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Yar' Adua May Happen Again In
Nigeria!
By Ugochukwu
Ejinkeonye
Gradually,
President Yar’Adua’s health condition is becoming an
item for very debilitating blackmail. And it seems to be
working effectively!
Just wonder aloud
why the president of such a critically sick and sinking
country cannot allow himself to be roused from crippling
inertia to seek with clear vision, focus and vigour the
nation’s healing and revival, and the next accusation
that would be laid at your doorstep is: “Oh, there you
go again, making fun of the president because of his
ill-health.”
And so political
correctness now dictates that we all enlist in the
confused choir of incurably naïve optimists who seem to
derive peculiar animation from continually chorusing the
hope that a heavy truck trapped in the middle of a
collapsing bridge, because its driver was having a good,
refreshing nap, would not soon disappear into the deep
waters even though the bridge is already down and about
to be washed away.
I think this is sad
and most unfortunate.
Now, why would
somebody make fun of anyone because he or she is sick?
Can the person accurately predict what the state of his
or her own health would be tomorrow? I think what most
people are trying to say is that there are too many sick
persons in the country and Mr. Yar’Adua just happens to
be one of them. What we owe all of them are our sincere
sympathies, prayers, and help if we are in a position to
offer any. But there is definitely no justification for
turning anyone’s personal health challenges into a
national burden. In other words, Nigeria cannot continue
to just sit still, fold its hands and do nothing in the
face of threatening devastating global economic crises
on the unpardonable excuse that its president is sick—as
if there are no capable and healthy persons in the
country?
For goodness sake,
this state of inertia has gone on for too long. If the
president is not sick, let him wake up, think, roll out
his plans and work? And if he is, and unable to perform,
as seems to be the case, let him excuse himself from the
throne, instead of holding everyone else to ransom. I am
quite sure that not many people would object to Nigeria
undertaking to pay the president’s medical bills for
life, as compensation for the “invaluable sacrifice,” if
he decides today to let go and retire to the serenity of
his family house in Katsina.
But will the
leeches and parasites feeding fat on his incompetence
and the nation’s carcasses allow him to make up his
mind?
For a nation as
badly run as Nigeria is, where decisions and actions
that determine the direction and future of the country
are mostly inspired by acute selfishness, Yar’Adua would
never lack a formidable army of self-serving loyalists
hailing his special capacity to sleep through the worst
crises, as we are witnessing at the moment. It is not
impossible, too, that a President Umar Musa Yar’Adua may
reappear in Abuja in 2011. I think that should not shock
anyone who has been watching the course of events in the
nation’s political horizon for the past few months. This
is one nation where people are continually drinking and
eating poison with utmost relish, and yet wanting to
live; yes, a country where people continue to assure and
reassure themselves that no matter how long they keep
stabbing their nation and drinking its blood, they would
still wake up every other morning to see it standing on
its feet and flourishing.
Well, all these
acts of self-delusion would in no distant time be forced
to evaporate by the grim realities that would soon dawn
on this nation. For so long now, Nigeria has remained
the best example of how a richly endowed country could
look like in the absence of any of form of government.
People who found themselves at the seat of power merely
looted the treasury pale and retired at the expiration
of their tenures to enjoy their unearned wealth. So long
as there was still oil pumping out crispy dollars for
the next regime to loot and put away in coded accounts
abroad, no one complained; and no one was asked to give
account. Only those foolish enough to die, like Gen Sani
Abacha, were branded corrupt, and their loot diligently
looted.
And so, at a time
world leaders are spending sleepless nights with their
economic managers and experts, devising ways to save
their nations from the looming global economic calamity,
we, in this ungoverned entity called Nigeria are busy
debating about our president’s vacation, which, if we
must be sincere to ourselves, he has enjoyed with little
or no interruptions since May 29, 2007. I once heard
that the motto of an association of pensioners was:
“Rest Is Sweet After Labour.”
Pray, what has
Yar’Adua done since the two years he has encumbered the
ground in Abuja to warrant his disturbing the nation’s
peace with tiresome talk about vacation? Which
responsible and responsive president would allow himself
to be caught dropping the slightest hint about a
vacation at time oil prices, his country’s sole
revenue earner, was crashing from near $145 to about
$30? The earthquake in the nation’s stock market is an
economic tsunami that ought to have kept any president
alert and worried, but our own man could not just be
bothered. He would rather go on vacation, even as major
multi-national companies are closing shops in Nigeria,
and relocating to functional countries like Ghana,
causing countless Nigerians to be dumped in the
unemployment market. Mind you, Nigeria remains the
biggest market for these companies; they produce in
Ghana and sell in Nigeria. What an unlucky nation.
Despite Yar’Adua’s
repeated promise to declare a state of emergency in the
power sector, power supply has worsened beyond what
anyone would have imagined was possible in a nation
ruled by a human being. I doubt if there is any
community in Nigeria today where anyone can walk to a
public tap, fetch healthy water and confidently drink
it. Indeed, no one with the means to afford alternatives
in Ghana, Cameroon or any of our tiny neighbours, takes
the risk of enlisting his children in Nigerian schools
any more. I challenge Yar’Adua or any governor to prove
that his children are in Nigerian public
universities—where many public officials had attended.
Nigeria’s health institutions are only patronized by
those willing to take a risk with their lives, because
they are too poor to fly out for medical treatment; not
even the president of Nigeria receives treatment in
Nigerian hospitals.
But the worst is
yet on the way, in fact, very close to the door.
By the time the
devastating effect of President Barack Obama’s New
Energy Policy reaches home to us here in Nigeria, there
is no doubt that the price of oil may go down to 50
cents. At that time, there won’t even be enough public
funds to steal. Maybe, then, and only then, would
Nigerians be forced by very unbearable conditions to
seek authentic leaders, people with a mind and clear
ideas to move society forward, and not a horde of
bankrupt creatures occupying offices where they are not
even qualified to be cleansers. Today, we are
complaining about the rise of violent crime in Nigeria.
By that time, it would degenerate to almost an open war.
And until then,
some vacuous fellows can still afford the luxury of
campaigning for a Second or even Third for Yar’Adua, so
he could stay back to “continue the good work he is
doing.” What a nation!
Ugochukwu
Ejinkeonye writes a highly-regarded column (SCRUPLES)
for Nigeria's leading national newspaper, The
Independent (www.independentngonline.com)
every Wednesday. He is also on the Editorial Board of
the paper.
scruples2006@yahoo.com
/
www.ugochukwu.blog.com /
www.ugochukwu.wordpress.com
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News Update
An ailing
president and a country on edge—Last Friday, senior
aides to Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua dropped a
bombshell, announcing that he would be taking "a
two-week leave of absence." Rumors that he suffers from
a serious kidney ailment aren't new, and the news
quickly reignited fears for the president's health.
Whenever rumors
that a developing country head of state suffers from a
life-threatening illness begin to swirl, political
uncertainty (and political risk) rises. It's especially
worrisome when the country in question is one of the
world's ten largest oil producers. . . .
But it didn't take
long for Yar'Adua's ill health to make headlines. In
fact, it first came to national attention when he
collapsed during a campaign speech and was flown to
Germany for immediate medical attention. Yar'Adua
managed to keep rumors about his health at bay long
enough to win the election, but late last year he
traveled to Saudi Arabia and stayed longer than
originally announced. (Speculation centers on a deadly
vascular auto-immune disease called Churg-Strauss
syndrome.) Word today from his spokesman that the
president will remain inside the country throughout his
"vacation" and that his leave has "nothing to do with
his health" will do little to ease growing doubts about
his future.
Only Yar'Adua's
doctors know the true state of his health, but the
sudden announcement of his leave of absence will only
further fuel doubts about his ability to cope with
Nigeria's large (and growing) list of problems.
But here's the
larger risk: Were he to die in office or to become
incapacitated, Vice President Goodluck Jonathan, a
southerner and Christian, would succeed him. Nigeria's
northern Muslims won't quietly accept an abrupt
transition to another southern presidency, and early
elections would fuel tensions and the risk of
large-scale civil unrest.
Eurasia Foreign Policy
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Blacks in Hispanic Literature: Critical Essays
Edited by
Miriam DeCosta-Willis
Blacks in Hispanic Literature is a
collection of fourteen essays by scholars and
creative writers from Africa and the Americas.
Called one of two significant critical works on
Afro-Hispanic literature to appear in the late
1970s, it includes the pioneering studies of
Carter G. Woodson and
Valaurez B. Spratlin, published in the 1930s, as
well as the essays of scholars whose interpretations
were shaped by the Black aesthetic. The early
essays, primarily of the Black-as-subject in Spanish
medieval and Golden Age literature, provide an
historical context for understanding 20th-century
creative works by African-descended, Hispanophone
writers, such as Cuban
Nicolás Guillén and Ecuadorean poet, novelist,
and scholar
Adalberto Ortiz, whose essay analyzes the
significance of Negritude in Latin America. This
collaborative text set the tone for later
conferences in which writers and scholars worked
together to promote, disseminate, and critique the
literature of Spanish-speaking people of African
descent. . . .
Cited by a
literary critic in 2004 as "the seminal study in the
field of Afro-Hispanic Literature . . . on which
most scholars in the field 'cut their teeth'."
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Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in
America
By Melissa V.
Harris-Perry
According to the
author, this society has historically exerted
considerable pressure on black females to fit into one
of a handful of stereotypes, primarily, the Mammy, the
Matriarch or the Jezebel. The selfless
Mammy’s behavior is marked by a slavish devotion to
white folks’ domestic concerns, often at the expense of
those of her own family’s needs. By contrast, the
relatively-hedonistic Jezebel is a sexually-insatiable
temptress. And the Matriarch is generally thought of as
an emasculating figure who denigrates black men, ala the
characters Sapphire and Aunt Esther on the television
shows Amos and Andy and Sanford and Son, respectively.
Professor Perry
points out how the propagation of these harmful myths
have served the mainstream culture well. For instance,
the Mammy suggests that it is almost second nature for
black females to feel a maternal instinct towards
Caucasian babies. As for the source
of the Jezebel, black women had no control over their
own bodies during slavery given that they were being
auctioned off and bred to maximize profits. Nonetheless,
it was in the interest of plantation owners to propagate
the lie that sisters were sluts inclined to mate
indiscriminately.
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The White Masters of the
World
From
The World and Africa, 1965
By W. E. B. Du Bois
W. E. B. Du Bois’
Arraignment and Indictment of White Civilization
(Fletcher)
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Ancient African Nations
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If you like this page consider making a donation
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Negro Digest /
Black World
Browse all issues
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1965
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____ 2005
Enjoy!
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The Death of Emmett Till by Bob Dylan
/
The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll
/
Only a Pawn in Their Game
Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson Thanks America for
Slavery
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The Journal of Negro History issues at Project Gutenberg
The
Haitian Declaration of Independence 1804
/
January 1, 1804 -- The Founding of
Haiti
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posted 5 March 2009
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