Where to lay the blame - My response Bro.. many thanks for your succinct contribution. Always delighted to read your views. Please pardon me if I have not given your contribution a title that expressed the content. I struggled with it a bit – where the blame lie or where to lay the blame or who is to be blamed. I disagree with you that the politicians in the western world are not better than rogues in Nigeria. The politicians in western world work/serve their people not milking them. Yes there is corruption everywhere but they defer in size and scale. A parliamentarian in the UK will serve jail sentence and resign from his/her seat for a thousand pound (N250,000) of false claim. Even ordinarily calling a policeman ‘pleb’ by a minister is enough to resign. No …no .. no politicians in Nigeria and western world are not comparable! Yes, you are right that the ideological positions of political parties are changing. But the defining factor in the political compass remains the same, i.e. left and right. It might be the centre of left or centre of right or far of right or of left but that defining/referencing factor of left and right still remain relevant. As I have pointed out in the piece, within the continuum of left and right, there are hybrids of types. But it will be unthinkable for centre-left to merge with centre right or far right. What might happen as the case with conservative and liberal in the UK is to form a coalition government for a life of a parliament. It also happened in Italy just to prevent ‘hang’ parliament. Even during the coalition period they will have their identities and fight for elections under their ideological banners not jointly. That is what is different with rogues and business men we call politicians in Nigeria. On the issue of civil service, I cannot agree more with you. Some of them are richer than the governors, most especially Federal ministries. Remember that most of the civil servants we are talking about are on living wages only. Corruption in civil service is in two parts: the low ranking that is playing smart to survive (I am nor condoling it but in reality how else can they survive). And the ‘politicians’ in civil service who are friends and associates of the politicians. It all boils down to leadership or lack of it my brother. The essence of government is to correct abnormities in and develop the society. If they cannot come up with programmes and policies that will stop people from stealing they should resign. Is not enough a good excuse for me that they cannot do anything. They begged us for our votes to serve us and if it is too hard for them they can throw in their towels. Thank God, we are both grown up enough to see what Buhari/Idiagbon did through War Against Indiscipline (WAI). Indiscipline is our number one problem in Nigeria today. Unfortunately it starts from the President down to the civil servants. How can a president that was a middle class now become a billionaire and instil discipline in civil service? How many of the politicians are poor and within a space of time become multi-millionaire? Don’t you think people can see it even if they swear by everything that they are not corrupt? Corruption is cancerous and killing Nigeria nation slowly. Look, is not that difficult to fight corruption if there is a will by the government. First, low ranking or level of corruption can be eliminated if life becomes bearable for people. Let the politicians make schooling and health care qualitative and free. We would see that 75% of corruption in Nigeria will naturally disappear. Expenses on education and health care are the major obstacles for most families. And they (politicians) should pay a living wage not killer wage. N18,000 in my opinion is a killer wage! If I relocate to London for instance, I will get more salary because standard of living is higher. In short, they should remove the temptation to steal. For the main thieves, a serious government will look into sentencing guidelines and loopholes for embezzlement and misappropriation of money. And will make sure the implementation is carried out. Another area we often forget easily are the people that are not working for the government – how do they survive? A serious government should look into that. Would the system or fight on corruption be perfected in one day .. NO but the signal will be positive. There is no country in western world that Oduah the aviation minister will still be in the government. Even in Latvia that is not (that) western (formerly part of USSR) the Prime Minster resigned few days ago because a supermarket collapsed and kill 54 people. Even if 54,000 people should die in Nigeria nobody will resign. What would they say – is an act of GOD! Someone stole some billions and was giving an option of fine in thousands – ridiculous! And the useless government/president and the most useless parliaments cannot enact law to stifle punishment for a cancer that is and has eaten up the society. Why was that? Because they are equally guilty like those that are caught and they know their days are numbered. Until we have honest people in the helm of affairs, Nigeria has no future. The crop of politician parading themselves either in person of Tinubu or Bukola or Jonathan or even their master Obasanjo are not the messiahs we are waiting for. I will submit in my conclusion that the western politicians are far better than the thieves or political robbers we have now in Nigeria. Without any doubt in my mind what Nigeria is using to maintain any of her institutions is outrageously high, even the legislative, judiciary and executive. Finally, civil servants are the employees of the government and the leader of the government is their boss (president and governor) not other way round. I am not exonerating the civil service/servants and indeed every Nigerian from the problem of indiscipline but the key is honest leadership which we are lacking.
Posted on: Sat, 30 Nov 2013 06:38:11 +0000
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