Nigeria: Kill Corruption Before It Kills You! By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye
It has since become common knowledge which enjoys widespread
acceptance that any day Nigeria is able to make up its mind to end its
obscene and ruinous romance with the stubborn monster called
"Corruption", this country will automatically witness the kind of
prosperity no one had thought was possible in these parts. Just
imagine the amount of public funds reportedly(and un-reportedly) being
stolen and squandered daily under various guises by too many public
officers andtheir accomplices, and the great transformation that would
happen to public infrastructure and the lives of the citizenry if this
organized banditrycan at least be reduced by fifty percent!
Now, is this monster divorceable? Of course, yes. But are there any
signs that anyone in the corridors of power is genuinely interested in
ending the strong grip it maintains on the very soul of this country?
That is the problem. It is sheer foolishness to expect many of them to
willingly block the very hole from which great goodies also flow to
them just because some other persons are also benefiting from there.
No, you can neither fight corruption with soiled hands nor retain
monopoly of it! It spreads like cancer. And the whole thing appears
now to have been so horribly compounded by the emergence and
successful empowerment of a very formidable class whose sustenance and
longevitysolely depend on its ability to continue sustaining the
culture of corruption and bleeding the country pale.
This problem began when public office gradually ceased to be a
platform for rendering selfless serviceto the people and transformed
into the easiest route to financial empowerment. And since then,
several generations of public officers have passed through this route,
looting the nation blind with utmost impunity, and retiring into
incredible abundance, without any fear of anyone ever prying into the
clearly unearned wealth they flaunt with utmost abandon.
Thus, an ever-swelling cult of looters has emerged, whose nuisance
value has remained the undisputed headache of the nation. And since
it isbecoming increasingly difficult to findformer council chairmen,
governors (military or civilian), ministers, presidents (military of
civilian), army generals, police chiefs and several other categories
of public officers who are not sitting on boundless, mysterious
wealth, it has also become impossible to persuade mostof today's
rulers to resist the temptation to surpass the unedifying exploits of
their predecessors.
Indeed, wealth has become everything and hardly any public officer
cares again about leaving behind a sterling legacy and good name. And
so, virtually no Nigerian governor, for instance, would find it
ennobling to wake up every morning,after he had left office, to engage
in honest labour to earn a living. That would automatically demean
him, and present him as "inferior" to his colleagues; in fact, even
his people may begin to call him a big fool for returning from the
Government House a "poor man." And so the desperation to retire into
boundless wealth and comfort is the sole motivation for all the
mindless stealing going on everywhere.
Who now will break this circle? Can such a person be found today even
in the so-called anti-graft bodies set up to battle the monster to the
ground? That's one question we need to answer sincerely, because, it
is becoming increasingly difficult to findany person among those
ruling us today who is more interested in acquiring a good name than
accumulating unearned riches. Over the years, a cult of corruption has
emerged filled with the country's political and economic elite, and
the sole qualification for initiation into this cult is wealth,
boundless wealth, mostly stolen from the public treasury, and
ownership of a couple ofexquisite mansions in choice areas in Abuja,
Lagos, Port Harcourt, Kaduna, London, New York, Paris, Dublin, Dubai
and so on. I doubt if the point being made here should in the least
sound strange to anyone who has lived in Nigeria.
Now, was it not late Sunday Afolabi, who, while working for the
unmissed Olusegun Obasanjo regime, told us that those who were offered
political appointments had actually been invited "to come and eat." At
least, the man was sincere about his understanding of the whole thing.
Gradually going are the days when most people sought public offices
with edifying intentions. No, not any more! Today, many go there to
serve themselves and cart away unimaginable wealth. And they usually
end up losing the capacity to feel ashamed, so much so, that even when
they are called thieves to their faces by a disgusted populace, they
remain unperturbed.
How then can this monster be tamed?How can anyone make all corrupt
pastpublic officers to give up all they had stolen and live normal
lives with resources whose sources areexplainable, in order to make
those currently in office to resist the temptation to steal? Where
would any one possibly start? And who would lead such a campaign given
that even among the country's security officers, anti-corruption
operatives and judicial officers are many whose desperation to
accumulate unearned wealth even surpasses that of the corrupt public
officers they are hired to check? Whenwill Nigeria be made a
functional state so that people would not need to go to great lengths
to steal in order to provide for themselves the amenities and comforts
they had failed to put in place for the entire citizenry when they
were in power?
With this dreadful cult in effective command at virtually all our
public institutions, how then can we possibly hope to have free and
fair elections in this country? These have so much money and have
easily enthroned themselves as formidable godfathers and kingmakers
who deploy the billions at their disposals to install and remove
governments atwill. Many of them can single-handedly found and fund
political parties without the slightest impact on their bottomless
pockets. They also have all it takes to frustrate any attempt to pry
into their hideous pasts. The very negligible few among them who
manage to get "messed-up" in the "anti-corruption war" are those
foolish enough to find the trouble of those more powerful than they
are, or get into some really complicated situation that it would be
difficult to extricate them without a serious backlash that might
threaten the peace and stability of the entire cult. So, they are
carefully sacrificed to preserve the whole house, and used in the
process, too, to launder a dubious commitment to an "anti-graft"
campaign.
The cult also has many quiet and evenmore deadly members. These
includevery wise and successful fronts, errand boys (and girls), thugs
whom the 'ogas' use (or had used) to prosecute their hideous politics
and criminal accumulations, and, also, the countless mistresses,
concubines and state prostitutes who take care of the leisure moments
of these fellows. These, too, in the process of time, acquire their
own wealth and clout, and gradually rise in prominence to become
"successful business moguls"or "party stalwarts." Others get into
government service as Special Advisers, Commissioners, Ministers,
council chairpersons, State or Federal lawmakers, or even governors,
and automatically graduate into "patriots"and, later, "statesmen" (and
women). A nation, no doubt, is judged by the quality of persons
leading it.
Now, with such an unwholesome band of resilient leeches controlling
sensitive spots in our politics and economy, with many of them even
maintaining effective hotlines to the highest point of power, how can
anyone pretend to enthrone transparency in the governance of
thecountry? How can corruption be rooted out? How can progress be
recorded? Do the fellows ruling us even understand what it means to
build a country?
By the way, assuming there is anyone really interested in rooting out
corruption, where would such person even start from? The sheer number,
clout and destructive ability of members of this cult are simply too
intimidating. Some have over the years even progressed and matured to
become refined, patrician "elder statesmen" (and women) with vast
"family business" empires, commanding enormous respect, but still
subterraneanly doing enormous harm to the country. Yet the only day
jobs anyone could remember they ever did were serving in public
officeswith clearly stipulated salaries, which when put together could
not have created those giant towers of wealth. They are mostly
proceeds of crime!
But should we give up? No! Never! No society should ever sit passively
and watch the scum and scoundrels in its midst (no matter how
formidably empowered) seize its tomorrow and murder it. That country
is doomed which has shameless thieves as most of its kings. Ask
yourself today: What are the antecedents of your governor, lawmaker
or councilor? Can anyone possibly succeed in rebuilding the very house
he is busy carefully plundering? It amounts to unqualified foolishness
on the part of the majority to allow themselves to be perpetually
enslaved by an immorally smart minority? A time comes in the life of a
nation when thepeople must rise with one voice and bellow a big NO!
And that time is now!Especially, as 2015 approaches.
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scruples2006@yahoo.com
June 2013