Wednesday 27 June 2012

Opening Pandora’s Box


Fatima Akilu's picture
Things will never be the same. It is official: Pandora is out of the box and cannot be placed back in. She has now grown too big for her old home. In a clumsy attempt to generate more revenue for its insatiable coffers, the government has allowed its citizens to glimpse under its skirt and the vision is not pretty. The greatest entertainment is currently being provided free of charge courtesy of the government.
From our armchair we are beginning to decipher the many truths and lies behind what is now universally thought of as one of the country’s worst-timed and implemented policy. The weekly soap opera provided by the newly awakened House of Representatives has lain bare what people have suspected for a long time – namely that Nigeria in the hands of a few different citizens would have been the envy of the world.
Our consciousness as citizens has been pricked; we are now spending our days crunching numbers and wondering aloud how a country can allocate huge amounts of money with such carelessness. It is obvious that budgets are seldom tied to development plans, while it seems chief executives have an inordinate amount of power when it comes to allocating how funds should be directed. It is also becoming clearer that the needs of the citizens are not uppermost in the minds of our chief executives when it comes to deciding how our national cake is shared.
The government’s nakedness has not been a pretty sight. We now know that it is fat and bloated, disease-ridden and full of black scars. We have also seen that a lot of the pillars holding it up are too far gone and not fit for service. For years they have fed on the fat of the land, handed to them on a platter by the people whom they have treated with nothing but contempt. Now that we know that the emperor has no clothes, the psychological advantage they held over us is no more. We can look them in their naked eye and dare them. We know now that we have the power collectively to make them blink. 
We are at the point of separation – a parting of ways between the governing and the governed. Is divorce then the next step? They should be afraid, very afraid. All the key elements for a permanent separation are there: contempt, lack of trust, disrespect and deep-rooted anger. While it is true that the present administration inherited a lot of the problems that has brought us to this sorry state of affairs, it had an opportunity to reverse the trend. It did not but seemly carries on with the same decrepit template perfected by its predecessors.  We are beginning to scrutinise the 2012 Budget, a budget conceived before the separation. And now we understand that they had intended to go on with business as usual.
For the past few years, the government has done almost nothing for its people. All jobs, even minor contracts that have in the past provided succour to the people, they have unilaterally split up between senior members of the executive and the legislature .Majority of companies getting jobs in Nigeria now belong to them.  Never mind that half of these jobs are never completed yet their companies collect monies in full. At their hands we have become perpetual losers.
Left to fend for ourselves, we have devised all sorts of ways to survive. Many have become traders or shop owners due to the virtual impossibility of making a living through other means. Others are investing time and energy in the fastest growing industry we have currently – that of crime.
Development is about vision, humility and a pride and commitment to changing the lives of as many as is possible. It begins but is not confined to leadership. It is about solid values that place humanity above oneself. It is about national pride, the feeling that you want your country and its citizens to be and to have the best in the world. It is about a confidence and a belief that you can guide that process by doing the right thing at every stage. In this case it could have started with the national budget; it should have been a people’s budget, one that would have put the needs of a hundred and sixty million Nigerians above that of five or ten million Nigerians.
But it did not. It was consumed with paying itself, thus, the consumption of 75 per cent of its allocation to servicing pay roll. While I am not of the view that public officeholders should go without pay, I also hold that a government that is determined to do the right thing would have used a more creative approach to cut it many frivolous gluttonous expenses, not  budgeted only to serve itself but  channelled such funds to its neediest.
A government that cares would not allot its first priority to its personal comfort but would have first ensured that its people are taken care of first.
It is becoming clearer that money or the uneven allocation of resources is the root cause of our many different strands of terrorism. The Niger Delta boys were silent when they were paid, and the Boko Haram group has made claims that they had been paid monthly by some governors. They are simple agitated when this payment ceased.
Many of the unemployed had come to view this payment both in the Niger Delta and some northern states as social welfare. Without jobs and means to earn a living humans still have to survive. That’s why some countries provide social welfare to the unemployed.
What Nigerians need overwhelmingly is not to be paid to keep the peace but a means to earn a living. We want budgets to be primarily about job creation so that our children can live in hope and dignity. Without that there is no peace, and that is why the citizens are on the brink of divorce from their government.
As anyone who has travelled on this road knows, divorce is nasty. With its many victims and collateral damages some never recover and most will remain tainted. Nigerians are really not ready for a divorce but with Pandora firmly out of the box, the government must woo us all over again. They must begin to regain our trust, and it has to start with ensuring that the 2012 budget is a people’s budget reflective of our wishes.
Communication has broken down in this marriage because of years the government has ceased to listen to us. They must come back to the table with their mediators and begin to listen to us. The poisonous friends that have led government down this road must be shed. This is a time to reconcile. If handled carefully, this marriage will emerge stronger than ever.
God save our crumbling giant.

No comments:

Post a Comment