The article you are about to read was first published in this column on August 30, 2016. Please read on.
For several years, I have been pondering on Nigeria’s democracy, opportunities and challenges it has brought to the nation in the past twenty years (1999-2019). In theory, the opportunities far outweigh the challenges. But in practice, the challenges are numerous and complex. Perhaps, that is why political scientists always say that democracy is a very complex endeavor. Although democracy is a fallacy in practice, I love it more than any type of military rule. This is because in a democracy, the people are supposed to keep the government in check. Provided however, the people know what the government is doing.
When Abraham Lincoln defines democracy as “the government of the people, by the people, for the people,” he was perhaps, referring to Western democracies. Lincoln’s definition of democracy doesn’t refer to democracies practiced by politicians of African genre. In the 1990s, some commentators and analysts expressed some condescending perceptions about Africans in their paperwork. One of them by name, George Louis Beer, claims that the “black race has hitherto shown no capacity for progressive development except under the tutelage of other peoples.” As if he was enhancing this derogatory assertion, he affirms that Africans’ existing stage of civilization in the Twenty-first Century is far below the potentialities for progress.
Beer was not alone in these derogatory remarks about Africans. There were other commentators and analysts who painted an apocalyptic portrait of African nations in the early 1990s because of the immense human tragedy that pervaded the continent at that time under assorted military regimes. Of particular reference, is the statement made by one Paul Johnson, who opines that “some states are not yet fit to govern themselves, and so the civilized world has a mission to go out to these desperate places and govern.” He suggests further that individual “civilized countries would serve under his proposal as trustees.” These offensive remarks are irritants to Africans who have the love of their countries at heart. For them, these remarks appear xenophobic, and outrageous. But are these individuals not correct?
Although, since Nigeria chose the path of democracy in 1999, there has been undulating progress made by successive governments in all areas of our national life. We thought with democracy, electoral processes will be strengthened. Rather than strengthen electoral processes, they are weakened by those who took an oath of office to defend the unity and uphold the honor and glory of the country.
Many Nigerians accepted democracy because they assumed wrongly though, that it would build bridges and not walls between the rich and the poor. Our democracy has not given the poor any hope. Inflation and unemployment now make the poor more miserable. A visit to the backwaters of the country throughout the 36 states and 774 local government areas will expose the poor conditions of some roads. One would find out that most public health facilities are decaying just as many primary and secondary schools need urgent repairs and upgrades.
It was in 2014 that Nigerians aligned themselves with a few politicians that there was a need for change in governance as corruption and disregard for the rule of law were at their highest amplitudes. As you read this piece, corruption and disregard for the rule of law still thrive in our society. That is why some analysts say Nigeria needs to be reformed politically and economically. But I was quick to ask: “Where are the reformers?” They are very scarce in our society and I doubt if they currently are in the government.
The current economic challenges facing Nigeria today have been conceptualized, orchestrated and implemented since independence not by colonialists but by the political elites. I am aware that democracy alone will not solve all the problems of the nation with multiple ethnic, cultural, and religious backgrounds
A careful study of current political and socio-economic challenges, gives an impression that the electorate was deceived with the “change” mantra in 2015. The masses fell for it. Even some Nigerians who knew these crops of politicians and their antecedents fell for their strategic deception during the 2019 general elections. I thought the primary question Nigerians should have asked politicians before going to the polls was that: whose values, beliefs, attitudes, or behavior would require change in order to have a progressive Nigeria.
Nigerians should have asked what shift in national priorities, resources, and power were necessary for development in the country? And what sacrifices would have to be made by whom, and for who, in order to actualize the desired change. We did not ask these questions. Thus, Nigerians missed the opportunity big time! After spending huge sums of money, Vision 20:2020 and the Economic and Recovery Growth Plan (ERGP) have just been abandoned. What an easy way of dumping a nation’s strategic plans. No one in the government deems it necessary to tell citizens what these plans achieved and what they did not realize as we look forward to Vision 2040.
The challenges Nigeria is currently facing are numerous and could better be solved when we have committed and sincere leaders at all levels of government. When all known indices of good governance are examined globally, Nigeria is always at the end of the ladder. Indeed, the reputation of Nigeria in the international arena is strained and embarrassing. Instead of democracy improving the quality of lives of the people, it has made many poor. Poverty experienced by Nigerians has reached a crescendo that some local analysts at a seminar asked: “In whose interest is Nigeria’s democracy.” In 20 years, democracy produced almost 90 million poor people only.
Nigerians want to know what they stand to benefit in a democracy. Some Nigerians reason that democracy in Nigeria means “government of politicians, by politicians, for politicians only.” A fellow while expressing his views at the seminar says that “if governors and lawmakers serve for only 4 years and each go home with severance allowances and pensions, but public/civil servants who served the country for more than fifteen years or more are not been paid gratuity and pension on time, democracy is only for politicians.” For several months, there has been outrage in the country over senators’ N13.5 million monthly allowance.
Such allowance to my mind does not match Nigeria’s circumstance as a technologically and industrially backward nation. That is why the ayes have it, when Senator Rochas Okorocha, the immediate past governor of Imo State advocated on the floor of the red chamber for a reduction in cost of governance declaring that instead of three senators per state, Nigeria should make do with one senator per state. Although the former governor is still battling with allegations of extensive property acquisition and extravagance in office, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has imposed sanctions on him. All said, it is still germane to ask: In whose interest is Nigeria’s democracy? Politicians!
