By Abuchi Obiora
While coming back on Tuesday, 2nd March, 2022 aboard a car conveying us back from an assembly of Nigerian youths in Abuja after the declaration ceremony of a presidential aspirant in the 2023 general elections in Nigeria, a discussion ensued amongst the occupants of the car, including me. The discussion was as usual, about Nigeria and the present challenges of being a Nigerian living in Nigeria.
All the four other occupants of the car excluding me as the fifth occupant were Nigerian youths less than forty years old. The driver of the car was so angry about the conspiracy of the political class who continue to share Nigeria’s resources amongst themselves. He was of the opinion that he will only vote in the polls of 2023 for a political party that will share the monetary resources of the country amongst Nigerians so that whosoever decides to continue to stay back in the country may stay because he would be taking his share (and the shares of members of his family) to seek for a safe haven in another country. He added that he was sick and tired of the country.
This opinion shocked me momentarily but I regained my composure and quickly kept tabs with my lost thoughts. I had a greater shock after some days after that encounter when I sampled this opinion amongst different audiences of Nigerian youths and got exactly the same answer from most of them. I concluded that being afraid of their bleak future in the hands of present Nigerian politicians, Nigerian youths have embraced as an alternative, what I prefer to call a ‘Kangaroo Economy’.
Deprived and depraved Nigerian youths have been deceived to believe that economic – both their individual and our joint national economy – can only be run by the means of palliatives and subventions such as the COVID-19 Palliatives, Poverty Alleviation Funds, Dangote Grants, Atiku Grants, Tinubu Grants, Fuel Subsidy Removal Grant, Child Delivery Grant, SURE-P Disbursements, N-Power Disbursements, National Youth Empowerment Scheme, Presidential Empowerment Scheme, FG-World Bank Grants, to mention but a few of all those dubious outfits solely arranged to divert Nigerian money to private accounts. Meanwhile sharp Nigerian fraudsters have taken advantage of this queer Kangaroo-type economy, to swindle gullible Nigerians of their hard-earned money as they organize counterfeits of these largesse.
Having absconded from doing their job of fixing the economy and maintaining a stable and sustainable economy, Nigerian politicians have uncannily made the youths to believe that a national economy is run by the means of Palliatives, Grants and Subventions.
In accepting this, Nigerian youths have become beggars in a country that they are equal owners of, suffering humiliation of accepting peanuts as their shares of the common patrimony, which these Palliatives, Grants and Subventions represent. The Nigerian politicians have made dummies of Nigerian youths, enticing them with all manner of ‘AWUFS’ (free gifts), dispensing to them in miserable piece-meals what rightfully belong to them.
In other countries managed by sane, patriotic and transparent politicians whose aims and objectives are not to swindle their electorate, welfare programs such like Nigerian politicians have made the bedrock of their economic planning, are only used to jumpstart comatose conditions whose benefits are either not immediate or they are in their early stages of yield. But here, Nigerians politicians are making Nigerians feel comfortable with peasant lifestyles with guarantee only for what will be eaten during the day.
Before we find out what A Kangaroo Economy is, let us first understand what a Kangaroo is. The Kangaroo is a macropod, a member of the animal family of large marsupials with strong hind legs for hopping. The strong hind legs enable the kangaroo to hastily hop, without preparation, away from danger on the slightest knowledge of danger, making the animal difficult to hunt. Ascribed to the characteristics of the kangaroo because of its secret underbelly pouch where it hides its off-springs, the word ‘hooded’ (secretive) is also widely associated to criminality in the contemporary English lexicon. This same feature of the Kangaroo has given the ‘Kangaroo’ the attribute of a hooded, fleece, deceptive connotation when used as a word qualifier or adjective as I have done in this discourse.
My usage of the word ‘Kangaroo’ in this discourse, is therefore meant to convey the specific idea of a hopeless condition; a hurriedly put-together, makeshift, impermanent, deceptive and dubious economic arrangement in Nigeria which is a mocking imitation and alternative to what is true, normal, sensible and the lasting order of an economic condition.
The present generation of Nigerian politicians have hoodwinked Nigerians to accept as the real thing, the hooded and uncertain economic principles veiled in make-shift and fragile ideas founded on the whims and caprices of kleptomaniac and unprepared economists who emerged by the flawed and unwholesome means of a cash-and- carry and nepotic political process whose natural result would always be plugging in round pegs in square holes.
As this anomaly goes on, there has been a groundswell of public opinion to Float youth political parties or youth political pressure groups in the country for the youths to directly address their problems themselves. In response to this development, many WhatsApp platforms and online youth groups have emerged to articulate the opinion of the Nigerian youths to present a united front and wrestle political power from older generations. I have been co-opted by some of my youth friends to some of these WhatsApp platforms and youth pressure groups. Though I cannot be called a youth now, my thoughts on Nigeria represent their opinions about the way forward for the country.
By the way, I am not applying the United Nations definition of ‘Youth’ in this discourse, because in Nigeria, when people talk about ‘youth’, they mean ‘youthful’ both in appearance, sentiments and attitude. These younger friends of mine got me enlisted in these groups (I always discover I am the oldest person in every of such group) and allow me to play the fatherly role for them.
Now, my relationship with these groups have given me more insight on how the minds of the present Nigerian youths, who are desirous of taking over power from the older generation, work. Surprisingly, their minds work the same way with the minds of the youths I encountered on March 2nd, 2022. For example, one of the items in the official Manifesto of one of these groups to which I belong is to support only a political party that will accede to their demand to dole out N5M as Citizen Right – a one-off payment to every adult Nigerian to settle him/herself.
Being in their midst, I am always careful because not a few times have I been misunderstood, insulted and maligned by some members of these groups after I have given out my opinions on issues based on my age and experiences in life. I have also found out that many of the leaders of these groups are very ambitious, seeking out how they can settle themselves the Nigerian way. To further buttress this allegation, one of these youth leaders once told me so many bad things including chatting me point-blank that they are not counting age in their WhatsApp forum, necessitating the Admin to temporarily shut everybody out from sending messages until tempers cooled down.
Another observation I made in the youth organizations that I interacted with may be succinctly summarized with the proverbial apathy and nonchalance of a man who is busy chasing rats while his house is being burnt down by fire. I also discovered that the leaders of some of these Nigerian youth organizations are not actually interested in an ideological change or progressivism (though they may pretend to be so), hence will be unmindful of in whose camp they offload their teaming followers, once the right price is paid.
Yet, in spite of the selfish and unpatriotic disposition of some Nigerian youths, I have good news for Nigerian youths which shows that they can actually take over the governance of Nigeria if they so desire. That good news is that being the most populous country in Africa, Nigeria has one of the highest populations of youth in the world. Do not look far to see why this is so. The first reason is that with a female gender life expectancy of 63 years and a male gender life expectancy of 59 years, most people that survive the onslaught of the wicked and thieving older politicians in Nigeria are either youths or they are youthful in disposition in their sixties. This means that it is actually the old wicked politicians who have stolen enough money to take care of themselves, and other Nigerians who survive by dint of luck and good fortune, who live beyond 63 years and 59 years, respectively for the female and male Nigerians. For this reason, it can be said that Nigeria is basically a youthful population with median age put at about 18 years which is lower than the estimate of other African countries (20 years) and the developed and developing countries of the world (29 years), respectively.
Children and adolescents (many of them having been orphaned as a result of early death of parents) make up a large segment of the population of Nigeria as a result of many couples having many children. This statistics points to the fact that Nigerians die early as a result of stress and stress related sicknesses, diseases caused by poverty, which has been brought about by corruption and mismanagement of resources of the country. Many other reasons have been adduced for the low life expectancy ratio in Nigeria but Mr. John Ahukammah, a Researcher, identified high employment ratio, ill-health, poverty, deaths from preventable causes, illiteracy, high corruption amongst other reasons as the major factors militating against long-life for Nigerians living in Nigeria. If these statistics are anything to go by, (they are!) then, Nigerian youths should see the 2023 general elections as a battle for their lives and the lives of their generations yet unborn.
The statistics is actually scary, but it is true. Most of the Nigerian population is young because people between 0-14 years of age already constitute 42.54% of the total population. Based on the life expectancy figures already given here, many of the balance of 57.46% don’t live beyond their 63 and 59 years respectively for the female and the male genders. This gives a conservative estimate of Nigerian youths or youthful Nigerians to be not less than 100 million, with the United Nations population estimate for Nigeria put at 214,979,340 of people in Nigeria as of Monday March 28, 2022. Now, another good news is that if 25% of this number (25m) decides to support a youth or youthful Nigerian presidential candidate and all the older generation decided to boycott the election, the candidate of the youths should be able to win the election because the incumbent President, Mohammadu Buhari coasted to victory in 2019 with a total vote of 15.2 million as compared to 11.3m for Atiku Abubakar, his closest rival during the election. The president winning ratio was a mere 56% of the total votes cast against the back-drop of the possibility of a winning ratio of an astounding 80% by a youthful or youth-supported president who will be able to implement policies that will liberate both Nigerians and her youths.
This youth or youthful candidate should be able to emerge as the president by 25 percent of the total votes cast, as per the terms of the Nigerian constitution, in at least two-thirds of the 36 states and the Federal Capital. This permutation is a simple one but must be safeguarded by elaborate checks and balances at all points of implementation because politics is basically a game of numbers. The demographical spread, the bias and voting patterns of the electorates, their numbers and expected votes to be recovered in the cities, towns and villages (grassroots) are all vital components of the winning formula in Nigerian elections. The Nigerian youths must therefore have a prior knowledge where their wining vote will come from and put more efforts in carrying such people along in their campaigns and sensitization till their votes are harnessed.
Now for all these things to happen, Nigerian youths must be ready to protect their votes once cast, if need be, with a vehement disapproval of any type of electoral malpractice or rigging at the polls, and if need be again, to reproduce an action reminiscent of their vehement disapproval of the activities of the defunct Police Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) as displayed during the October 2020 spontaneous #ENDSARS youth protest.
Having said all these things about Nigerian youths and their chances of attaining political power in 2023, I must observe an important caveat. In a research that went viral, analysis was made of personalities of the present Nigerian political class comprising the retired military elites, retirees of the Federal Civil Service, the bourgeoisies in the nouve-rich businesses (419 et al.), self-made members of the now-disappearing middle class and a select, privileged few University dons from the academia, it was discovered that most Nigerian politicians presently active and still standing, started their careers in politics as youths.
Why is it therefore that these Nigerians did not, between their youthful ages and now, transform Nigeria and prove that the challenges of transforming Nigeria is well vested on Nigerian youths?
Based on my afore-recorded recent interactions with Nigerian youths, I have come to understand that the major problem of Nigeria and the reason why the country has not developed is not because of the age of the people who have at different times manned the political affairs of Nigeria, but because of greed, selfishness and lack of patriotism. Most of the present Nigerian youths still display these vices.
In my opinion, there is not yet a character transformation in most present Nigerian youths to show that they can do better than the youths of yesteryears when given the opportunity to handle political offices in Nigeria. What is the reason for this, you may ask. The reason is that there is an in-built mechanism in the present Nigeria which breeds and encourages corruption through greed, selfishness and lack of patriotism. This in-build mechanism is institutionalized social inequity and lack of level playing grounds for qualified Nigerians. This discourse will be too limited to explore the many sources of this inequity, yet I must observe before ending the discourse that any system that does not extol excellence and allows mediocrity to reign supreme because of institutionalized and official government policies as the Federal Character Formula, is bound to breed nepotism and corruption. Nepotism (as always observed in the expression of religious and tribal sentiments) and corruption (as a result of greed and selfishness) are the major problems of Nigeria that youths who seek political power in Nigeria must endeavor to overcome.
After interacting with Nigerian youths, let me repeat that most of them are out there to share from the proverbial Nigerian national cake by all means available to them, including organizing themselves for the highest political bidder who will pay for their efforts, youths or no youth.
My understanding, therefore, is that the start-off point for transforming the country is to change THE CONSTITUTION OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA to reflect equity and fair play through the introduction of FISCAL FEDERALISM that will encourage the natural urge and process for people to attain excellence through competition. The present system where the blind is favored to lead the sighted because the constitution has been skewed to assist a certain section of the country to easily attain leadership position, must be abrogated.
What Nigerians, irrespective of their ages, should be looking for is a candidate who will change the present constitution of the Federal Republic in his first year in office as the president. As a result of this, the only reason I will recommend a youth (or youthful) president in Nigeria is because of the drive and energy of youth which will avail him, the President, the opportunity to physically follow-up and monitor his programs and not delegate authority or relegate power to his subordinates (who may not share completely in his dreams for Nigeria) because he has to jet out periodically out of the country in the manner of the incumbent president, to attend to his failing health.
Finally, my admonition to the older generation of Nigerians is that it is a good thing to age, yet, it is a better thing to age graciously in the confines of one’s home, and amongst family members and loved ones as people like me prefer to do. Older people can do better and become more useful in advisory capacities from their homes contributing to the running of the society as have been proved by many researches because the power of the intellect and wisdom brightens and blossoms further as the limbs and other physical reflexes slow down. Nigeria will be better for it when elder statesmen offer their matured intellect, wide experiences and wisdom to youths, who as foot soldiers will be on the driving wheel of national governance.
ABUCHI OBIORA
FOR:
Global Upfront Newspapers
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