WAS FELA ANIKULAPO KUTI A PROPHET?

Jon Chikadibie Okafo.

I enjoy listening to the lyrics of the late Fela. No day would pass without my playing one of his songs. Incidentally, this piece is not to showcase my choice of music, rather it is to tell my fellow countrymen and women that the music of the legendry Fela has failed to become irrelevant as per happenings in Nigeria, our dear country.

Fela sang about army arrangement decades ago and we thought he was just singing for the sake of singing, or maybe to spite the military that visited sorrow, tears and blood on him. Obasanjo and his co travellers have been playing a silly game of hide-and-seek with our country. Handing over power to their choices of candidates, irrespective of what we, the people wanted. Just recently, Mr. Obasanjo out of his own arrogance decreed to foist Mr. Yar’dua on all of us-other candidates that declared interests to contest for the highest political post in Nigeria were frightened into oblivion. Obasanjo’s reason was that Mr. Yar’dua was the best candidate to lead Nigeria to the magical Eldorado. And I ask, since when did Nigeria belong to Obasanjo for him to be deciding who leads us? How could we allow a man that failed to manage his farm to lead us as a nation for 8years? And what did we the people do? Nothing! We are all afraid to stand up to the charlatans that ruin our lives. The actions of people like Obasanjo and co affects every one of us negatively, to say the least. Why must the Nigerian state keep recycling old, tired and failed politicians? A cursory look at the men and women that have strode the corridors of power since the First republic would reveal that it is the same group that has remained there till today! This is a case of parents handing over to their children. Are Nigerians really docile and free from care? Why can’t we stand up to these rogues and send them packing?

Talking of our leaders, let us take a look at the happenings in the National Assembly. The National Assembly represents the rot that is Nigeria; this is a case of pure evil, a monumental representation of the callousness of our “leaders”. As Fela sang, you people dey fat with big money and the rest dey hungry. The legislative arm of the Nigerian government represents a case of pure goatdom! [apologies to Prof. Okey Ndibe]. The greatest moral failing of the present crop of Nigerian leaders has its abode in the National Assembly. This is the place where supposedly peoples’ representatives feed fat on our commonwealth, oblivion to the pervading misery and hunger in Nigeria! A National Assembly filled with men and women afflicted with the worst cases of avarice, selfishness and a stupendous level of moral evil. You think I am exaggerating? Well, recently teachers in Nigeria downed their tools in protest over their poor remuneration-they were demanding for N20,000 as basic salary. The “peoples’ representatives” in Abuja rejected this-the amount was too much for teachers they reasoned! It is this same Lawmakers that pocket obscene amount of money daily for doing next to nothing! The recent car purchase scandal in the House of Representatives is a good example of the psyche of those honourable members.  We all know how most of the men and women in the National Assembly found their ways into the place [most of them would remain eternally grateful to a shameless man named Maurice Iwu]. I am so saddened at what is happening in Nigeria, my heart bleeds at what our fellow country men and women in authority are doing to their fellow citizens. What is the problem with Nigeria?

We need to appreciate the magnitude of the evil that is plaguing Nigeria. The so-called leaders in Nigeria [most of them] represent man-made evil. Why are our roads so horrible? Why can’t we have regular power supply in Nigeria? Why can’t Mr. Yar’adua receive medical care in Nigeria? Why should Nigeria have a police force that arrests goats instead of bank robbers? Why should we have graduates roaming the streets jobless? Why should the youths of the Niger Delta and elsewhere be kidnappers instead of being engaged in good jobs? Why then do we have a government in place in Nigeria if it fails woefully in addressing our collective problems as a free people? Why should Mr. Yar’adua appoint Mr. Tony Anenih as the board chairman of the Nigeria Ports Authority? This Anenih character was the federal minister for works that failed in patching up old roads not to talk of constructing new ones! The roads were so bad that the man was flying from Lagos to his Benin City home! A man whose only credibility lies in fixing dodgy happenings in the PDP! Should we continue being passive while party members carve up our collective wealth? And we were told that president Yar’dua is a morally upright fellow? Is there anybody out there who still deceives himself that Yar’adua is any different from the rest of the PDP wolves? When are we the people going to have the guts to stand up to the people that mismanage our commonwealth? We need to wake up from this self-induced indolence and start holding these charlatans responsible for their every action! Fellow citizens, stop wasting your strength on prayers, this is our fight and we can win it! Nigeria belongs to all of us, not just to the Obasanjos, Yar’duas, Anenihs, Atikus, Babagindas, etc! This is our country and nobody can deny us that right. Let us stop living in fear in our own country. Americans fought for their freedom. The British in spite their conservatism as a people are known to be quick in demanding that whoever pillage their commonwealth be made to face the law. Today, we run from our country to go and live in the US, UK where people have died for freedom. Obasanjo advised Nigerians to pray to God for regular power supply, and we all kept quiet! Has this old man no shame? If Nigeria was a country where the rule of the law is thriving, Mr. Obasanjo would have been sent back to Yola prison to die! A man that wasted our wealth while lining his own pockets!

Finally, I hope that those that misrule Nigeria would have a change of heart. May it come to their conscience that it is a moral evil to steal government money. Nigeria has all it takes to be a developed nation, but we need to realize that we must first rid our country of the politicians whose sole intent is to rob us all blind! We need to make sure that those that mismanage our wealth be made to pay. We need to make sure we do not have as presidents those that prefer foreign hospitals to local ones! We need to checkmate the antics of the thieves in the National Assembly who sit in a round table to decide how much they are paid from our commonwealth! Please, let us stop suffering and smiling………

Jon Chikadibie Okafo lives in London [johnteddyus@yahoo.com].