I remember hearing a story of when my dad and mum, on invitation, visited the University of Ibadan around the time the NYSC scheme was introduced in the country. My father, who was the permanent secretary at the federal cabinet office, heading those who pioneered the scheme, was carefully and with much pride in his achievement delivering his well-prepared speech. Suddenly, all hell broke loose as the students went on a rampage, in protest of the highly unpopular scheme. I can’t help but chuckle to myself every time the picture of my parents in their best regalia scampering for their dear life flashes past my mind. It makes me sound wicked abi? I know, sorry.
With the farce we called elections recently in Bayelsa and Kogi states, our political leaders continue to teach the average Nigerian that you must get what you desire at all cost. Force is the name of the game and the end justifies the means. I must confess that there are far too many reasons why I don’t feel particularly proud to call myself a Nigerian at this moment in time.
The thought that we now live in a country where a governor who has apparently failed to pay civil servant’s salaries for almost 39 months can be voted in to continue office for another 4 years, particularly grieves me. I just don’t get it. This absurdity presents us with a classic case of culprits of bad behaviour, not facing any direct consequences for their failures but instead catalysing by their actions, a series of immeasurable dire consequences for the society they live in.
So, what do you expect? The ordinary man also resorts to doing the same in his own little way whenever he gets the chance. The sad thing is, in the end, we all pay for it. Trust is lost, almost irreparably in both the rule of law and in those employed to protect its sanctity. The next thing I’m about to say is where the whole election saga becomes somewhat weird.
El Rufai, a highly cerebral gentleman, whose courage to speak the truth has always commanded my respect and admiration and who undoubtedly has proved himself to be one of the best performing among the current crop of governors, didn’t see the irony in allegedly going down on his knees to beg the good people of Kogi to vote for a governor who hasn’t paid his government workers for over 3 years? How do you explain that?
Students of Machiavelli will no doubt identify how his peculiar principles on power seem to be playing out before our very eyes, here in Nigeria. It was he who famously said, “it is necessary for a prince wishing to hold his own (power) to know how to do wrong.” This philosophical position advanced in his book, The Prince, has since continued to make Niccolo Machiavelli a reference point when it comes to the ruthless use of power. He was the first to outrightly divorce ethics from politics saying there was no place for ethical behaviour in the art of politics. This may explain to a great extent why a performing governor who sees the need for him to do that which makes the lives of the people of his state more meaningful would beg people badly governed by their own governor to still go ahead and vote for him.
The end game is for the party to retain political power at all cost as that’s all that matters. Machiavelli too was known to be resolute in his position that the end justifies the means. However, something which escapes many who may know a little about his submission on power but which is actually very significant, is that he didn’t believe in tyranny serving the selfish interest of the ruler. Power, whether used or abused he insisted must ultimately benefit the people. And that’s where we see a clear departure between him and our political rulers. Our people have proved themselves time and time again to have far fewer noble intentions.
There is an ethical theory, propounded by Immanuel Kant, which says an act is morally right if it satisfies duty. In other words, what makes it right is that it’s a duty to man met and not whether the consequences are desirable or not. This he called the Categorical Imperative because it’s a must.
So, whether the consequences are immediately beneficial to the agent or not is immaterial. It’s believed that if everyone does this, it would ultimately benefit all. To Kant, all humans must be seen as inherently worthy of respect and dignity which made him go further to say that it was morally wrong to treat any human being only as a means to an end. We must all be accorded the respect of an end ourselves. I make mention of this because there is a school of thought which believes the legal system emanated from moral theories and that Kant’s ethical theory that no one should ever be used only as a means to a selfish end actually forms the basis of what we now refer to as human rights.
We are all moral agents therefore we all have inherent dignity as human beings. A wider teaching of this in Nigeria certainly wouldn’t go amiss. Maybe, just maybe if our leaders, both political and otherwise, had inculcated this mindset as adolescents, things might have turned out very different for our nation. In politics, the electorate, and in the corporate world, the subordinates, wouldn’t be treated purely as tools to serve the interest of the supposed leader. In place of utopian altruism which is seldom achieved, enlightened self-interest, which Kant incidentally didn’t frown upon would be allowed to take centre stage, leading to infinitely better economic, infrastructural and general societal progress. So, using others to achieve your objective as long as it benefits them too, according to Kant is morally acceptable.
Fact is, no one rich or poor, influential or seemingly insignificant, can ever be completely immune to the consequences of a barely functioning society. And a society where power for its own sake appears to be the focus and those who wield the power are rarely held accountable for poor performance or bad behaviour can never function well. At the end of the day, we all pay for it in one way or the other. Now, that’s the gospel truth.
OLADAPO AKANDE
Changing the nation…one mind at a time
