Of the Lion, the Hyenas and the Cobras

By Moffat Ekoriko

Last month, I wrote a piece on the old tired men ruling (ruining) Africa. In the article, ‘Between Macron and Mugabe’, I carefully avoided any mention of the travail of Nigeria.

I did that for two reasons. One, my 78 year old president has been on medical leave in London. My Annang culture forbids attacking (even with words) a sick
man. Two, I come from a country which suffers from the deficit of objective reality.

No matter how straightforward a matter is, even the supposedly educated would see it through the prisms of their ethnic, religious and political affiliations.

The point I was making that Africa needs young leaders who can see visions of the
future would have been lost in a cacophony of contradicting voices on whether the 78 year old was the
only one who can deliver Nigeria.

Never mind that the country is still existing while he is on medical leave. I
have used the word ‘existing’ carefully, for the country is literally in survival mode. It is like a parked car with the engine turned off.

Perhaps, it is expedient to take up the matter of Nigeria.

For the uninitiated, Nigeria is a big country: 180 million people, some of them, among the brightest 0.1 per cent
in the world. It is very rich. In fact so rich that between 1980 and 2007, as much as $400 billion was stolen from the country and stashed in western banks yet the country’s economy did not collapse. A Nigerian leader once said he did not know why the Nigerian economy had not collapsed.

It also has the most selfish elite in the elite in the world: All the politicians in the country educate their children in
secondary schools and universities abroad while the educational sector which educates the children of those without access to the public till are left decrepit and not fit for purpose.

In case you think the politicians were
born rich, most of them could not afford bicycles before getting into public offices. Once in office, they become so rich that the god of mammon becomes their apprentice.

The money they are using to educate their children abroad is not hard earned resources but funds stolen from the budget, that were meant to buy chalk for the teaching of everyone’s children or malaria drugs to save the lives of orphans in public hospitals.

They own harems of the most expensive cars on planet earth. If you visit a Nigerian politician and he has less
than five cars in his garage, just know that he was sacked (by the courts) after few months in office or the old witch in his village manipulated him to hide the
wealth.

He does not need to hide it anyway. His wealth can be the oasis in a desert of poverty without any risk to him.

He will appropriate at least ten policemen from the state to protect him from the miserable poor. Let me not forget to add that we also have some the world’s
richest pastors who invariably provide hope to one of the world’s poorest congregations.

It is this country of unrealised dreams, non existent infrastructure, corruption and income inequality that elected a 78 year old leader to chart its future.

No one can quarrel with the decision of the electorate (not even in post Brexit UK). As for me, he became my president
from the day he was sworn in.

I am fervent in prayer that he should recover and return to office. I dread to
think of what would happen to Nigeria if anything happens to him before the end of his tenure in 2019.

A senator has already warned that hyenas and jackals are circling in the absence of the lion king.

If there is any indication the Lion would not come back, I can bet the leopards, cobras, pythons, crocodiles, rattlesnakes, agama lizards, eagles and hawks would run riot in the forest.

You can imagine the free for all. The lion must return to save his forest from ruin.

The absence of the lion throws up many fundamental issues. One is that given the constitutional arrangement, the president’s absence should not be much of an issue since the vice president automatically steps in.

In the case of Nigeria, the letter transferring power mandated the vice president to ‘coordinate the activities of
government’. The Senate corrected this and made him acting president.

The trouble is that in power games,
intentions of the leader expressed in his words acquire spirits of their own. Those who wielded power still see the acting president as a coordinator.

There is talk of a cabal holding sway and the vice president being too cautious in
taking some decisions like sacking non performing ministers.

The fundamental question is, what purpose does it serve to have the spirit of a sick president hovering over the authority of the person acting in his
absence.

What this means is that the country does not have effective leadership. The president is ill and away, the acting president is encircled and cautious.

I have not used the word, ‘afraid’, so no one should impute it.

The second issue is the failure of the Nigerian state in serving even those who hold it captive. By exporting our president to the UK for medical attention, we are telling the world that we are so backward that we cannot even
treat our president.

Can you imagine Vladimir Putin being treated in a UK hospital? Are we saying that this country cannot afford investment of $200 million to create a centre of excellence that would be the last word in medical care? Are we saying that we cannot find the manpower from the thousands of Nigerian doctors in the
UK, US, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, to man a centre of medical excellence? What if Nigeria was under international sanctions, does it mean our president would have died because lack of access to medical care? How do the Nigerian politicians who steal the money meant for our hospitals but go to Ghana, UK and Egypt for medical care, sleep at night? In order to prove that our president is alive, we are flying governors to London for photoshoots with him.

Was that necessary? The man should be allowed the space and peace to recover.

The money spent on this trip can buy malaria drugs and save the life of a child in one rural village.

We can do better as a country.