Last Sunday, I was one of the Nigerian “professionals” in the United States who answered an invitation to lunch with President Goodluck Jonathan in New York.
Last Sunday, I was one of the Nigerian “professionals” in the United States who answered an invitation to lunch with President Goodluck Jonathan in New York.
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I wondered if we would be treated to cassava bread, or Umuoffia-style high elevations of pounded yam. Would there be peppersoup ogbono, bushmeat, isiewu, afang or oha or suya?
It turned out there was no such subtlety, no attempt either at symbolism or suggestion. No Nigerian restaurant in the United States got a phone call asking if it could feed a few hundred Nigerians.
Lunch, it turned out, was processed Omaha steak: what do you mean you do not eat beef?
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The other part of the event, talk, was far more Nigerian, and that was why it became the day I learned President Jonathan suffers from a crippling disease: adulation.
It is an open secret Mr. Jonathan is a weak President, but to listen to the song and dance of the people around him, the man is Hercules, a hero, a savior. What this means is that even with the best of intentions, the Nigerian leader can barely hear, see or smell the agony of the real Nigeria.
Professor Ade Adefuye, Nigeria’s ambassador to the United States who welcomed the President, spoke about his heart and his wonderful decision-making, including his insistence that qualified Nigerians abroad be brought home to head some of the new universities. He spoke about Nigeria’s rapid production-line of high-level achievers in the country; 10 of them were presented to Mr. Jonathan.
Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the Coordinating and Finance Minister, described how well the Nigerian economy is doing, while Industry, Trade and Investment Minister Olusegun Aganga put in a pulpit-shaking Pentecostal-Minister style shift as he praised Jonathan’s wisdom, leadership and achievements. So successful was his earthquake-in-the-backyard that Mr. Jonathan, when he spoke, repeatedly quoted him.
One of the MCs bragged about Nigeria’s “achievement” as Mr. Jonathan would speak in 4th place at the United Nations General Assembly debate (“Claps your hands!”); that Mr. Jonathan would ring the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange (“Clap…!!!”).
He also celebrated Nigeria’s taking over, “in 2014,” as Africa’s largest economy. Mr. Aganga did not appear to have been so sure it was a good idea to nail such a date to the mast, but he assured Nigeria would take over, although “perhaps not in 2014.”
Speaking of the MCs, let me dismiss the most annoying language usage in Nigerian officialdom: “Mr. President.”
Each time this form of address is used outside the introduction of the incumbent, it is an attempt at sycophancy, and Nigerians are very good at it. We say, “Mr. President said…” as though he answers President for a name. “I told Mr. President…” “And then Mr. President took a sip of his water…”
The correct usage is to say “Mr. President” only if you are introducing him—that is, calling on him—or addressing him directly.
Nobody was guiltier of this on Sunday than the two MCs who did their groveling best to make Mr. Jonathan look as if his wife obtains her medical care in Abuja.
We were permitted four questions, a number I considered to be somewhat unfair but perhaps understandable in the circumstances. I did not think anyone really wanted to fire uncomfortable questions; we were honoring a country, not an individual.
Mr. Jonathan answered the questions himself; his Ministers were scheduled to do that. To his credit, he went beyond the three questions that were raised—the fourth was a medical inventor’s comment about his product—and responded to a couple of hanging questions. In my view, he demonstrated a new level of comfort about his job.
The two extra questions he addressed were national security and corruption, but he was not challenged, and he said nothing substantial.
In the end, it was clear that the current government will remain mediocre, promising plenty, delivering little. At the event, for instance, we heard that in 2014, Nigeria will have 10,000 megawatts of electricity.
The streets of Nigeria are littered with broken political promises, and Mr. Jonathan is proof of how the country’s poor, the unwary and the uneducated can easily be seduced with them. Google my list of his 2011 electoral promises, for instance: despite completely ignoring its implementation, the President seems to believe he will run again, and win.
Promises: In a speech in Kaduna in November 2009, he promised Nigerians they will have full and unfettered electricity in 2010. In September 2010, he promised electricity in 2012, just as he promised Nigerians, in 2012, they will begin to enjoy the performance of his government in 2013.
“People (critics) will begin to change after one year,” the president said during his Media Chat. Well, 2013 is almost over, which might explain why those around him are now swearing by 2014 and 2015.
Evidently, Jonathan got Sunday wrong, premised on ancient History: that Nigerians abroad are ignorant about their country. That lured an unimaginative government into gathering a distinguished wattage of Nigerians simply to tell them much less than they already knew.
Nigerians abroad know the challenge of supporting a long list of relatives at home. But it is also true that there was none of them on Sunday who could have confidently stated that were he to travel to his home State in Nigeria today, he will return.
And think about it: no Nigerian present can name any friends or that has gone, or is preparing to go to Nigeria as a tourist. That is because the front door into Nigeria is practically locked and barred. It is not the same with Ghana, South Africa or Ethiopia.
This is not about the potential of Nigeria; it is about our debilitating kleptocracy which masquerades as a democracy: it is incapable of bold visions and novel solutions.
Nigeria has bright prospects, but how can we be taken seriously when the leader chooses one of New York’s most expensive hotels to demonstrate his power. For Mr. Jonathan to pay $10,000 per night in New York insults Nigeria’s poor and the very concept of battling poverty. How does the leader of a developing nation make such an abominable judgment when he knows that his hotel bill alone can take care of entire villages or universities or hospitals?
When a leader makes such a decision, it feeds into the stereotype of Nigeria, but it is also a covert signal for the looters that the bar is open. It fuels the corruption and impunity that has imprisoned us. It means that whatever anyone says we are achieving, we can achieve 100 times as much.
It must also be remembered that Nigeria’s impoverished exist in large numbers outside Nigeria. I know many in the Diaspora who, with a little public policy encouragement, would return home. Unfortunately, while many Nigeria thieves are walking free, building mansions and traveling the world, such returnees are unsure they can afford an apartment.
In any event, exactly how well-off is a Nigerian abroad when he is disenfranchised at home? It is a shame for someone to describe you as “successful” knowing that by definition he is against your right to vote.
And so we come back to the ugliness of two Nigerias: home and away, rich and poor, strong and rich, in power and outside of it, the clinic where patients treat the doctors.
There is a lot of talk, but there is even more hypocrisy. We conveniently forget that food poisoning does not mean someone has put poison in your eba. You can poison yourself.
Twitter: @SonalaOlumhense
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