By Banire Abiodun
Saturday, 07 September 2013.
Dear Fela
As you mark the 16th anniversary of your transition and
communion with your pan-African forebears, it is not my desire to taint
celebration with the woes of an incorrigibly sick nation, but I feel obligated
to do so considering the inimitable doggedness and sacrifices you made for this
country. I chose the occasion to write to you as you complete the 16th corpus
of the Ifa system, a condition for your coronation as “chief priest” of the
great beyond.
As this occasion has the likes of Martin Luther King,
Malcolm “X”, Thomas Sankara, Ben Bella, Seko Toure, Patrice Lumumba and Kwame
Nkrumah (who obviously will chair the event) in attendance with cups filled
with wine, I hope you wait and ponder before joining in the revelry.
Today, Martin Luther King’s America is a model and cynosure
of human liberty, as even a black man is president, which more than fulfils his
“I Have A Dream” project. Even Malcolm “X” must be smiling now as blacks in
America no longer need legislations to live freely; so the “bullet” is no
longer relevant as the “ballot” is potent enough to effect desired changes in
America.
Kwame Nkrumah’s Ghana is now the paragon of progress in West
Africa, and the streets of Lagos no longer stream with Ghanaian “shoe makers”
(a “profession” which was the exclusive preserve of Ghanaians in Lagos
throughout the 1980s and 1990s). They have all returned home; not because of
the “Ghana must go” policy of the Nigerian government, but because the survival
of small and medium scale business is guaranteed with stable electricity supply
and workable economic policies in Ghana. I think the Ghanaian government even
instituted a “Nigeria must go” policy some time ago. Oh, you think I am lying?
Ask Chinua Achebe who just left us (if his pan-Igbo sentiments as expressed in There
Was A Country will allow him attend your coronation).
You remember South Africa? That pitiful apartheid-ravaged
country which formed the focus of your “Beasts of No Nation” is now the giant
of Africa. The country is trying hard to forget the horrors of apartheid, and
even Nelson Mandela is reluctant to join you on the other side because his 27
years tenancy at Robben Island is translating to rapid development in his
lifetime.
You must be wondering what is happening in Nigeria
especially with the military rascality and brigandage that reached a choking
crescendo when you left. Well, the soldiers have returned to the barracks and
Nigeria now practices democracy. But before you ask for 30 virgins and 15
parcels of hemp to celebrate the return to democracy, let me quickly add that
only the jersey has changed, the players and tactics remain essentially the
same.
I know the mention of Olusegun Obasanjo’s name is nauseating
enough to make you throw up but the man came back from Kano Prison (where he
was residing when you left) to rule for 8 years. Well I know you are too
familiar with the man, so I should just say he did the familiar things. Yes,
there was unbridled looting at all levels. Victimization of perceived critics?
Ha Ha Ha, I remember he did that to you on February 18, 1978. Well, that is his
“regular trademark” as you sang in one of your albums and he actually removed
some heady governors. Chuba Okadigbo is over there; ask him how he lost his
presidential seat at the Senate. But please don’t call Baba Iyabo a “yeye man”;
he is an Owu chief now. He is also born again, and goes on many UN and AU
missions as elder statesmen.
Your other foe, MKO Abiola (I wonder how many times you have
exchanged blows with him over there), is now the hero of Nigerian democracy.
You remember his election was annulled by his “padi” for reasons best known to
the two of them. Well, he now has a statue in Lagos, a polytechnic and a
stadium now bear his name in Ogun, and the current Emperor tried, although
unsuccessfully, to name the Lagos University after him. That is how forgetful
we are, and now I understand why you took the “look and laugh” posture in your
final moments. It is, no doubts, incurable amnesia that makes us forget that
the politics of the Awolowos which was ideology and development-driven as
represented by free education and agricultural legacies was substituted with
politics of bags of rice, salt, Ankara fabrics by the likes of Abiola. Today, you
can hardly convince a Nigerian to vote or support a cause without “greasing his
palm” with Naira votes. That is why the likes of Gani (I hope he has finally
calmed down over there) and Femi Falana will never win elections in Nigeria;
they won’t grease palms. Today, the same Abiola you christened “Abi-Ole” at one
of your Yabbis sessions is the hero of democracy, and every politician clings
to June 12 mantra; they must survive, and everybody knows the “Awoist” slogan
no longer works.
By the way, please when next you see Ken Saro-Wiwa
disturbing the peace of Hades with the cry of marginalization of his people,
tell him to stop living in the past as his kinsman is now the Emperor. Tell Ken
his kinsmen are fully in charge and the “blood vessels” that sustain the
Nigerian nation have been entrusted in the care of goons from the creeks. Even
superannuated war horses (did you ask if Clark is one of them?) have been
brought back to prominence. In fact every Tom, Dick and Harry from Niger Delta
today is a major stakeholder in the Nigerian project whose view must be
seriously considered. This is why a common ragamuffin belched from the bowels
of the creeks could muster enough temerity to declare that the only condition
for Nigeria’s continued existence beyond 2015 is for the Niger Delta-born
Emperor to be returned to office. Don’t ask whether the Emperor is performing
well or not; performance is not a condition for re-election or election in
Nigeria’s democracy. The caucus or cabal you belong is the sole determiner, and
Igomigodo (am not sure you met this grammar machine before you left us) got it
right by dubbing Nigeria’s democracy “cabalocracy”.
Nigeria has slumped into the "slough of
despondency." Nothing has changed except the degree of the disillusionment
that envelops us, and I am more than convinced that George Orwell had Nigeria
in mind when he asserts in Animal Farm that “Things do remain the same; never
much better, never much worse - hunger, hardship and disappointment do remain
the unalterable laws of life” in Nigeria.
Electricity, water, food, house are still in the realm of
imagination and hope (where you left them); unemployment is still employing
Nigerians in millions (about 70% now); basic health care system remains elusive
(am sure Gani must have told you how the poorly-trained, poorly-paid Nigerian
physicians diagnosed and (mis)treated him for wrong ailment in the
poorly-maintained public hospital. Our roads continue to railroad people to
your end of the divide and our aircrafts have been re-christened “flying
coffins”.
Authority stealing has never been this prominent, as Niyi
Osundare aptly asserts that corruption has become “the Grand Commander of the
Federal Republic.” In fact, the culture of stealing with impunity has been
institutionalized - where an official who uses his position to loot is rewarded
with chieftaincy titles and even “compensated” with rehabilitation contracts
and presidential pardon like “thieving Tafa” and “Chameleonic Alams”.
I listened to your track “Authority Stealing” and shuddered
when I got to the part where you maintain that the big thief in Nigeria is
allowed to go home, while the small thief who probably stole to escape the pang
of hunger is condemned to jail. I wonder if you composed that song for those
days or for these days, because it aptly describes the reality of today where a
man who stole a governor’s phone has been sentenced to 45 years in prison,
while an official who stole over 5 billion naira police pension fund has been
asked to “pay tax” (which the fine represents) and then go home to enjoy his
loot.
Before you start “yabbing” us for not recognizing the simple
reality that the phone thief’s crime is against just one man (the governor),
while the pension thief’s is against the nation, humanity and all the families
of the affected retired policemen (did you say it is their punishment for
harassing the masses while in active service?), let me quickly tell you about
the “crazy demonstration” that we experienced recently.
Thirty-five Nigerian governors gathered to elect a chairman
for their forum. Two governors contested the seat; one had 19 votes while the
other polled 16, but in a fetid and rancid show of shame; show of complete
disregard for the collective moral and mathematical sensibility of Nigerians,
many of them (governors who participated in the same election) posed with the
loser with 16 votes for obscene photographs in celebration of his victory over
democracy, mathematics, common sense and Nigerians. And as if that was not
sacrilegious, the Emperor, while hosting the Liberian leader, Ellen Johnson
Sirleaf, recognized the loser as chairman of the governors’ association in what
seemed like a world press conference to announce Nigeria’s new mathematical
rules.
Five “Horrorable” members of the Rivers parliament (believed
to be the Emperor’s myrmidons) have even taken the new mathematical theory to
greater heights by impeaching the Speaker and suspending 15 of their
colleagues. Don’t “pardon" me abeg, you heard me right; 5 members out of a
32-member House did the show. How it was resolved? Well, the matter na
stalemate oooo, as we are still asking ourselves if 5 is indeed greater than
27.
No! No, Fela, it is bigger than my mouth to tell the
ever-smiling Emperor to go back to school to learn arithmetic. You are “the
fearless Abami-Eda,” tell him yourself, but please beware of “Abatic Bomb” and
“Okupean Missile” who are more lethal and more biting than the mosquitoes at
Gusau and Alagbon prisons.
You must be wondering what the likes of Wole Soyinka, Femi
Falana, Tunji Braithwaite etc are doing in the face of this travesty of common
sense that percolates the entire fabric of the Nigerian state. Well, dem kuku
dey talk, but the Emperor does not give a damn. How many times has Soyinka and
Falana been jailed? Hahaha… you are truly living in the past, Baba. The Emperor
does not want to overstretch the already congested prisons with such
“sophisticated ignoramuses.” Where I got that phrase from? Hahaha. No, no, not
from Igomigodo, it is one of the many darts of Abatic Bomb. Of course, Kongi in
his sarcastic manner welcomed the dart as a prize for reminding the Emperor
that granting amnesty to a wanted criminal who disguised as a woman to escape
trial in London does not portray Nigeria as serious about stamping out corruption.
Today, you do not “Yab” or picket the Emperor’s too many
follies and wait for the black maria to arrive; you only need to fuel your “I
pass my neighbor generator” and switch on the television to see the Kata-Kata
you have brought upon yourself with the avalanche of darts you are sure to
receive from Abatic Bomb and Okupean Missile. The Emperor cares so much about
his image; he abhors snags, and that is why he has recruited two firebrand
“Doctors” to doctor our thinking and perception of the “Oga at the top,” and
deal ruthlessly with busybodies who won’t stop “distracting and overheating”
the polity with their oversabi.
Abatic was on our side; the masses' side, but you know that
is not the lucrative side for a deft businessman. Some say the Emperor’s offer
was too irresistible, but we should also know that the conscience of a true
populist does not have a price tag. Okupean Missile is on a familiar track; a
hatchet man par excellence. Their combination provides the Emperor with a
fortress built on lies and deceptions. They are unsparing, and the ferocity
with which they attack shames Hitler’s Blitzkrieg.
Nigeria today is like a rudderless ship trapped in a
whirlwind at sea. Our captains continue to perform circus shows in the name of
salvaging the ship; the senior captain, surrounded by his menacing lapdogs,
looks and acts clueless, yet scorns at every voice that seeks to correct. The
passengers have been mummified and converted to inmates who must contrive some
smiles to endure suffering – “Suffering and Smiling.”
While our "Ogas at the top" continue to fritter
our commonwealth on frivolities, we give our battle to the lord; so we shall
continue to throng Lagos-Ibadan expressway and Idi Iroko-Ota road every Sunday
to entreat God, and we shall continue to pay out tithes so that our pastors can
fly our prayers to heaven in private jets. We are optimistic that our miracle
is on the way whether you believe it or not.
The coronation party must have gathered momentum now, and it
is not nice for the guests to see you, the celebrant, in a pensive mood. The
Lagos state government has built a museum in your memory to preserve your
legacies – at least that’s good news. But as you assume mantle as the
"diviner" of Hades, please make it your first duty to entreat the oracle
on our behalf, as we have spent eternity entreating Western gods to no avail.
Banire Abiodun is a Fulbright Scholar at New
York University and can be reached atsabanire@yahoo.com