Whoever owns a mouth can send it on whatever errand the heart desires. This Yoruba proverb evokes what Okey Ndibe might be tempted to call “the strange career” of Senator David Mark’s mouth. Easily one of the busiest mouths in sub-Saharan Africa, coming second only to Michael Aondoakaa’s mouth, that part of the anatomy of the Senate President has been running errands for its owner since the mid-1980s. From his comfortable perch as a naturalized citizen of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Senator David Mark has sent forth his mouth on all kinds of missions to the neighbouring Peoples Republic of Nigeria.
I indicated in my weekly column for 234Next.com a few weeks ago that the Federal Republic of Nigeria is different from – and is not to be confused with – the Peoples Republic of Nigeria. Unlike the 140 million citizens of the Peoples Republic of Nigeria, the less than five thousand citizens of the Federal Republic of Nigeria are the world’s richest people. The Federal Republic of Nigeria is even smaller than the Vatican. We are talking of less than five thousand people sitting on the world’s seventh largest oil reserves. We are talking of less than five thousand people who have made more than a trillion dollars from oil in the last fifty or so odd years. Divide a trillion dollars by five thousand people and you get the picture: the tiny Federal Republic of Nigeria is the world’s richest country just as her huge neighbour, the Peoples Republic of Nigeria, is the world’s most indigent and most rickety country.
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As a rule, it is easier for a North Korean to beat his country’s security dragnet and defect to South Korea than for a citizen of the Peoples Republic of Nigeria to cross the border into the Federal Republic of Nigeria. They are two different countries separated by visible, intimidating, and absolutely insurmountable visa restrictions. Citizens of the Federal Republic of Nigeria are some of the most border-conscious people on earth. They are extremely territorial, treating potential immigrants from the Peoples Republic of Nigeria in pretty much the same way Americans treat potential illegal immigrants from Mexico and other Latin American countries. If America has what it has always described as a Hispanic problem, the Federal Republic of Nigeria has always had a problem called the Peoples Republic of Nigeria.
David Bonaventure Alechenu Mark left the Peoples Republic of Nigeria for the Federal Republic of Nigeria sometime in the mid-1980s when the tyrant ruling the Federal Republic made him a Military Governor. He has never looked back. First he got his green-white-green card and became a permanent resident of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Five years later, he became a naturalized citizen of that country and now heads its Senate.
Although he has never visited his country of origin, the Peoples Republic of Nigeria, since he left more than twenty years ago, Senator Mark has allowed his mouth to do the visits for him. And his mouth does not like to travel incognito. His mouth loves to roam and rove with all the trappings of power it can muster. Wait for this: David Mark’s mouth is not and has never been in government. That mouth is and has always been in power. That is a nuanced distinction to keep in mind as we explore the sinews of Senator David Mark’s mouth like Mungo Park the explorer.
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When the mouth in question visited the Peoples Republic of Nigeria for the first time some twenty years ago, it was to announce to the citizens of that country that telephones were a luxury that should be kept beyond their reach for their own good. If they had telephones like their rich neighbours in the Federal Republic of Nigeria, it could lead to chaos and confusion of nationalities by making it much more difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff.
Telephonegate has been the greatest achievement in the illustrious public career of Senator Mark’s mouth to date. After this, the mouth went into hibernation as its owner fell out of favour with his paymasters in the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Later, the mouth bounced back and picked up the pieces of an interrupted career in garrulity. A couple of billions stolen and scattered everywhere from Ireland to Bermuda and a few rigged elections later, David Mark and his mouth found themselves in the saddle as the unelected President of the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Folks in the Peoples Republic of Nigeria have had no respite ever since. Like a restless run of locusts (apologies to Femi Osofisan), Senator Mark’s mouth has sallied forth from Abuja on periodic missions to convince the world that those who claim that his naked Emperor Yaddie is naked are suffering from the eye irritation we call ‘apollo’ and can therefore not see the Emperor’s gold-coated, diamond-encrusted flowing robes. And the target list is rich: President Barack Obama, Senator Hillary Clinton, and all Nigerians in the diaspora.
Because of its owner’s military past, this rampaging mouth takes no prisoners. Hence, by visiting Ghana, President Obama is ignorant and does not mean well for Nigeria; Senator Clinton is bad mouthing Nigeria because she is envious of the spectacular achievements that Emperor Yaddie and Senator David Mark have recorded in terms of publicizing their desire to eventually intend to aspire to pursue a seven-point agenda and approach 3000 megawatts of electricity somehow and somewhere down the road; and Nigerians abroad are all unpatriotic enemies of the country. Of course!
The recent simultaneous celebration of 49 years of prosperity for the Federal Republic of Nigeria and 49 years of penury and abjection for the Peoples Republic of Nigeria provided an occasion for Senator Mark’s mouth to log a few overtime hours of work. That mouth was at its paternalistic best, advising Nigerians not to “bottle up anger, resentment, and frustration against the nation”. And, of course, Nigerians were assured of a “firm promise” to fast track the process of constitutional amendment.
Bottling up anger, resentment, and frustration against the nation? What Senator Mark’s mouth is attempting to operate here is called semantic fraud. That mouth has some notable accomplices among Nigerians abroad. These irredeemable quislings roam the Nigerian internet community, deliberately misrepresenting the categorical rejection of the imbecilities of our rulers in Abuja by the real patriotic Nigerians as hatred of Nigeria. They equate rejection of the mediocres in Abuja with rejection of Nigeria. These are masters of the sleight of the hand, professionals of sophistry, and lovers of solipsism. They have never met anyone capable of loving Nigeria the way they do. Nigeria is their father’s personal estate. They are the final bus stop of patriotism; hence their regular foolish talk that demonizes other Nigerians as bottling up anger and resentment against the nation. Which nation?
What the vocal critics that David Mark and his quislings abroad love to demonize resent is not the Peoples Republic of Nigeria but that Federal Republic of Nigeria that is exclusively owned and operated by such internal colonizers and enemies of the people as Ibrahim Babangida, Olusegun Obasanjo, Umaru Yar’Adua, James Ibori, Michael Aondoakaa, Andy Uba, Dimeji Bankole, Vincent Ogbulafor, Tony Anenih, Segun Adeniyi, David Edebvie, most state governors and virtually every member of the National Assembly.
We resent the Nigeria of this brood of vipers. David Mark should go and jump into the river Niger if that makes him unhappy. As for his “firm promise” to the people of the Peoples Republic of Nigeria, someone should remind David Mark that his ilk has made “firm promises” to the people since October 1, 1960; someone should remind him that his Emperor Yaddie has made so many promises in the last two years that we may very well need a Federal Ministry of Promises, not one has ever been fulfilled. It is therefore an insult and a provocation for any member of Nigeria’s discredited rulership to use the word promise. A final word for David Mark’s mouth: could you please let us know if your owner really won the election that got him to the Senate? Comment on that or forever hold your peace!
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