One people

One people, two destines

"All animals are equal but some are more equal than the others."

One of the most profound books I have read and which has had (and still has) a great impact on me at a time I was most impressionable was George Orwell’s Animal Farm. It is regrettable that liberal arts generally has suffered a quantum decline in post-independence Nigeria. The evidence of this decline is that ideas and thoughts no longer have any influence on our society and the way we live our lives. Literature and thinking have been taken out of the reality context where they interact with the universal community and where their utilitarian import is determined. They are now arcane matters confined to the hollow congregation of practitioners where they assume nothing more than an abstract category and mere academic paper to be used to determine the promotion of their authors. I often wonder whether our generation can produce another Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe or Niyi Osundare — all globally accomplished writers, poets and novelists.

My concern on the dearth of literature was born out of my reflection on the Orwellian metaphor of class or racial superiority typified by the subtle hegemonic ascendancy of pigs as captured by the oxymoron of all animals being equal and some being more equal than others. These contemplations are easily provoked as I witnessed the replication of that metaphor in my environment on a daily basis.

Sometimes in December last year, a very important personality (VIP) who is renowned for his philantrophy was brutally murdered by hired assassins in front of his house in broad daylight. His death sent shock wave across the length and breath of the country. This is well understood considering that he was a well engaged man being a frontline politician, a business mogul and a philanthropist. His death angered the young and old including President Olusegun Obasanjo. The individual concerned was late Chief Layi Balogun.

A special instruction was given to the Inspector General of Police, Mr Musiliu Smith, by President Obasanjo to fish out the killers of Balogun before the figurative spittle he spat on the ground dries up. The entire police and intelligence machinery was deployed, combing Lagos, Ibadan and Abuja. When they were not found in three days, President Obasanjo reiterated his demand for the apprehension of the murderers. Thankfully and to everybody’s relief, the police have made progress. About 30 suspects have been, arrested including some who have allegedly made confessions on their role in carrying out the gruesome murder.

Perhaps the police should be congratulated for solving a murder riddle in record time (even when the London metropolitan police is yet to record any breakthrough on the murder of Nigeria’s Damilola Taylor, with all their sophisticated technology) but that is if the suspects did not ‘escape’ from custody a la Nigeria. However this seeming police efficiency throws up a plethora of questions on the nature of the Nigerian State. The first one to be asked is why should the police demonstrate such efficiency in solving a murder case because the victim was a big man? Do not misunderstand me. I have nothing against Chief Balogun (may his soul rest in peace) who had an excellent testimony of being a good man while he was alive. I believe that a befitting honour that should be done to his memory is to bring his immediate and remote killers to justice. But we cannot waive aside the fact that the state has often shown efficiency when important people are involved. Another instance was the speed at which the killers of late Anthony Ikhazobor were found and brought to book. One of them incidentally happened to be the son of a serving Deputy Inspector General of Police.

Countless homicides are committed every day in our neigbourhoods. Jealous husbands or wives, armed robbers on rampage, ritual killers, corporate warfare, inheritance crisis, etc. have always instigated one murder or another and people have learnt to either obtain justice from unorthodox sources such as the Oodua People Congress (OPC) and spiritual media. Others would elect to hand over the matter to God to judge and award commensurate retribution in his time. All these are because the law enforcement agencies are comatose.

The proliferation of secret cults and the heightening of their murderous activities in our tertiary institutions have resulted in the untimely death of hundreds of valuable lives and the orgy of killings in those institutions is yet to abate. The belief in those rascally kids has been reinforced in time: they are at liberty to visit mayhem on their communities with impunity. I stand to be corrected but I can say authoritatively that no cultist murderer has ever been jailed or hanged for any of the killings that have ever taken place in our various campuses. Does it mean that the lives of those killed do not count?

Just last week, a vehicle in the convoy of a serving Minister in Obasanjo’s cabinet collided with that of a young couple, killing the couple instantly with the bride’s three months pregnancy. The Minister, apparently more concerned about his threatened cabinet post in an imminent reshuffle, has employed all kinds of shenanigans including inciting the family of his reckless driver to threaten the dead couple’s family. But the Minister has not been able to explain why his convoy left the pregnant woman writhing in pain in her own pool of blood before giving up the ghost many hours later and after the Minister had left. Mr. Wigwe, the father of the late bride is crying for justice and his voice could be heard only because of his standing in the society. What about the countless victims of police cover ups and state insensitivity?

For how long are we going to live with the antediluvian Marxist notion that the state is nothing more than the executive committee for managing the common affairs of the ruling class. That description of the state is no longer fashionable. The democratisation of the state to accommodate both popular interests and the specific interest of its controlling group is a sine qua non to democratic development. A state that continues to pursue the parochial interest of its ruling class while neglecting the general interests of the under privileged and downtrodden stands the grave risk of provoking rebellion by the lower classes.

The writer is a Professor of Obafemi Awolowo University