Buharification of Nigeria – Part 2

Every four years, we appear to be blessed (?) since 1999, with new sets of recycled, rebranded, reprocessed, reconditioned, refurbished and unrehabilitated leaders. To remain as dealer-leaders, some have crossed from the debauched side of the political carpet to the degenerate side of licentious iniquity. Parading themselves as servant-leaders, they steal like the ordinary house helps, only on a grander scale. Like quack surgeons, they operate mercilessly and wickedly on our national treasure, draining the blood out of our natural resources; trampling on our rights, impoverishing us, and turning our mangrove and rain forests into the wasted, dry and sandy desert of underdevelopment. Across the thirty-six states and FCT, the political leader is to be found, as the recurring decimal of twenty-two divided by seven. He starts his journey of exploitation from the state house of assembly, where he serves ignominiously, and moves progressively to the lower and upper houses of leeches and fleas. The level of our gullibility, as citizen electorates, surprises me. How on earth can we elect a person who slides back and forth from house to senate to governorship and then back to senate? In whatever position they occupy, they, like the skunk, leave behind a trail of slur, smear, stale, and stink, all wrapped up in the flowing embroidered robe of scandalous ignominy. Many times, I wonder just for how long a country can survive under such disgraceful political leadership. This Nigeria, currently as it is, must die to live; and one was hoping that Buharification will be the killer

It will be interesting to know what our researchers will find should they focus their search on the damaged state of mind of the citizens of Nigeria who have been for so long, under the vicious and malicious battering by our politicians. One thing you can say for the Nigerian, he is not just foolishly forgiving, but he has this masochist spirit of enduring pain, and a pretended enjoyment of pain. A cursory survey of the damage inflicted on the health of the ordinary Nigerian by the political class may yet reveal undescribed physical, emotional and mental conditions that make us come out every four years to roll out the drums, parading with unbounded hope, in the charade of the election and erection of the elusive good governance. Ever ready to make fun out of every disaster, Nigerians end up, giving nicknames to many of the political leaders and derisively describe their performance. Here are some examples. Not even Judas could have done more damage with kissing than a condition called “sara-ki-sitis” where the opposition party does not only get all the minority positions but adds on that of the Deputy leadership of the chamber. A bout of “okorohausalitis” produces a craving or mania for constructing statues in memory of the living and starving the living to death by denying them of their hard-earned salaries. Infection by “fayosensis” results in the desire to focus on building infrastructures of the gastro-intestinal tract right from the mouth to the anus, allowing for free passage, so much so that your community performs the art of open defecation second to none in Nigeria. “Eji-jumobiensis ”creates a gap through which you attempt with Authority to “Obanise” every street in your State capital, thereby creating employment for designers and makers of beaded crowns. You are stimulated, when “Ogbeniaisis” infects you to turn “opon imo” to “opon ofo” moving the standard of education in your state to dip below zero. When you are struck by “ jabaganiosis”, you develop the power to decide who and for how long a person rules, and a tendency not to pollute your pocket with dirty naira notes, but bullion carry freshly minted cash, as the bank comes to you instead of going to the bank. Finally, “go-slow-itis” is the condition that motivates you to do in the coming four years what you should have done in the gone four years.

As other “politico-medical” conditions created by our beloved politicians come to attention, the dictionary of politician diseases of Nigerian will be updated.
Concluded.
•Tomori wrote from Lagos.