Kashim Shettima sparked a social media storm with his oversized suit and sneakers at the Nigeria Bar Association annual conference in Lagos.
Some dude on Facebook alluded that Shettima didn’t have any idea of the NBA that invited him and so he decided to dress up to expectations, so that he would blend with whichever hall he might find himself in. Well…as it turned out to be, he wasn’t going for a meeting with Masai Ojiri and the rest of the D’Tigers squad playing basketball in the USA.
He found himself in a hall brimming with lawyers and the liars who have been taking this nation on a bumpy ride for two decades now. Nigerians might have had their laughs about the bogusly dressed former Borno State governor, but there are burning surface and underlying issues that are begging to be resolved, so that the country can return to work and yield benefits for every citizen.
But the political clowns are ready to put on more shows that would make the audience laugh out loud until the next election, where another clown would be voted in and the merry go continues. Six months after the election and no cabinet perhaps, the elected president would come and tell desperate and helpless needy citizens that he’s no magician and cannot tackle the ills plaguing the country alone. How Pathetic!
Nigeria needs a shot in the arm; it needs a shock therapy and whatever concoction any president can conjure to bring it back to bouncing social and economical life. Only an elected energetic and focused president can bring the country back from the brink. Judging from the line up of aspirants and how the main gladiators have based their plans at the NBA conference, it is plain to see it would not be an Uhuru come May 29, 2023.
The lies are still the same, according to Fela Anikulapo Kuti, “same old politicians wey spoil Nigeria before.” They have baggage of corruption and lies packed in their ‘bullion vans,’ yet they are the very ones we must now take a decision to choose from. What else is there to expect? Nothing but the same old song, same old politicking of tribe and religion, deception, incompetence, insane bribery and corruption. This is not a doomsday prophecy, but stark reality staring at everyone in the face.
It’s pleasing a good number of youths are clamouring for a change, but how many are ready to go the extra mile, move straight out of their facebook and twitter pages to make a change? Five out of ten Nigerians youths have no voters card, out of that five, three are tribal and religiously attached and this is what the politicians desire, they never want a unity of purpose amongst the Nigerian population, because if there was, these juggernauts would be out of business every four years they failed to perform.
Imagine how sharply divided the youths of the country were during the ‘ENDSARS’ protests. While those in the South and Middle belt were in the thick, those in the far Northern part of the country were in the fringe forming a counter protest, burning cars of protesters, stabbing and chasing DJ Switch and her likes into their holes. It was the same politicians who planted it into the minds of the gullible youths in the North telling them it is their brother the Southern ‘ínfedels’ want to overthrow. This is the sad setting of the Nigerian political landscape. There would never be any agreement, only arrangement by the ruling political class. Chop make I chop! It was why Bola Ahmed Tinubu confidently declared in Abeokuta, Ogun State: “Emi lo kan.” It is his turn indeed, in a country that has been so bruised and battered by his party.
For now Peter Obi is a popular choice amongst the youths and some of the elderly Nigerians. Most of them have been taken in by Obi’s promises of a better Nigeria. It’s just like in 2010 when former president Goodluck Jonathan came with his ‘school without shoes’ story. But 2023 is a different water to swim; there are two big fat fishes in the pond. From all reckoning, Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Atiku Abubakar have everything going for them and that thing is money. They are ready to spend and buy up every ‘Obidient Zombie’ if they offer themselves for sale. Tinubu and Atiku have both laughed off Obi’s chances, saying he does not have the structures to win the election. Rightly so and that is the pattern the election next year is going to take, unless there is an upward swing of the Obi movement.
Nigerians would be doing themselves a world of good, if they elect their own Macky Sall. The 60-years-old Senegalese president on his first tenure in 2012 carried out reforms that put his country back on track. He shut down one of the arms of the bi-camera national assembly, embarked on cost saving measures and modernisation of infrastructure, today, Senegal is stable and doing well. They have trains that do not stop in the middle of nowhere, there is constant power supply and investors are pouring in.
Meanwhile flight connections to Nigerian are getting drier and drier by the day. The local airlines themselves are running out of aviation fuel. Who wants to bring their money to a country, where doing business is like digging four miles into the belly of the earth to search for gold and coal. 2023 should be a turning point, Nigerians must look for a leader that will carry out reforms in every aspect of national life, before the country reaches a point of no return on its journey to the abyss.
