Dr Paul Amen-Aifuwa in his work titled, “The Nigerian Leadership Can Make It” reviewed by Humphrey Onyima in 2014, has this to say.
Excerpt:
As the state’s Craft of the Nigerian statehood entangles with her centenary landmark, mixed feelings are rife on the part of various schools of thoughts with the deep concerns and reminiscences which include arguments, that for over 50 years of post-independence, the nation had stuck in a precarious state due to her colonial circumstances; while others would contrarily and more discernibly put it cynically, bluntly that the nation is simply what and where she is democratically due to her own delinquent or diligent making of the fortune or misfortune of her Self-Rule: insisting that Mother-Land ought to have fared exceedingly better on the socio-economic and political clime.
Dr. Aifuwa’s progressivism is seen in his universalism of purpose based on the foregoing postulations as delineated inter-alia in the classic thesis on the CAUSE-EFFECT Socio-Political upheavals of the nation and the redeemability placebo, as it relates to the otherwise vouchable and worthy quality of the genealogy of the Leaderships from the onset, post-INDEPENDENCE: “This is as can be deductible from the freedom fighting and the liberation exploit of the nation’s founding fathers; save that along the line there were fortuitously intervening forces which smacks of some shock-waves in which the nation was not only caught unawares, but hit by a seeming social and political paranoia, resulting in disorientation on the psyche and temperament of the unsuspecting polity, ever since then things were never again the same!! This is to the extent that the nation perhaps unknowingly, drifted into such abysmal chaos; such that had been of tension- filled hazards in which any one could hardly be emotional well enough to think clearly, neither nurse hopes nor contemplate towards a better ‘tomorrow’- a deplorable scenario as of hostilities and violence to which the jolted polity had been exposed: with dire threats to life expectancy which is now at its lowest ebb, due to crisis–induced uncertainties which now contend even with the short span of nature’s mortality for the nation’s inhabitants!!!
From all that the above notions had cumulatively engendered, Dr. Aifuwa attributes the sordid character traits that are better branded as CORRUPTION to have derived from the said Socio-Political-Toxins as harvests of ALL that formed the background to the Civil War and the incidental Take-over of POWER by the Military of which pathology remained glossed-over and not quite ‘settled; such that had been the socio-political BAGGAGE, which contraband contents are ethnic differences and disunity, that had fostered the fiends of heightened self-aggrandizements, nepotism and parochial flirtations, to the detriment of the growth of demographic culture, being the mess in which the nation had wallowed all along; and that such grave impediments that constitute the nation’s ‘Rock- of-Ages’ that must CLEAR if only for its corrosive effect not to render the coveted TRANSFORMATIONAL ‘refoundationing’ as PILLARS on a QUICK SAND… for which it is of prime importance that the Government of the day would find QUALITY Time and Pace to examine the SITUATION with broadcast address and well-gazetted AFFIRMATIONS to allay all segregative phobias and reinforce the firmament of inclusive national belongingness amongst the populace of the nation’s various geo-political zones.
Dr. Aifuwa further buttresses . . .but let it not be glossed over that such ongoing debilitating moments of travails which had almost subjected the nation to a kind of sociological cross-road that compares vividly with the Scriptural references of the amoral ‘excesses’ of Sodom and Gomorrah, are in desperate demand for the righting of the wrongs that would be a matter with premium of exhaustively concerted and pragmatic ACTION: such that would, by the way, elicit exercises for a drastically revamped educational system that should include specially modulated syllabus on civic tuition in all strata of the school’s grades; and that the nation would brace up much more assiduously to get her acts together in a focus to Walk the Talk, and doggedly put the nation’s house in order unequivocally from the perspectives of the factors that exigently require a revisit to the Civil War antecedents, which necessitated the said ‘cliché’ as “Reconstruction, Reintegration and Rehabilitation” — of which laudable intendment and significance that should be introspectively re-examined; especially from the stance of the said “Reintegration”, which suggests a purposeful fine-tuning on functional Unity and Co-existential understanding amongst the breeds of the populace; this being the nozzles from which the socio-political turbulences actually triggered; and that this remotely Divisionism and Separatist orgy be targeted and RESOLVED for the benefits of its far-reaching effect on the tricky issues of ‘Subsistence’ and ‘Survival’ which is the spell that the notoriety of ethnicism had cruelly cast on the hapless citizens.
In other words, it is the fundamental question of ethnic cohesion that must as of priority be tackled from a Take-the-Bull-by-the-Horn range; as it has all along remained the un-healing ulcer within the genetics of the sociology of the populace — given the peculiarly sensitive and emotive human angle which form the confounding dilemma of the nation’s demography, as configured by the colonial order of 1914 Amalgamation; and this needs to be further stressed as being what becomes the undoing element of segregative and negative reflexes in mutual disaffection, and discriminatory tendencies especially within the ranks and files of the Political Class; such that robbed-off malevolently on the attitudinal temperament of the polity that soon assumed a stigma of mutative social defect with corruptible effect on the otherwise Spartan character of the Nation, out of which were the endangered tracks of issues that arose from the imbroglios of the antecedents of the said civil war; and the inability of the Political Class to have in whichever way risen to the occasion, to move the nation away from ever racing against the tide in quest of the panacea to the seeming mirage of the swelling National challenges, which require the determination of envisioned GOAL with the mustered political WILL to ascertain the right footing in the right direction which leads to a train of FORWARD-EVER…
This is needless to say that all of this would need intensified efforts and passions with a proven superseding maturity in Leadership. This is for the nation to be alive to the prospects of all that belie the by-gone stories foretold of Her as a potentially SUPER POWER nation, but steeped in avoidable jeopardy, as even now aggravated by subversive reactions of some lay-about members of the public who are now prowling in a free-for-all crime wave; just as some concerned irate civil society group now on the let-loose hankering for all manner of uprising and revolution; this being heightened by the mother-of-all-terror insurgency in unprecedented devastation that almost erased the Northern Region out of demographic and economic existence — this being a reality that is of an omen with a pall of implication that is gravely dicey as it reflects an aperture of perilous threat to the nation’s democracy: needless to say that critical situation beckons the quickest of constructive action from concerned Stakeholders, especially from the stable of the nation’s Leadership whose performance abilities are now on edge of a TRIAL.
On the conflagrating flame of insecurity in the country, Dr. Aifuwa retorts: “. . .that the seeming combative engagements of the Pro-Northern Stake-holderships against the Spirited Efforts of the Federal Government in the face of the recrudescence of the insurgents’ aggression, were as unfortunate as they are ironically uncalled for: that is, given if there’s not more to it than meets the eye; neither any intent for pussy-footing on the part of either party; and if political differences must be sunk in lieu of the looming offensives, it is to be found that options of far more result-oriented and tactfully logical attention and action abound: this is as it exigently calls for a pertinent and pertinacity of the exact response by every concerned interest; from the purview of what ought to be done initially, that should be considered aptly expedient even now, – this is in order of First-thing-First, that centres on due process with judicious dissection of the peculiarity of the very reasons and/or grievances of the warring Sect: that a first-hand spontaneous reaction be dispassionately established, from the stand point of the fraternity and aboriginal concerned Body of the Muslim Hierarchy, and the assemblage of the pantheon of the Northern Governor’s Stake-holderships, with the eminent personages of the Northern descents, along with the ex-Heads of State, together with the Royal Fathers including the Emirs and Pre-eminent Sultan — all together of whom with such majestic patriarchate to say “No” !“That the out-break of the terror incident is abominable to our Founding Fathers, and to our Motherland, and even as it is a profanity and anathema to the peaceful Brotherhood of Islamic Faith, and our collective humanity under Allah”!
Dr. Aifuwa calls on the eminent Islamic Doyens and worthy Northern paternity to deploy suasion and enlightening didactics towards their re-orientation in fairness and firmness; to ‘spare not the rod and spoil the child’, to enlist their remorse towards voluntary surrender of the unprovoked hostilities… “This is also not only for the hostility of the insurgency war to be won preferably with ease, and at its cost-effective ratio, but for the preservation of the ultimate peace that is the ensuing desire… Just yet as such victory would have evinced a profound breakthrough in a somewhat Litmus Test for the nation’s leadership generally; such that would usher in opportune moment not only for hopes in the said nation’s leadership to rise to the delight of the citizens, but would attract far-reaching and gratifying nods by the international community to be resilient in the confidence that Nigeria, after-all has what it takes in latent Leadership Preserve to be so entrusted with the leadership chair, not only just of the Continental Negroid Race, but as a formidable self-esteemed leadership that can be reckoned with at the strata of the larger World that is now a global village.
This fascinating reformist individual, postulated that “. . .for the imbalances in the political ‘covenant’ between the nation’s leaders and the citizens to be streamlined, with priority for conciliatory and remedial normalization: for the vista of the two interests to be seen to ally in agreeing to agree as hitherto illustrated: like the saying that two hands can only be clean when the Right and the Left do the washing together; just as the scriptural admonition which says: “when two or three are gathered…, shall their request be granted.” This sanctified socio-political understanding between the citizenry and the leaderships that long eluded the nation, must be the providential era to dawn for the nation to be due to be recipient of the long sought breakthroughs in facilitated socio-political cum economic progress … only at the threshold of the obedience to a national mutual empathy and accommodativeness of the leaders and the rest of the people!
Furthermore, to paraphrase, late Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu in a re-affirmation of his long held belief, that Nigeria needs unity; he defined a nation as “…a people who can together choose a leader; no Nigerian leader can emerge until Nigeria comes into true existence; until we are prepared to modify, and sometimes to abandon our primordial attachments in favour of a new Nigerian relationship; we cannot achieve unity without abandoning our fear of unity; we cannot achieve our manifest destiny without achieving unity; without unity of purpose nothing in Nigeria can function with the requisite efficiency.
It is at this juncture again, that the order of the protocol of nature takes precedence: as regards what needs to be done as its borders on the imperatives of the ‘first-thing-first’: as a seeming preamble that precedes the conjuring of an answer being sought against the circuitous challenges that confront a nation like Nigeria: for which is the desperate want that something should ‘give-in’ exigently and exclusively on the part of the leaderships, to serve as a culturing and psychological balm and/or olive-branch in preparatory towards the redress of the dismal trends that had rightly or wrongly but allegedly so attributable to the excepted errors and omissions of the said Leaderships, which had formed the vicarious grounds of disgruntlements amongst the populace; from which are the ensuing uproars with manifest upsurge of anarchical and multi-faceted anti-social vices!! Indeed this is for there to be a remarkable gesture of what-to-give as a token of good- turn by the leaderships to the People from whom to expect much and also to deserve another.
Dr Aifuwa then breathed down heavily, incisively in unprecedented submission for URGENT need for an immediate All-Embracing-Social-Welfare PLAN be put in place; and that this initiative be funded at the voluntary instance of the Hierarchy of the said pedigree of the Nation’s Political Leaderships — that is, of all the collective lineages of the Nation’s Leaderships from inception as dignitaries that include: the Heads of Governments and Presidents, Cabinet Members, the Parliaments and other Doyens of Political Office holders, who would for proof of Statesmanship and love of Country, be sufficiently and patriotically provoked at saving the Fatherland; and that they magnanimously eat-the-apple-pie, to flag-off the funding of this Welfare PACKAGE-such as to serve the basic stipend needs for categories of nation’s needy and extremely down-trodden: the under privileged: the disadvantaged and the unemployed — all from which are relative sources and of the hatchery of the epidemics of the afflictions and metastasis of social ills against the nation.
He further opinionated uncannily and with exhaustive didactics,…that aside natural calamities, it’s to be acknowledged that the trails of endangerments and pyramids of social ‘impasse’ with hardships, brutality and most dead-end difficulties of life, that subjected human populace to endangered species, are all conspiracies of the evil machinations of the mind of man; and that it behooves the world to now consider the ‘Audacity of Necessity’ to legislate against amoral tendencies and aberrant attitudinal behaviourism – a cause not only to be immediately embraced by the Nation’s Legislative Houses, but be Championed by Nigeria for adoption by the rest of the world!
Dr. Aifuwa advertently x-rayed the current prevailing socio-political atmosphere and captured the entire Nigerian scenario clearly and cleverly epitomized in the manner a Patriot, Historian, Counsellor, Evangelist, Humanist, Teacher, Writer and even a Seer would do.
Dr. Aifuwa’s perspective of the “The Nigerian Leadership Can Make” as reviewed by Humphrey Onyima is a long awaited remedial dossier to the nation’s vicissitudes and beleaguered socio-political and economic vertebrate; as it is a master key and a denouement of a cause at eliminating man-made conflicts and afflictions of man. This piece of work is therefore, a must-read not only by every Nigerian but by Governments of all Nations and indeed every member of the Human Family.
This article was first published in 2014 among the collections in the book titled: Stewardship written by Humphrey Onyima.
