It is highly uncharitable to make such an ascription, but as a Nigerian, who is uniquely fascinated with the sociological behavior of my society, I would not be much truthful, if I did not say that the society is a mob or rather the social relationships and communal communication patterns of the people is driven by the irrational urgings of a mob; angry, unquestioning, destructive and highly unreflective. Indeed, many and a great number of communal conflicts in Nigeria, were stoked by reasons and causes which are at best mundane. An example that could be easily attributed to most ethnic, religious or civil conflicts is that, we are fighting because it is thought somebody blasphemed our God or it is because of the other tribe, we are encountering our present predicament or rather, it is widely suspected but not proven, that such deed is at the root of a contentious government policy.
It is highly uncharitable to make such an ascription, but as a Nigerian, who is uniquely fascinated with the sociological behavior of my society, I would not be much truthful, if I did not say that the society is a mob or rather the social relationships and communal communication patterns of the people is driven by the irrational urgings of a mob; angry, unquestioning, destructive and highly unreflective. Indeed, many and a great number of communal conflicts in Nigeria, were stoked by reasons and causes which are at best mundane. An example that could be easily attributed to most ethnic, religious or civil conflicts is that, we are fighting because it is thought somebody blasphemed our God or it is because of the other tribe, we are encountering our present predicament or rather, it is widely suspected but not proven, that such deed is at the root of a contentious government policy.
It is upon such a mindset, I came across a lecture delivered by Professor Emeritus Bolaji Akinyemi, which was hailed to no end throughout last week, it was titled; Leadership, Democracy and Development: A Paradigm Relationship. The paper asserted that it is virtually impossible, for a Nigerian citizen to become billionaire on a legal and legitimate means of livelihood. Actually, the speech and the question and answer which immediately followed, advocated the need for a strong leadership over the necessity of concrete institutions of government, indeed, the celebrated scholar in international relations, was of the view that President Barrack Obama erred, when he made preference for strong institutions against reliance on great leaderships, on his first and epochal visit to the continent of Africa, after ascension to the democratic throne of the White House through the route of an address in Ghana.
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Because, according to the former foreign minister, the concept of a little man, which automatically infers and is inclusive of the female folk without mentioning, who organizes, inculcates, promotes and galvanizes the civil society for action, is not attainable within the platform of an African continent, more so as, it is only able to succeed, where institutions of the government protect channels of dissent and avenues of alternative opinion, which are the principal hallmarks of genuine democracy. His theory is that it is only from a strong leadership, predicated on honest, patriotic and selfless individuals the African people could defeat the ailment of bad governance afflicting it, indeed, he related the stories of the glorious past, when the Nigerian society was morally sound, composed of admirable cultural values, while the leadership at the time, where role models in character content, highlighting that it is only the reappearance of such a situation, which could preserve the polity from its present social morass.
While I could never claim the veneration of old age, neither could I accept the description of a Young Turk. Rather, as an individual who is mentally aware of his environment, from its long history of trials and tribulation with foreign exploration invasions to colonialism and the attainment of freedom through independence. As a society which has adopted eastern theological philosophies in the monolithic scripture and western administrative acumen of modernity, a choreographed depiction of my little village in the northern part of Nigeria, attest to the fact that the richest people in the community, do not simply pay their taxes because it is merely the right thing to do or it is inherently good to so or acquire landed properties to assuage intricate feudalistic fervor and give loans with monumental interest rates to vulnerable peasants, among other predatory and parasitic vices for the good of the community.
Unfortunately, such decadent behavioral trait was not atypical to my community, as societies down from the thickly forested creeks at the southern tip of the nation, to the arid sparse-land of the northern part of the country, had similar stories of greedy local merchants, who hoard farm produce for easy gains and hijack large communal land as a confirmation of their status symbol. In fact, it is the fear of institutional authority, which has always served as a sufficient motivation, to check the behavioral excesses considered as inimical to the maintenance of balance in the whole society. Indeed, even in the modern times, at the height of triumph and dominance of European and American civilization, persons, most especially among the class of exceptionally rich elites, always try as they could to avoid paying taxes, with their savings and investments in economies considered as tax heavens. They also do give and receive bribes, where it is tolerable and plausible, especially when the long sight of the law is a bit blurred, as has been confirmed recently, with the prosecution and conviction of many individuals in their own countries, for aiding and abetting corruption in African foreign lands.
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In other words, even in earlier times and periods that is subject of nostalgic renditions of folklores, about an orderly society that never had or tolerated social vices, the people did not partake in abominable acts and conducts, not because they are purely and inherently good human beings, but because there were institutional frameworks to check resort to anti-social behaviors. As habitual ails such as stealing, corruption and general crimes were not only frowned upon by the community, its legal institutions punish individuals found in breach of its accepted communal norm.
The newfangled concept in itself is a challenge to the very democratic tenets, especially, as it was delivered on a stage inaugurating an elected governor of Ondo state, where the theorist prayed for other states in the country to have the likes of Olusegun Mimiko in power, not because of any superior ideals of the incumbent, but because he has delivered the dividends of democracy, a fact subjectively acknowledged by him alone.
Indeed, the fundamental ethos of democracy is not based on prayers or even hope, that the society must always elect a good leader, every time the demand to go to the polling booth arises, after all the availability of terms and tenures of office, was inserted to the rudiments of democracy as an accountable avenue and means of assessing elected officials, with the verdict of either re-election for good performance and rejection at the polls for a disappointing tenure of office. In fact, historically, the greatest of democratic nations of the world, have also at one time had bad leadership, but it did not threaten the system, as the institutions in effect and in existence, always helped to check the excesses of a leader seeking the infamy and infamous.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of SaharaReporters
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