An Unauthorized Biography of Goodluck Jonathan’s First Akara

A witty Yoruba proverb has it that a child wastes the first kobo he earns on akara. Why akara? Don’t ask me. I don’t know. You never can tell how the ancients came up with some of these proverbs. Like all proverbs, this one is a compressed worldview with a didactic essence. The lesson here is that sudden exposure to real money can make you go gaga.
After all, the same Yoruba also say that “anjoonu l’owo” – money is a ghomid. The spirit of money – especially  sudden exposure to too much money at the ‘commanding heights’ of the “national cake” -  is already at work in Aso Rock and President Goodluck Jonathan is now ‘doing 440’ to spend his first kobo on akara.

But this is no ordinary akara.  President Jonathan has summoned omo alakara because he has ten billion naira to burn on akara. In case you haven’t heard, that is how much Mr. Jonathan proposes to spend on Nigeria’s 50th birthday bash. You can always rely on the National Assembly to take expeditious action in matters relating to the belly. They approved Jonathan’s supplementary appropriation bill swiftly. Very swiftly. Mind you, supplementary appropriation bill is the botanical name for more food for the boys in Abuja. So, the boys in the National Assembly asked no questions whatsoever about the particulars of the akara money. Expectedly, tongues have begun to wag. The internet is abuzz. Reuben Abati and other bewildered columnists are screaming blue murder. If folks are confounded by this mind-boggling budget, they are even more furious about the break down.

Here is how the President proposes to spend his akara money (warning: people with heart disease, high blood pressure, or any serious medical condition are advised that this breakdown could aggravate their condition):
N350 million for  national unity torch and tour
N50 million for Mrs. Patience Jonathan’s special visit to special homes, orphanages, prisons, and selected hospitals
N20 million for a special session of the National Children Parliament
N20 million for a party for 1000 children
N40 million for a Presidential banquet
N50 million for calisthenics performance
N310 million for cultural, historical and military exhibitions
N40 million for “food week.”
N320 million for secretariat equipment, accommodation, logistics, and utilities
 N30 million for the designing and unveiling of the 50th anniversary logo
N1.2 billion for the Ministry of Information and Communications  for insertion of special reports on Nigeria in both local and international media
N320 million for jingles, adverts, billboards, documentary and publicity
N105 million for Ministry of Foreign Affairs for an undisclosed expenditure
N700 million for accommodion and transportation of special guests from within and outside the country
 N450 million for the production of branded souvenirs and gift items for foreign heads of state and to erect a coat of arms on Aso Rock
N210 million naira for a variety gala night and fireworks
N200 million for an international friendly football match and a local competition 
N120 million naira for event managers and producers
N400 million for the publication of a compendium on Nigeria
N150 million for a compendium on the Legislature
 N50 million for a compendium on the judiciary
N10 million naira for the commissioning of the golden jubilee plaza 
N540 million for designing, constructing, and mounting a Tower of Unity in the 36 states of the Federation.
N150 million for debates, essays, conferences, lectures, and a colloquium
N60 million for musical concerts and carnivals in the 6 geo-political zones
 N100 million for durbar, masquerades, and cultural dances
N80 million naira for designing and constructing 10 symbolic monuments of founding fathers of Nigeria.
N40 million for a memory tone at the Tafawa Balewa Square, Lagos 
N500 million naira for security and protocol 
N25 million for medicals

Because I am a man with an ear to the ground, I have heard plenty of rumblings from enemies of progress about this budget. Some enemies of our “nascent” and “learning” democracy have described it as pure lunacy; some say that those who sat down in Abuja and came up with this madness aren’t just interested in looting. They say that the budget has been designed to shock and awe Nigerians so that the sheer outrageousness of it all will become a distraction from 2011. They say that Nigerians are going to be so pissed they will spend considerable time debating who on earth earmarked 50 million naira to the non-existent office of the First Lady just for Mrs Jonathan to visit orhpanages and prisons during the celebrations!

I have also overheard some other bellyachers say that undesignated looting went by the official name of “miscellaneous expenses” in our vocabulary of corruption but this budget has invented a new and more ambitious vocabulary: “undisclosed expenditure”. The Foreign Affairs Ministry will test run this new addition to our vocabulary of corruption by spending 105 million of our naira as “undisclosed expenditure” during the party. The naysayers are claiming that the lootapalooza that has been packaged as our 50th anniversary budget is so dizzying, so gargantuan, so brazen that nobody will remember to remain vigilant about what the usual suspects maybe up to in the build up to 2011. Uncharitable as ever, these naysayers are now calling the budget a lunatic weapon of mass distraction.

I disagree with them. I have a different take on this akara budget. No matter how horrible Nigeria’s rulership has been since independence, there are some past rulers who could still claim to have invested massively in infrastructure with the “change” they had left after looting the bulk of the oil money. Somebody somewhere can say: “I developed Lagos. All those bridges and flyovers are my legacy. Never mind that I told the world that how to spend money was our problem. We were all drunk during that oil boom. The bridges of Lagos are my legacy.” There are also some rulers who, between them, could say: “we built Abuja from the scratch. Abuja is our legacy from the Niger Delta’s oil money.”

Methinks that President Jonathan wants to seat down quietly somewhere in Bayelsa, twenty years from now, and declare solemnly: “my legacy? I partied. The first ten billion I had from the oil money, I blew it on akara. I organised that historic and gigantic owambe party to mark Nigeria’s 50th birthday. Africa’s most expensive party organized by Africa’s biggest political party. That is my legacy.” We don’t know if President Jonathan will contest; if he does, we can pretend not to know that the dynamics of incumbency would grant him (s)election success. Therefore, we have to assume for the sake of argument that this is the only shot he has on that seat. We have to assume that this will be the only providential shot of the Niger Delta in the next two life times – if we don’t re-structure our dysfunctional polity. We have to assume that rather than attempt to build a city like Abuja somewhere in the Niger Delta – at least start it – and damn the consequences, Mr. Jonathan has decided that a ten-billion owambe party would be his lasting legacy.

As a patriotic Nigerian, I have some suggestions to help him consolidate this emergent legacy. I think he needs to add two billion naira only to that budget to take care of some critical omissions that I have noticed. If you budget 700 million naira for transportation and accomodation of domestic and foreign guests (looks like they plan to buy new planes to fly in their guests), it goes without saying that kidnappers would see the foreign guests as prime target. Because of the total collapse of modern structures of policing, discipline, and punish in Nigeria, the Oba of Benin has had to go back to ancestral methods of dealing with kidnappers. A ritual was recently performed at his behest in Benin and kidnappers were cursed ancestrally. I hear it is working because our superstitious people fear original African taboo more than they fear the white man’s law and order. I propose we earmark one billion naira for the Oba of Benin for special cursing rituals starting from September 25, 2010. The curse should target any kidnapper hoping to embarrass the Federal Government by kidnapping visiting Heads of State or Hollywood stars invited to the owambe anniversary. That brings us to 11 billion naira.

President Jonathan recently had a stop over in Saudi Arabia on his way home from France. He wanted to thank the king of that country for taking care of our late President but was told that the king was “not on seat.” Well, we have many countries to thank as part of our 50th anniversary. Ever since our rulers gave our country to the dogs and created a national archetype called Andrew in the 1980s, the developed countries of Euro-America have played host to that character. They’ve had to deal with all the national traits and stereotypes of a character running away from lack of water, electricity, security, and other basic necessities of life in Nigeria, the “giant of Africa.”

By the 1990s, countries like Benin Republic, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Botswana, Swaziland, Lesotho, South Africa, China, Japan, India, Bangladesh, Malta, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Vietnam, Thailand, Ukraine, Nepal, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Papua New Guinea, and Kenya joined the regulars in Europe and North America in hosting and coping with the voluntary economic refugees produced by Nigeria`s fiftly years of colossal failure. These countries have had to deal and cope with new economies of meaning associated, fairly or unfairly, with our presence. As part of our 50th owambe celebration, I propose a budget of one billion naira only for a Presidential delegation to visit and thank all the countries that have hosted and taken care of Andrew all these years. The roving thank you delegation should be headed by Ojo Maduekwe. Micheal Aondoakaa, Tafa Balogun, James Ibori, Patricia Etteh, Tanimu Yakubu, and Bukola Saraki should be members of the delegation. That brings us to twelve billion naira only.

Now, if President Jonathan spends ten billion (plus my suggested 2 billion) on akara and does not get the chance to be in the saddle after 2011 in order to do other things that could add up to a concrete legacy, we all know that history’s harsh judgment awaits him. Nigerians will talk forever about the most expensive celebration of fifty years of absolute state failure the world has ever seen; his people in the Niger Delta will accuse him forever of squandering their only shot at the “national cake” on akara.

When this happens, he will need to explain things to his people by re-writing history. That is the nature of Nigerian rulers. After messing up, they always try to smuggle themselves into nice corners of our history ‘before our very before’. Witness how much Babangida has spent on hagiographers since 1993. And we know that in the nature of things in Nigeria, the other, especially the ethnic other, is always responsible for one’s poor choices. If an Igbo man coughs in the morning, those ngbati and ofem manu traitors and bastards are responsible; if a Yoruba man farts in the afternoon, those stingy inyanminrin bastards are responsible; if the Igbo and the Yoruba pee in the evening, those illiterate and uncivilized mallams in the north are responsible; if the Fulani man has a headache at night, those filthy infidels who are not born to rule in the west and the east are responsible. No Nigerian ethnic group is ever responsible for anything.

This national malaise explains why I pity the two Yoruba people who are Minister of Finance and Minister of state for Finance respectively in President Jonathan’s cabinet at the moment. When history begins to snarl furiously at the retired Goodluck Jonathan some twenty years down the road, I foresee and predict the following conversation:
History: Jonathan, you had a golden opportunity and you blew it partying. Why on earth did you spend your first ten billion naira on akara when you could have spent just under a billion on credible electoral reform and given that country a fresh start in electoral ethos? What a legacy that would have been! You would have written your name in gold but you opted for a ten billion owambe.

Goodluck Jonathan: Hmm, my broda, see me o. I made the mistake of appointing two Yoruba people in the Ministry of Finance. They made me do it. They said it was o.k. They said that we could afford the grandiose party. You know Yoruba people and owambe.

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