Are we still a family?
If you grew up, as I did on the shoulders of the eighties, and perhaps in the early ninties, it is not impossible that you may have heard enough dose of that iconic music entitled “We are a family” by an equally iconic group dubbed Sister Sledge. It was a favourite choice music at parties and on the airwaves. No doubt, Kathy Sledge and her sisters were passionate about the song as exemplified in their fantastic renditions at national concerts. You cannot but be infected by the “We are a family” bug. As did “We are the world” a classic song of the same period.
It was a pseudo national anthem, if you you will, at the time. No thanks to the the disc jockeys of the era who almost dulled our ears with the captivating song. At the turn of the century, however, Jack Hartmann, a children’s television personality, intruded the airwaves with yet another hit album with the same title. His version of “We are a family” was less known but no less popular with the children. Jack’s composition had such irrepressible lines as “though, we are different people, we live together in love.” And that is the attraction for me besides the sumptuous melody therein, as a creative mind. It was easy to extrapolate the reality of our existence from the lyrics of the music and draw inspiration from it. It says it all. Indeed as Kathy Sledge would say in the chorus lines, “…we are a family…I have my sister with me… the golden rule is have faith in what you do and you’d never go wrong” in contrast it is becoming increasingly difficult to assert that we have our brothers with us therefore, we are a family. Are we living together in love? I don’t think so. We squandered our diversity many political dispensations ago. Our fault lines are getting larger by the day, no thanks to our opinion moulders in government.
The two albums in essence eloquently captured the thrust of our oneness as a united and indivisible nation. At a point in this country, we were so united and cohesive that one never thought of individual nationalities or tribes or religious affiliations as important factors. Those differences were not a threat to our co-existence rather they enhanced our plurality in the comity of nations We were a composite of a plural society and we accepted our fate as it is without questioning the the colonial overlords who chaperoned this holy matrimony.
We were just one entity with one destiny. Our national anthem again underscores this point forcefully with words like “one nation bound in freedom, peace, and unity.” That “the labours of our heroes past shall not be in vain”
In our hey days, we even fought a 36 month civil war with no winner, no vanquished verdict. And then we had in place a Reconciliiation, Rehabilitation and Reconstruction, our version of a marshal agenda to mend the broken walls. Subsequently General Yakubu Gowon who was married to Victoria, an Igbo lady from the troubled estern region initiated the National Youth Service Corp (NYSC) scheme to further bridge the disunity gap between the regions. You probably would remember the mantra of the day at that trying moments, “Go On With One Nigeria GOWON”. The nation was able as it were to overcome its challenges because united we stand and divided we fall. And that was the cementing block that held us in place, until the emergence of a new set of political actors, in and out of uniform. The rest is history.
Over the years, especially during our transition periods of democratic experimentation, we seemed to have jettisoned, wholesale those values of unity, brotherhood, mutuality of existence and espirit de corp, equity and fairness that formed the fulcrum of our relationship. These values, you will recall also informed the bedrock for the agitation for independent by our founding fathers. Sadly, the import of that struggle for self determination is gradually being frittered away in the altar of hegemonic buccaneering.
Today, some nationalities in this mix are emboldened by a supposed vantaged position to tout doctored population figures as raison de’tre to their hold onto power in perpetual succession. They assume, quite ridiculously, a trusteeship on behalf of the rest nationalities. Where is that done in a commonwealth environment such as ours? And in a democratic setting? This sophistry must not be allowed to take root in this country. I make bold to submit that we are a nation of equal stakeholders with equal interests and obligations. No one nationationality is superior to the other, at least not by reason of population. Nor by natural endowments of oil and gas etc. This nebulous and fictitious idea is hard to swallow, and we all must abridge its advancement and spread by a band of ill-informed agents of hegemony and tribal lucifers before it gains currency.
No doubt these founding fathers whose blood and tears gave us this land will shudder in their graves when confronted by the gory pictures of our trajectory. This was not what they envisaged in pulling strength together in the fight for freedom and emancipation from the British colonial masters. It was a collective fight that yielded the desired fruit of independendence. It is our responsibility to uphold the sanctity of our independence.
It is rather unfortunate that those core values have been corroded by the acid of nepotism, self agrandisement corruption, ethnicity, religious bigotry, greed, tribalism, injustice, negation of the rule of law and such other untoward vices imported into the polity by political elites. It is a festering sore that has acquired the reputation of a cancer. No nation ever survives the erosion of these core values and social mores and still remain intact. It’s not possible.
Isn’t it laughable that sixty years after independence we are still embroiled in dialogues of rotational presidency. And 22 years after our foray into democracy, we are still not sure where our next president should come from? We cannot continue in this musical chair. Certainly not.
Truth be told, things got to a head in the last 6 years of the emergence of the change government. With a knee on the neck of nation breathing has become a matter of life and death. Not only is the nation haemorrhagic, we are also suffering from economic dysphagia. Insecurity and its twin sibling, armed brigandage have taken a fearful toll on every part of the country. Citizens live by the grace of the Almighty God… unsure of their safety the next day.
The government of the day has tacitly entrenched undemocratic rules of engagement to accentuate its hold on power. Or how do we explain the audacity of non state actors nibbling away at our peace. They even occupy several ungoverned spaces in some local council areas of some states such as Niger State, a shouting distance away from the federal capital territory. The government has over the years devalued the sacredness of life. It has shown incapacity to tackle some of the major challenges of the country. But more worrisome is its deft in the art of obliquity while the nation is literally on fire. Who does that anyway?
The brazen display of arrogance by those in the corridors of power coupled with its disjunctive management of the economy, its insensivitivity to the call for restructuring of the country among other factors including its intolerance of dissenting views have without more fueled those questioning the morality of our co-habitation in brotherhood. It is this same lackadaisical attitude that gave occasion to the #End SARS last year. We are yet to recover from the trauma of that incident. Some families will have to live with it for a pretty long while.
How do we contextualise APC’s failure to keep faith with its campaign promises?
Distilled from its manifesto in 2015, here are just a handful of promises, the APC sold as a dommy to Nigerians. Those promises did not see the light of day. The promises include:
a) to implement efficient financial management strategies and to ensure true federalism,
but. ) restructure governance in such a way that kick starts our political economy so that we can begin to walk the path of our better future,
c) to create a federal system with more equitable distribution of national revenue to the states and local governments because this is where grassroots democracy and economic development must be established.
These faultless and unassailable promises, pleasant to the eyes on paper. That is where it ends—on paper. They have been set aside since 2015 when it demanded for our votes. Soon, the party will run its full course without as mentioned of these lofty promises because assembly they say, promises assure made to be broken.
And that I daresay is the cause for the continual agitation for individual self determination by aggrieved nationalities. This government has not shown enough leadership by addressing the salient issues of our brotherhood. It’s almost getting too late in the day to turn a new leaf. She can however, take us a notch higher and closer to el dorado if it so wish. Let us, bear in mind that history will only be kind to those with good records of their deeds while in power. Power is transient. Treat it with care before slips out of reach. A word is enough for the wise.
But come to think of it, are with still a family? This is my stand.
….Thomas Ebikabowei Peretu
A social commentator and political analyst wrote from Bayelsa
