Daily Independent (Lagos)
Tiko Emmanuel Okoye
3 December 2008
opinion
Believe it or not, the jaw-breaking 29-letter mouthful - floccinaucinihilipilification - is for real! Touted as the second longest word in the English language, it literally means the estimation of something as having no practical value or usefulness. I remembered the word as I mulled over the paradox of a nation like Nigeria being so poor in the midst of plenty. Comprising mainly the G-8 and emerging economies like China, India and Brazil, the G-20 was recently established to grapple with the global financial crisis. South Africa made the cut from Africa but Nigeria didn't, making several government functionaries to cry blue murder and start insisting that Nigeria deserves an automatic slot.
In the 80s, Smith Barney, a U.S. investment bank, had an award-winning television ad that simply stated: "At Smith Barney, we make money the old fashioned way - we earn it!" China's astronomical economic growth (with $2trillion in foreign reserves!) earned it due recognition as an economic powerhouse; same (to a lesser degree) for Brazil, India and the Asian tigers. But it would appear that the power elite in Nigeria believe that respect is given on demand. Nigeria desires to become a member of the Top-20 league (a.k.a. Vision 2020) not by the old fashioned way of earning it but by wishful thinking on the part of its spineless and lethargic political leadership.
Just the other day, Senate President David Mark (Nigeria's No. 3 Citizen) candidly admitted that the Federal Government lacks the will to end gas flaring by multinational oil companies. The same day his remarks were widely circulated, newspapers also displayed photographs of a grand reception in Abuja for Mark Ward, the new MD of ExxonMobil Nigeria, and his predecessor by - wait for this one - Foreign Affairs minister Chief Ojo Maduekwe! Still wondering what David Mark was talking about? Leadership floccinaucinihilipilification!
Ever wondered why Indian Home Minister Shivraj Patil and National Security Adviser MK Narayan promptly submitted their letters of resignation in the wake of the Mumbai (Bombay) terror attacks that have so far killed over 170 people when their counterparts in Nigeria are glorified as "good party men" despite the Jos riots that have reportedly claimed over 400 lives? Now, if a mere council poll can cause such mayhem is the government serious about avoiding a conflagration in 2011 by stopping the manipulation of the electoral process by 'do-or-die' political parties and their garrison commanders? Are you troubled that Vice President Goodluck Jonathan declared ex-cathedra that "contrary to insinuations (of which the principal peddler is his own boss who confessed that the process that produced his 'victory' was flawed and promptly established an elections reforms panel), INEC succeeded by recording a grade A in its performance in the 2007 polls"? There's only one answer to these questions: leadership floccinaucinihilipilification!
As at the end of last month the nuts and bolts of the 2008 federal budget were still being tinkered with! Next thing you know, this administration will start pointing at hefty unspent votes returned to the national treasury at year-end as proof of its 'stellar' performance whereas every aspect of our national life is crying for redemption! And have you been following the comical circus show in the senate called ministerial screening? These senators are rubbishing the sanctity of the constitution on the puny altar of a bow-and-go tradition. Why can't they realize that President Yar'Adua's dismissal of nearly half of his cabinet for non-performance within twelve months is a telling indictment of the screening process? Well, these are all symptoms of leadership floccinaucinihilipilification!
What about the pernicious fund raiser recently held by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)? The 'owners' of PDP concluded that it was high time they constructed a befitting N10billion national secretariat in Abuja. Now, shouldn't the PDP - as the ruling party that produced the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria - be more interested in giving Nigerians a befitting and eye-popping economy in the first place? The fund raiser is bound to make us a laughing stock in the eyes of the world as a very unserious nation. Just the other day, the United Nations Industrial Development Organization's (UNIDO) country representative in Nigeria, Masayoshi Matsushita, disclosed that Nigeria's industrial base has been eroding over the years, from a measly 8.4% in 1980 to an even more measly 4.6% in 2005 (2008 data would definitely be far worse). How can a ruling political party in a nation with a huge infrastructure deficit, a degenerate real sector, pervasive poverty and record-high infant and maternal mortality rates luxuriate in such a highly profligate act if not for leadership floccinaucinihilipilification?
To ensure the fund raiser's success, Wadata Plaza (PDP national headquarters) handed down marching orders to its state governors to 'donate' N50million each to the 'worthy' cause. It didn't matter that some of the affected states could do a lot with that kind of money. For instance, in a place like Oyo state where civil servants engaged Gov. Bayo Alao-Akala in a long drawn-out battle over an increased minimum wage, that princely sum could have paid the new wage of nearly 500 public servants for a whole year! And amid loud protestations, the PDP chairman 'reassured' Nigerians that the governors have been told not to dip their fingers in public tills but to source the money from their 'friends' and business associates. Besides the 'small' matter that a reward scheme is likely to be instituted to recognize governors having friends with the most-generously-deep pockets, the PDP hasn't addressed two salient issues: how much the federal government, with a near-monopoly control over economic largesse, is expected to raise through political jobbers, influence peddlers and contract seekers as well as the propriety of allowing foreign-owned businesses in Nigeria to corrupt the political process through illegal financial donations.
Ever considered why a court in Thailand recently dissolved the nation's top three ruling parties for electoral fraud and temporarily banned the prime minister from politics while in Nigeria it is "carry-go" and "business-as-usual" despite the monumental frauds that pass for elections and why INEC keeps insisting that although the PDP fund raiser represents a serious breach of the Electoral Act it lacks the constitutional powers to sanction the ruling party? And why hasn't our servant-leader and crusader of rule of law and due process - President Yar'Adua - ordered an outright refund of all the monies so far collected? You guessed right -leadership floccinaucinihilipilification!
Dumb Ass Award
This week's award goes to Nuhu Ribadu. What a great irony that the former EFCC chairman - the loquacious point man ex-president Obasanjo employed to subvert the 1999 Constitution in the guise of fighting corruption (exhibiting open disdain for court judgments in the process) - is today running from pillar to post in a bid to get the same courts he disrespected to stop him from being given a dose of his own bitter medicine. I don't believe in kicking a man when he is down but there's some poetic justice in the travails that have befallen Ribadu since he fell out of grace. What goes around surely comes around but will today's wielders of that ultimate aphrodisiac known as power realize that it is only transient? I don't think so.
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