. The
new constitution should address federalism both in terms of its fiscal
and structural perspectives. It must replace a strong, almost unitary
centre, which we currently operate, with a much trimmer, weaker but more
efficient, centre. Some of the key considerations should be how to make
policing a regional affair, create a unicameral legislature with much
fewer members who would drastically reduce the drain, the current
structure and size has constituted on the resources and move more power
and governance to the regions.
Regions should be at liberty to create their own local governments as
they deem fit. This is amongst several other recommendations we had made
on this column in the past (refer to “Massive Government, Miserable
Populace” April 24, 2021). We must state without any fear of
contradiction, that one of the anger points in the polity is that the
political class seems to have cornered the wealth of the country for
themselves to the detriment of the populace. We have held the view that
politics should not be a profession. It is a misnomer for someone to
introduce himself as a politician. In many cases, our “politicians” do
not have any other jobs. They have seen politics as a place to make
money rather than where to contribute towards uplifting society with the
skills they have acquired elsewhere. Any wonder why the recycling just
for the sake of being in the corridors of power. Reference is made of a
former governor who accepted a transitional local government
chairmanship role from a sitting governor recently. We must make
political offices unattractive to job seekers in favour of accomplished
solution and service providers.
The economic angle to the anger is what we consider the most potent in
this essay. A fortnight ago, we discussed unemployment and insisted that
the very high level of unemployment is significantly responsible for the
insurgency in the country. The argument is that a country that has more
than 33% unemployment rate as against the allowable 4% rate, is
preparing a large army for recruitment into crime. This figure is
exacerbated by close to 90m Nigerians who are trapped and living in
poverty. These are people who must find a way to feed and survive,
whatever it takes. It is the responsibility of government at all levels
to ensure that these numbers are reduced to the barest minimum, and we
made recommendations in the column under reference.
While the government is looking at these, it must also not lose sight of
the more than 16m out-of-school children in the country. These are
potential time bombs that will invariably detonate in a few years’ time
and will be available to enroll in less than noble callings with
dastardly consequences. Meanwhile, inflation is roaring at about 20% and
exchange rate pressure is not abating.
There is also the issue of revenue generation and allocation which
straddles the political and the economic. To the extent that we do not
generate enough revenue and the fact that we enmesh ourselves in debt,
spending what we do not have, we will continue to have a growing pool of
angry people. The anger begins to boil over when we realise that over
70% of our fiscal allocation goes to servicing less than 1% of the
populace who are in government while less than 30% goes to the rest of
us. Even if they do not understand the numbers, the ordinary people see
the lifestyle of those that are supposed to represent them. They knew
what they looked like when they were canvassing for votes and 4 years
down the line, they can compare and contrast. They can tell when their
money is no longer complete. They can tell when the roads, water,
electricity and other amenities promised them are not delivered! Even
when it looks like they cannot do anything about it, they can at least
know who is responsible for their state and would be justifiably angry.
Given the level of anger in the land what should government be doing at
this time? One of the things not to do is to do nothing. Just like John
F. Kennedy said, “the mere absence of war is not peace”. People may have
endured all these in the past, but it does not indicate that they are
happy. This, to my mind, is an opportunity for those in power to quickly
engage the populace and listen to them. This is the whole essence of
democracy. Even when people are seeking self determination, which, by
the way is their fundamental right, the government of the day should not
be tired of engaging them. Quebec in Canada has been seeking self
determination for decades. Twice, Canada had held a referendum for them
and twice, majority of the people have voted to remain as part of
Canada.
It is clear evidence that agitation for a referendum does not mean that
it would gain majority vote. Today, the major ethnic nationalities in
the country are yearning for one form of autonomy or another. Government
must understand this in the context of the anger in the land supported
by hunger and violence. We encourage the government to robustly engage
the leaders of these groups and discuss genuinely and frankly. We
believe we can always find common grounds to coexist. This is definitely
not the time to talk tough or beat the drums of war. The truth is that
no part of this country can fight a war that would leave it better than
it was. The beneficiaries would be the Russians who make AK47 and other
countries that would jostle to sell weapons to all the sides. The losers
would be the people who have no ‘Plan B’ and would exist in the theatre
of war and the country, which is not producing much, not to talk of
ammunition. At the end of the destruction and carnage, the survivors, if
any, would still gather at the negotiation table to discuss. So why not
hold that discussion now? Should you be in doubt, ask Rwanda, still
doubting, contact Somalia!