If you’re a person of the Christian faith, you would have been conversant with the Book of Nehemiah. Of all the 66 books of the Bible, Nehemiah speaks, perhaps more than other books, about nation building.
Here was a slave in another country who, upon hearing that Jerusalem, his homeland, lay in ruins, set out to rebuild it by all means possible despite strong resistance. The zeal, the selflessness, the determination, the resourcefulness, the courage, the patriotism, the candor, the sagacity, the strength and the grace with which Nehemiah brought to bear in the rebuilding of Jerusalem are there for everyone to see.
There are many modern day Nehemiahs today. The last edition of REFLECTIONS! published on 15 September, 2024 talked briefly about Lee Kwan Yew, the founder of modern Singapore. With great vision, values and determination, he and his cohorts rebuilt that nation state from a decrepit state into an economic powerhouse.
Today, Singapore, a tiny country of 6 million people with the size less than Lekki Peninsula (734 km2 for Singapore vs 755 km2 for Lekki Peninsula) exports goods worth about $1 trillion a year, nearly twice Africa’s annual exports. Because of visionary leadership.
China is another country with modern day Nehemiahs. Under just four successive leaders, China has between 1978 and now brought well over 700 million people out of poverty. With a population of more than 1.4 billion people, just a tiny 56 million are poor. At a public lecture some years ago, Chief Arthur Mbanefo, a renowned accountant, told a story that when he visited China for the first time in 1978, the people were so poor that one could not distinguish between the genders. But in 2010, China overtook Japan to become the world’s second largest economic power.
The country is projected to become the world’s largest economy by 2035. A blend of economic liberalization and political dictatorship have made the country a symbol of a superpower.
When BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) was formed in 2006 Nigeria was conspicuously absent. The reason being that she was not considered as an emerging economy that enjoyed strong growth for a number of years.
Then came MINT (Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Turkey) in 2011 as a group of nations expected to show strong growth and provide high returns for investors over the coming decade (2021). Of the four countries, Nigeria is the only one growing backward. In fact, this BRICS has expanded to include five more countries (Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates).
These countries represent good examples of how nations are being led aright. Rwanda is also an interesting example. Even though the Rwandan example has not been tested under more than one leader, no one can deny the fact that the country has had a complete makeover under a generation. Rwanda under President Paul Kagame has become a destination of some sort in tourism, technology and fruits, vegetables, coffee, tea and flowers exports. Given the genocide of 1994, it appeared as if the country would not survive, but today Nigerians and people of other nations have turned it into a tourist destination in Africa. It is one of the safest countries in the world.
The standard of living is higher than Nigeria’s, quality of life is thrice higher than in Nigeria, respect for the rule of law, where we can score ourselves very very low, is very high; poverty rate is low and corruption is equally low compared to big brother Nigeria.
Having said this, one thing is certain: Nigeria is not working; things are broken down. Maybe I should correct myself here: Nigeria is actually working but only for a tiny fraction of its population and foreign collaborators. The chaos, the decadence, the rapacious corruption, the lawlessness, the decay and the dysfunctional systems work so very well for this tiny few; and left to them, nothing should be done to change things as they deliver the best outcomes for them.
Conversely, for the greater majority of Nigerians, the country is not working. Most of her citizens have been thrown under the bus, life is hard (and that’s putting it very mildly); poverty is now more widespread than at any other time in history (outside of the civil war era); you can hardly get things done well in the first place. We now harbour the highest number of poor people in the world (and the highest of the extremely poor after the Democratic Republic of Congo; perhaps because there are wars going on there!). A nation of Big Man (rather than Big Institutions) is collapsing like a pack of cards. It did not start today.
REFLECTIONS! has argued forcefully that the current political system Nigeria practices is incapable of bringing about development and prosperity for our people. It is not a democracy, it is not a rule that can be applied anywhere else nor is it founded on any known principle. It is just a system where a group of people (whoever they may be) capture state power and do as they like, not as is required of them by the constitution (its numerous shortcomings notwithstanding); but entirely as they fancy it. And they cannot be questioned, let alone held to account because they know too well that there will never be a day of reckoning through state instrument.
It has nothing to do with who is in power at any given time and level but everything to do with the fundamental defects inherent in the system. And the bad guys are exploiting its inherent weaknesses to the maximum.
REFLECTIONS! is seizing the opportunity that the 64th celebration of our Independence from Great Britain today to advocate for a different political future for Nigeria. It is doubtful if there is any person, including the President, who is genuinely satisfied with how far we have come as a nation. To move forward, Nigeria is in dire need of a new political order. I do not know what that order would be. However, I will hazard my thoughts in this two part article.
CONVOCATION OF NATIONAL CONFERENCE:
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu should as a matter of urgency send a bill to the National Assembly seeking approval to constitute a broadband Constituent Assembly or National Conference that would fashion a new political system of government for Nigeria. Nigerians need to be given the opportunity to decide how they want to be governed. Political power belongs to the people who have a say in how they are to be governed. What currently obtains was inherited from the military government with so much tele guiding. The 1999 Constitution (as cosmetically amended) was produced by the military. Its defects are numerous, and it is unable to provide good governance. It cannot even be fundamentally changed. The type of National Conference that REFLECTIONS! is advocating for is one that gives the people of Nigeria absolute freedom to discuss any and every issue apart from the sanctity of the sovereignty of the nation.
In 2011 after President Godluck Ebele Johnathan won his election, he was advised to set up a constituent assembly to fashion out a good political system for the country. He and his lieutenants lampooned the people and the idea. When it had become clear that his bid for a second term was not well received in some quarters, he quickly set up the Justice Idris Kutigi Commission cochaired by Bishop Matthew Hassan Kuka. In my opinion, his purpose for setting up the body was not so much to usher in a better society but gaining acceptance to run for a second term. Unfortunately for him and his regime, the Commission could not complete its job within the anticipated time. His hurried implementation of the simple tasks in the report could not swear the electorates to vote him back into power. And his successor, President Mohammadu Buhari, who was loathsome to the Commission’s report did not waste time in literally shredding it. Till date, nobody in government has made reference to the document.
However, what is being advocated is different from the political expediency type of National Conference that the Johnathan administration had. This Assembly should be set up before the end of this year while it starts sitting from January 2025 and should submit its report a year or 18 months after to give it enough time to exhaust what the people have to say. People from all walks of life should be made to represent their constituents and interests in the Assembly. Selection of attendees should be from the bottom up. And government should come in to appoint people from certain interests not adequately represented such as artisans, the disabled, illiterate, the poor, widows, and such like. The final report of the Conference could be subjected to a national plebiscite. Nigerians should decide how they want to be governed.
Unfortunately in his speech to the nation this morning to mark the 64th anniversary as an independent country, the President was silent about political issues. The closest he had on politics were his government’s determination to implement the Supreme Court’s ruling on the financial autonomy of local governments and the setting up of a 30 day national youth conference. At best, the outcome of the youth conference can only solve few of the problems the youth are facing but not move a needle in Nigeria’s endemic challenges. And the state governors have already perfected strategies to ensure that the financial autonomy of local governments will be on paper.
President Tinubu of all people cannot be shying from confronting the big political issues of the country. Here was a man with the credentials of belonging to the camp of those asking for a sovereign national conference.
Today, after four or so addresses to the nation in 16 months, he is comfortably mute about it. Almost all his speeches are on the economy (and partially on security) as if he was elected the coordinating minister for the economy!
Esiere is a former journalist!
©️2024
