Shortly after his election as president of Nigeria, Bola Tinubu announced that he had suspended payments on fuel subsidies. Once that announcement was made, cost of living in Nigeria reached Pluto and Mars and brought into stark reality, the predicament of the Parisian mob of 1789 – just like the Parisians who rioted and changed the course of European history because they could no longer afford bread, Nigerians too can no longer able to afford bread, soap, beans or even rice. Basic human kinetic functions have become a prerogative for only the extremely rich and the bourgeoisie. Things got so bad that many began to wish for the lean days of the lean Pharaoh himself, Muhammadu Buhari, whose epoch ushered Nigeria into the golden age of Nigeria as poverty capital of the world, that is, in spite of our phenomenal wealth.
Yet while the host of Nigerians suffered affliction, extreme want and hunger pro max, the legislative arm of government began to add salt to the injuries of our collective injuries with the announcement of ‘juicy’ salaries, emoluments and perks for members of the National Assembly. They did not stop at the salaries but went verily ahead to buy state-of-the-art cars for each member of the National Assembly at outrageously gargantuan costs. The sheer brazenness of it was unprecedented, far beyond what can be explained away – and explain it away they did, insisting that you know what, the reason the members of parliament needed to be very well fed, clothed like kings and princes and princesses and had to drive those expensive SUVs is just so that they can drive through those terrible Nigerian roads to be able to reach those unable to afford eggs, or afford transport to work and who have no regular power supply.
But by far the severest insult to the collective injury of Nigerians was the announcement that as much as N15billion had been allocated for the ‘renovation’ of the Abuja residence of the Vice President of Nigeria. This was in 2023. In June 2024, Nigeria allocated another N15billion for another ‘renovation’ of the Lagos lodge of the same Mr. Vice President. Posers emerged from these gargantuan allocations for the ‘renovations’ – one, either that the former occupant was an extremely dirty and wanton fellow (I assure you he wasn’t) or that somebody somewhere needed some cash to settle political debts, and therefore it was monies from the public purse that would defray that debt. Just like the ‘explanation’ regarding the SUVs-for-MPs, those who tried to explain away the senselessness and recklessness of allocating so much money for the comfort of individuals whilst the great many swam and drowned in an ocean of hunger and extreme deprivation said that the monies were for the ‘full digitalization of the entire State House and Lagos State offices and quarters.” A lot of Nigerians thought that this was a stupid idea, and therefore in November 2024 when young and old, North and South, East and West, Christian and Moslem rose in a 10-day of rage, it was to eloquently declare that in spite of the ratiocinations that were professed, the so-called full digitalization of the entire State House and Lagos State offices and quarters’, had done nothing to mitigate the extremity and the harshness of the fierce winds coming out of this Mephistophelian and existential epoch.
For all it is worth, these allocations basically exposed our political class and elite as a self-serving bunch of retards obsessed with their alimentary needs, the feathering of their nests and the aggrandizement of their egos. One would have thought that ‘renovation’ of public buildings to be occupied by public officials, at the onset of unpopular regimes would have been a good way to solve the endemic problems that pervade our communities – irregular power supply, high cost of living, failed roads, poor infrastructure and systemic failure of the institutions of governance. But no it is not – if it would, most of the individuals on the other side of the aisle who man some of the public institution from whence governance is executed would have constructed skyscrapers for themselves, allocated these humongous allowances to themselves, and ‘renovated’ offices that their predecessors once occupied. Take a look – within twenty-four hours of taking office as president, Donald Trump is probably sitting on the same chair that Biden sat, in that same Oval office, and at the same table that Biden wrote from, and has signed several executive orders, most of which will strike deadly blows at some of the systemic irregularities that have bedeviled the American society, and the world at large. In the coming days, the application of some of those executive orders will see millions of Nigerians, most of who ran away to escape the effects of the misplaced priorities of our so-called leaders being deported to Nigeria. In the coming days, President Trump will take decisions from that same Oval Office, from that same chair and table in the Oval Office, that will have far-reaching consequences and repercussions for Europe, the Americas, Africa and even for climate change. I saw a video of Vice President JD Vance who had not been to the Oval Office before being escorted there by President Trump. His immediate expression was a simple ‘wow’. We are sure that the Vice President would not be asking a President Trump, progenitor of the Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE, to build him an office as significant as the Oval Office just to aggrandize or massage his ego.
What makes matters in Nigeria extremely difficult to wrap hands around and understand is in the positions often adopted by many a Nigerian elite over the executive orders that President Trump has signed, and which will affect many Nigerians in the US. These elite will never take a stand against many of the misplaced priorities perpetrated by our own public officials – misplaced priorities that force our people to seek the good life elsewhere. Whether or not they benefit from these misplaced priorities does not concern them. As long as these Nigerian personages occupying these positions of public trust, and who abuse this trust are either family, religious and community members, the rest of Nigeria may well capsize. But they are quick to poke their fingers at, and run those puerile commentaries at people in other lands taking bold, strong and adamant decisions to secure their own borders, block leakages, and run an efficient government that will usher in the good life for their own people. If you call that kind of behavior a shame, I am verily inclined to agree with you 100%.
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Image: Pixabay.com
