Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Shameless Politicking and Mortgaged Tomorrows

The folklore of the "Brown Envelop" as a means of making possible what may be illegal, unjust or downright untenable under the law is well documented in the annals of Nigeria's history - at least from the maradonic days of the evil genius. The colour was not arbitrary nor was it accidental. It was a deliberate attempt at camouflaging its contents from the casual observer, as though it reduced the magnitude of the offence when it went unidentified and did not don the giver with a lawbreaker garb. (Although, there are a minority whom this ploy did not deceive and who could ingeniously fathom the amount contained in any brown envelop merely by glancing at the matter (i.e., weight and space) of the envelop and applying the time of day, multiplied by the status of the giver and divided by the status of the recipient).

However, all that is history.

Today, white envelopes have gained on their brown sisters as the need for concealment of what used to be deemed criminal has been sacrificed on the very same altar that witnessed the death of the collective moral codes. The dearth of a sense of right and wrong, occasioned by a stifling and deformation of the conscience has meant that crimes no longer need to be committed in the dark confines of obscurity. The fallout of the inability of the justice system to live up to it's billing has been the reality of our experience where the high and mighty get away with anything while the low and dirty get docked for petty lifting.

Small wonder multinationals are trooping into the country to invest and we think it is because Nigeria has become an investment hub. The lawlessness in operation here is an indication of a bleeding economy and the sharks of business cannot resist the temptation of a tasty meal. The result mostly tells itself in the statistic of the pool of local entrepreneurs knocked out of business as a consequence of a haemorrhagic economy while these companies gleefully smile, not to our banks, but to their country's banks. Mostly.

You would think with all these, Nigerians, you and I, would demand for change by the majority! Well, you would be quite honestly in error. The first course to the buffet that is the 2015 elections is proving to be a case in point to test this hypothetical averment and what are we seeing? The defrocking of the dubious politician.

For their selfish purposes, they have not allowed the fear of the revelations of their true intentions to deter them from contaminating the public space with the putrefaction of their naked ambitions. Rather, they have brazenly displayed such unadulterated selfishness at every instance from defections to institutionalised corrupt practices. It has been a free course in political selfish interest.

However, students who should reap the advantages of these gratis lessons, Nigerians who swear by their allegiances to one politician or the next, are not paying attention. Rather, they are allowing themselves to be distracted enough to miss the pain of the truth biting them in the butt.

Defections, especially the motives for them, ought to open their eyes to the insincerity of these political jobbers, but if only they are paying attention. It has come to the stage where it will be nigh impossible to convince these Nigerians of their gullibility even if such convincing were attempted by someone who came from the dead. The naïveté is numbing.

No doubt, some envelopes (white more than brown) would have secured their irrevocable fidelity but how much good will that do? Their weather-beaten faces at the jamboree-esque rallies that commemorate these defections look all scrawny, poverty-infested and hungry. Should any casualty be recorded and any of these "faceless" supporters loses their precious little lives, their political principals would not even hear of the loss nor consider it worth his time to shed a few crocodile tears at their passing.

Nonetheless, rather than search for lasting change, these Nigerians pocket temporal reprieves - that may not last the month - and go into exertions that leave them sicker than they were in the morning. And having sold their birthrights for a broth, they now endeavour to mortgage even the future of their own children and dependents.

I should stop here; it's nauseating.

Wednesday, February 5, 2014

The Social Media Godliness of Single Folks

I had the impulse recently to share a thought about status updates and real life status and acted on the impulse. The past I shared on Twitter, Facebook and BBM innocuously (if that term has currency on contemporary social media, it is arguable) claimed that most of those who post God-related statuses and pictures were single. It was meant to be on the fairer side of humour where readers would chance upon it, chew on it a while, ponder examples around them a little, smile at the correctness or otherwise of the claim, shake their heads, leave a comment if it so picks their fancy and go on with their jolly lives. Little did I know I had pried open something akin to a Pandora's Ghana-Must-Go. As a serial God-related status-poster and pic-uploader, I was the primary target of the avalanche of reactions it eructed.

Let me immediately state, as I've been met with the affirmation by some friends already who claim that I ought to be number one on this list based on how much (95%, as one friend said) of my statuses are God-related, that singularity (used here in my own terms), as at the time of posting this, hasn't been declared a crime and can be, based on individual preferences, much better than a relationship that's going nowhere fast.

Secondly, the fact of the use of the words "most" and "mostly" indicate that this wasn't a general categorical statement but that some leverage was given for a marginal percentage under which would fall some married folks or some peeps in committed relationships who still see some value in sharing God-related statuses and pics would fall. Then, there's the taxonomy of those who have dedicated their lives to not marrying, just as much as those for whom relationships, single-lives or celibacy have nothing to do with their social interaction.

However, all these tend to simply obfuscate the simplicity of a funny, simple and otherwise harmless crack at making a joke. No offence but do we always have to make the simple complex? I guess I should be asking myself.