Reddlemen”, we must now become

“Deciding what topic to comment on in Nigeria these days is proving to be less and less of an effortless undertaking, what with the breathtaking spate of egregious discoveries within the leadership class, and the brazen indifference of the ranking members of that class to those discoveries. I dare say that it is inconceivable to think up a more damning script for Project Nigeria than the intensifying “You be thief! I no be thief!” drama among our elected leaders – see my piece in The Guardian of 6^th April, 2018.

I had once remarked to a colleague that contemporary Nigeria is likened to a military parade wherein a clumsy ill-trained recruit tragically assumed (read usurped) the drum-major’s position. That of course was not a novel commentary on the Nigerian state. Parallels to my expressed view could be obtained without exertion; famous among these was the late Pius Okigbo’s scathing line in his 1992 University of Lagos 30^th Anniversary Lecture: Crisis in the Temple. In his clinical analysis of the sources of decay in Nigeria’s tertiary institutions, the renowned economist pointed out that successive investigation panels on the administration of Nigerian universities had observed that most lecturers notoriously fail to update the currency of their qualifications. Typical of him, he then went on to conjure up the hazardous graphics of drivers with expired licences. Academic qualifications, the anniversary lecturer had asserted, like driving licences, are meant to be renewed periodically. In his immortal words, “If Faculty members lack the discipline to diligently revalidate the currency of their intellectual contents, these are automatically deemed incapable of learning… Now, would any one be taken aback that our temple of learning is in crisis, when those who are notoriously incapable of learning have taken to teaching therein?”

The unfortunate situation depicted by the great Anambra state born intellectual aptly mirrors the situation in all other sectors of the Nigerian state. And, as the yet unfurling leadership crisis reveals, that ugly situation is rendered ugliest by Nigeria’s primitive political culture, which permits of semi-illiterates and ill-bred persons rising to the pinnacle of power. Imagine the absurdity of notoriously corrupt officials of one political party vociferously calling for the arrest and prosecution of their fellow notoriously corrupt officials in another party??? (The kettle calling the pot black is apparently the new normal in Nigeria) Therefore, we now can safely say that discounting the few, not unlike the late Aminu Kano; MKO Abiola; Alex Ekwueme, etc, who were unquestionably accomplished prior to seeking political office, a greater part of Nigerian politicians are mindless gold-diggers who spare little or no thoughts for the ordinary people whom they swear under oath to conscientiously serve. Much to our collective discomfiture, these questionable characters have now leveraged themselves into vantage positions in Nigeria’s political space with ill-gotten wealth. Simply put, ill-bred persons now predominantly decide the composition of Nigeria’s leadership. This scenario clearly is a state of national emergency calling for massive citizens’ action. If Nigeria were to keep her glorious appointment with destiny, her committed patriots, be they men or women, party members or not, young or old, religious or not, able-bodied or physically challenged, professionals and non-professionals, must now cultivate the spirit of the “reddlemen”, a leading character in one of Thomas Hardy’s classic novels, “The return of the native”.

Hardy’s reddleman could pass as a benevolent masquerade in our setting, because he was not only something of a guardian spirit committed to sniffing out evil plots and persons in his 19^th Century Wessex, England, but would go the entire hug to ensure that the ultimate aim of those evil plots came to naught. Instructively, he did all of these entirely at the expense of his personal resources and risks to his safety. Diggory Venn was the man literally behind the reddleman’s mask. In pre-industrial England, a reddleman was a person whose vocation it was to supply farmers with redding for their sheep. On account of their ware, reddlemen were usually red from the crown of their head to their feet – thus disguising their natural features. Being itinerant, reddlemen have privilege knowledge of their communities. Citizen Diggory Venn had patriotically put that advantage to the peace, unity and progress of his Wessex homestead. The climax of these instances was when his priceless intelligence gathering culminated in averting the potential elopement of Mr. Damon Wildeve and Mrs. Eustacia Yeobright. 

Damon and Eustacia had been lovers; but Damon’s unfaithfulness caused Eustacia to harbour second thoughts about the relationship. During Christmas, Clement Yeobright, a glamourous native of Wessex who had made good in Paris in the world of finance, returned. Eustacia, the local beauty who ceaselessly dreamed of living out her life in a more glamourous setting than rural Wessex, was inexorably taken in by the returnee’s reputation. Ever the resourceful coming lady, she caused her path to cross with the illustrious returnee’s. Against both families’ misgivings Clement and Eustacia struck up a relationship that made a bee-line for marriage. Eustacia’s estranged lover, Damon, acting with an eye to spiting his former heartthrob, married his casual lover, Thomasin on the rebound. But he no sooner learned of the unending torments of burying one’s love before its death. Eustacia was still much the love of his life. He desperately, albeit furtively, wanted her back.

Meanwhile, Eustacia, to her disappointment, was similarly circumstanced. She had cleverly schemed to marry Yeobright in the hope that he would return to Paris after his short visit to Wessex. Was she utterly mistaken! The accomplished economist had returned to give back to his fledgling community. Clement had come back to stay! Eustacia consequently starting toying with unholy ideas about the young marriage, much like a kitten sports dove. Under such a heavily misty atmosphere, Mr. Damon Wildeve and Mrs. Eustacia Yeobright were able to contrive a most secretive elopement plot. But for the legendary selfless intelligence gathering exploits of the reddleman, most of which were undertaken in the dead of the night and in inclement weather, that evil plot could well have been pulled off, much to the heartbreak of many a Wessex citizen.

Damon and Eustacia died in the misadventure. But it was a happy ending for the reddleman as he earned bounteous returns on his huge investments in sustained selfless community service. He was the residual legatee of Wessex with his marriage to Wildeve’s widow who recently came into her rich inheritance. The tale is as engaging as its moral is compelling. The latest shocking revelations in our own land ought to jolt us into massive citizens’ action to exorcise the political class of the ill-bred characters among its ranks. We must now become reddlemen. Needless to say that I am one already; that is the reason I persist in speaking poignant truths to power, in spite of explicit death threats to my person by government agents. Needless also, to state that the spirit is slowly but surely finding a foothold in our much abused country, Nigeria. It is interesting to observe that a number of recent group-protests against the harsh realities in the country readily adopt the reddleman’s colour code: deep red. One of these has even produced symbolic blood-red cards to express the mood in which its members would approach the 2019 general elections. I couldn’t agree more; ordinary Nigerians have endured red-eyes for decades due to a succession of grossly incompetent leaderships, it’s time red-cards substituted the weary red-eyes!   

Reddlemen, therefore, we must now become to reset Nigeria on the course of true greatness; so help us God.

Afam Nkemdiche; consulting engineer. November, 2018                                          

1963 Republican Constitution, a veritable guide

This is a sequel of sorts to an earlier piece, Restructuring: History 101, published in this newspaper. We now can comfortably presume that the Jury is finally in on the vexed topic: restructuring. If Nigeria were to “catch-up”, she must necessarily restructure her administrative apparatus. Much earlier, another piece in this newspaper, Legislature should elect president and governors, had deployed technical facts to make the point that Nigeria is, indeed, NOT a democracy, but republican. The rising calls for restructuring, and ipso facto a reversion to the 1963 Constitution inspired the current piece. The latter article is quoted in extenso below:

“Were the United States of America a democracy, Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party candidate in the 2016 presidential election would have broken the ‘glass ceiling,’ and become the first female US president because she won the popular votes by some three million. Rather, the Republican candidate, Donald Trump became president because the US practises republicanism, thanks to the collegiate votes. Not a few persons still wonder at the difference of the two terms due to the convenient-interchangeability to which politicians have rendered them over the centuries. The thought would not have crossed the minds of the US founding fathers who under the apparent influence of Plato’s Republic, rejected democracy, lock, key and barrel.

“George Washington who had presided over the Constitutional Convention and later accepted the honour of being chosen as the first president of the US under its new Constitution, indicated during his inaugural address in April 1789, that he would dedicate himself to the ‘preservation of the republican model of government.’ James Madison, who is rightly known as the ‘Father of the US Constitution,’ wrote in the Federalist, No. 10: ‘…democracy have been spectacles of turbulence and contentions; have ever been found incompatible with personal security; or the right of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they are violent in their deaths.’ John Adams, a signatory to the US Declaration of Independence, said he championed the new Constitution because it would not create a democracy. He had insisted that democracy never lasts long, ‘it soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There was never a democracy that did not commit suicide.’ Alexander Hamilton in his stead had averred that ‘we are forming a Republican form of government. Real liberty is not found in the extremes of democracy, but in moderate governments. If we incline too much to democracy we shall soon shoot into monarchy or some other form of a dictatorship… Our real disease is DEMOCRACY.’

“It is therefore not a wonder that the word ‘democracy’ is not found in the US Constitution. Article IV, Section 4 of that Constitution categorically declares: ‘The US shall guarantee to every state in the Union a Republican form of government.’ Republicanism recognizes the gradations that exist in human societies, and therefore posits that electoral votes be aggregated. Democracy, on the other hand, promotes the doctrine of absolute equality of all humans; each vote carries equal weight. Therefore it is disingenuous to interchangeably employ the two terms; the one is cheese, while the other is chalk.

“Article IV, Section 4 of the US Constitution could well have been influenced by Edward Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, which appeared in the period of US Declaration of Independence. That towering masterpiece traces the Roman history from the middle of the Second Century A.D. to the dissolution of the Western Empire late in the Fifth Century, through the Dark Ages and the Middle Ages in Western Europe, including the history of the Eastern and Byzantium for a thousand years to the fall of the Constantinople in 1453. The Decline and Fall deploys empirical evidence to show that the greatest western empire ever, collapsed essentially due to the failure of democracy in the Roman constituencies.

“According to the treatise, as the Roman Empire’s material wealth attained unprecedented proportions, following many conquests, her emperors felt the irresistible urge to centralize administration. With centralization went the liberty for individual initiative and creativity. Consequently, constituencies’ contributions to the common wealth declined. That declining fortunes adversely affected citizen’s morale, inclusive of the soldiers, thus the fall of the Roman Empire. Centuries after, the Great British Empire would follow that declining trajectory; see The Decline and Fall of the British Empire, (Allen and Co. Ltd, Bocardo Press, Oxford, 2005).

“From the respective fall of both empires we could see that the ‘collect and share wealth’ philosophy, a cardinal attribute of democracy, which only works as long as there is someone else’s money to share, is doomed to eventual collapse. Those receiving are quite pleased with getting something for nothing. But those forced to give are denied the right to spend the benefit of their natural endowments and labour on their own self-interest, which creates jobs no matter how the money is spent. They also lose a portion of their incentive to produce. The result is that democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy. This historical lesson must have moved another US founding father, Benjamin Franklin, to define democracy in these graphic words ‘two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.’”

Conclusively, therefore, the United States of America practises a republican form of government. And since we purportedly imported our present form of governments from the US, it is appropriate to aver that Nigeria aspires to practise republicanism. Thusly, a republican Constitution must necessarily guide her endeavours. Need we state that a more forceful argument cannot be made for reverting to the much-acclaimed 1963 Constitution; and by extension, for Nigeria’s administrative restructuring? 

Afam Nkemdiche; consulting engineer. August, 2019    

 

A sketch of rescue operation

Barring rhythmic chirping by birds in surrounding bushes and mild north-easterly winds sweeping across Ecuador and her environs, all was funereally silent on that starless night. A stranger walking or driving about on that night would come away with the impression that the coastal town had been recently evacuated of its residents following one of the many natural disasters that often troubled those parts. But to a resident, it was a typical night in Machala. At exactly 11:17pm two familiar glistening cars eased into an undulated driveway and proceeded at a pace dictated by topography. Lithe security operatives behind huge steel gates at the end of the driveway were already making to release the safety catch on their AK-47 riffles when coded signals came from the front car. ‘‘Shit!’’ one of them cussed. ‘‘What the hell are they coming back for?’’ another asked in anger.

Their ever-grinning commander and his cohorts had taken leave of the premises about three hours earlier; and in the days since the African VIPs took up residency there Controller and his associates had not called at the isolated guesthouse more than once a day. No, this was not in keeping with the established routine here, thought one of the senior security operatives, hesitating; his index finger yet on the safety catch. His heart missed a beat and accelerated when a young operative started to unlock the gates and had actually been at the verge of issuing a counter-order when he recalled how fast established routines had been changing around them in the past few days. Their commander and his associates now made daily calls at the main house and stayed for uncharacteristically long periods at a time; significant changes that lent some credence to current rumour by domestic workers in the central house that the present siege was about to end.

The middle-aged operative was thus rationalizing when the first car past the gates and headed towards the central house. On passing the gates the second car moved a notch slower than the first, as though dithering, but the security operatives were no longer paying serious attention to the all-too-familiar sleek cars. Within a twinkle of an eye the snail-paced motion turned into lightning speed as the boot of the second car flew open at the same time as a hail of bullets rocketed out of silenced sub-machine guns. Two men in bullet-proof vest adroitly hopped out of the luggage compartment, their index fingers did not relent even as they did so. By the time the first rugged Toyota Land Cruiser reached the steel gates twelve-odd men were sprawling on the ground either dead as a herring or dying; it swiftly drove past and headed towards the rear of the central house, its equally ruggedly clad passengers hopping out from all directions and smartly taking positions. The second Land Cruiser did not venture past the steel gates.

Meanwhile David, leader of the rescue operation, closely followed by Jacob, Dayan, Isaac, and Ben, had smashed their way into the central house through large windows, promptly dispatching three security personnel to permanent slumber even before the trio were fully awakened from the transient variety, although one of these had been able to dislodge a handful of bullets from his pistol before. One of the bullets grazed the audacious leader’s temple. Less than one minute after entering the house David, Jacob, and Dayan were already on the upper level calling out ‘‘Mister President! Mister Foreign Secretary! Identify yourselves! We have come to take you home! Mister President…!’’

Ben and Isaac, as eagle-eyed as they were keen-eared, and holding the ground floor by the staircase thought they heard amidst noisy opening and closing doors overhead distinct report of riffles coming from behind the house.

‘‘Come on now Mister President! All’s safe now; we are your friends…’’ Dayan’s husky voice was calling out above Jacob’s when a seemingly suppressed response came forth from one of the locked doors along the narrow passage. The three dark figures dashed, like an arrow in flight, towards the direction whence the response had come. As they did so, another, if more confident response came from the opposite direction of the first.

Firmly seated behind a steering wheel and calling out precise instructions to a manager in Miami was the Colombian operation coordinator; seamless weaving of multiple activities was the sole key to success in the operation at hand, Marcos kept reminding himself. Soon after, both captive VIPs, donning purpose-designed bullet-proof vest over outsized pyjamas and barefoot, were being part-carried and part-led down the exquisite wooden staircase. In another moment both glossy cars were speeding past the steel gates much like racing cars, completely unmindful of the undulated tracks. The two Land Cruisers brought up the rear. The entire operation had taken less than the maximum time allotted to it by the mission-managers. From when the first hail of bullets was fired to when the convoy of four sped past the steel gates was recorded as 4.52 minutes on Marcos’ wristwatch.

Not sparing a thought for his wound and taking the same attitude that one took to common people to the VIPs seating next to him, David roughly snatched the satellite telephone from Marcos, who was having some difficulties keeping pace with the leading car while following a conversation in far away Florida. As the leader snatched the handset Jacob impulsively turned and per chance caught a glimpse of David’s wound and thought it was nothing to make a song and dance about at that point. He then took a good look at the objects of their mission as though making assurance doubly sure that the two completely dumbfounded men sitting next to his leader were the actual people the team had come half way round the world to rescue, and not some impostors. Not that he had any foolproof way of differentiating the chaff from the wheat, but the exuberant ex-commando was depending solely on his animal instincts to alarm him if something was amiss.

Speechlessness was as often as not caused by shock than addled state of mind; neither Vice President Alhaji Sai’du nor Honourable Nwankwo could tell with any accuracy whether or not the group of men into whose hands they presently found themselves were indeed friends or modern day Jacobs in the skin of Esau of old. The foreign minister had seen reels of movies where hostages moved from one set of kidnappers to another in very precarious circumstances. And on a sub-continent where abductions hardly made news such dramatized fiction as soon translated into living reality. Since taking French leave of their respective bedrooms nothing in the purported rescuers’ demeanour suggested to the dignitaries that they were once again liberated men, what with the unsettling discourteousness in which they were presently enveloped and the belligerent countenance of the purported rescuers. Even with that heavy air of uncertainty still shrouding their fate the two Nigerians seemed marginally pleased with the present situation; one of them had actually quietly exclaimed ‘‘What a great relief it is to be let out of that prison after four consecutive weeks!’’ the moment they sped past the steel gates. A nineteenth century sage had remarked that none could appreciate freedom more than a people who had been completely denied it for long.

A goodly while after the convoy of four had left Machala the elderly VIP suddenly remembered the existence of the Most-Beneficent-and-Most- Merciful, and spontaneously commenced telling his beads even though he had understandably left those precious-looking stones back whence they came. David involuntarily turned towards the familiar soliloquy and just as involuntarily uttered ‘‘Shalom!’’

Afam Nkemdiche is an engineering consultant; October, 2019

A sketch of rescue operation

Barring rhythmic chirping by birds in surrounding bushes and mild north-easterly winds sweeping across Ecuador and her environs, all was funereally silent on that starless night. A stranger walking or driving about on that night would come away with the impression that the coastal town had been recently evacuated of its residents following one of the many natural disasters that often troubled those parts. But to a resident, it was a typical night in Machala. At exactly 11:17pm two familiar glistening cars eased into an undulated driveway and proceeded at a pace dictated by topography. Lithe security operatives behind huge steel gates at the end of the driveway were already making to release the safety catch on their AK-47 riffles when coded signals came from the front car. ‘‘Shit!’’ one of them cussed. ‘‘What the hell are they coming back for?’’ another asked in anger.

Their ever-grinning commander and his cohorts had taken leave of the premises about three hours earlier; and in the days since the African VIPs took up residency there Controller and his associates had not called at the isolated guesthouse more than once a day. No, this was not in keeping with the established routine here, thought one of the senior security operatives, hesitating; his index finger yet on the safety catch. His heart missed a beat and accelerated when a young operative started to unlock the gates and had actually been at the verge of issuing a counter-order when he recalled how fast established routines had been changing around them in the past few days. Their commander and his associates now made daily calls at the main house and stayed for uncharacteristically long periods at a time; significant changes that lent some credence to current rumour by domestic workers in the central house that the present siege was about to end.

The middle-aged operative was thus rationalizing when the first car past the gates and headed towards the central house. On passing the gates the second car moved a notch slower than the first, as though dithering, but the security operatives were no longer paying serious attention to the all-too-familiar sleek cars. Within a twinkle of an eye the snail-paced motion turned into lightning speed as the boot of the second car flew open at the same time as a hail of bullets rocketed out of silenced sub-machine guns. Two men in bullet-proof vest adroitly hopped out of the luggage compartment, their index fingers did not relent even as they did so. By the time the first rugged Toyota Land Cruiser reached the steel gates twelve-odd men were sprawling on the ground either dead as a herring or dying; it swiftly drove past and headed towards the rear of the central house, its equally ruggedly clad passengers hopping out from all directions and smartly taking positions. The second Land Cruiser did not venture past the steel gates.

Meanwhile David, leader of the rescue operation, closely followed by Jacob, Dayan, Isaac, and Ben, had smashed their way into the central house through large windows, promptly dispatching three security personnel to permanent slumber even before the trio were fully awakened from the transient variety, although one of these had been able to dislodge a handful of bullets from his pistol before. One of the bullets grazed the audacious leader’s temple. Less than one minute after entering the house David, Jacob, and Dayan were already on the upper level calling out ‘‘Mister President! Mister Foreign Secretary! Identify yourselves! We have come to take you home! Mister President…!’’

Ben and Isaac, as eagle-eyed as they were keen-eared, and holding the ground floor by the staircase thought they heard amidst noisy opening and closing doors overhead distinct report of riffles coming from behind the house.

‘‘Come on now Mister President! All’s safe now; we are your friends…’’ Dayan’s husky voice was calling out above Jacob’s when a seemingly suppressed response came forth from one of the locked doors along the narrow passage. The three dark figures dashed, like an arrow in flight, towards the direction whence the response had come. As they did so, another, if more confident response came from the opposite direction of the first.

Firmly seated behind a steering wheel and calling out precise instructions to a manager in Miami was the Colombian operation coordinator; seamless weaving of multiple activities was the sole key to success in the operation at hand, Marcos kept reminding himself. Soon after, both captive VIPs, donning purpose-designed bullet-proof vest over outsized pyjamas and barefoot, were being part-carried and part-led down the exquisite wooden staircase. In another moment both glossy cars were speeding past the steel gates much like racing cars, completely unmindful of the undulated tracks. The two Land Cruisers brought up the rear. The entire operation had taken less than the maximum time allotted to it by the mission-managers. From when the first hail of bullets was fired to when the convoy of four sped past the steel gates was recorded as 4.52 minutes on Marcos’ wristwatch.

Not sparing a thought for his wound and taking the same attitude that one took to common people to the VIPs seating next to him, David roughly snatched the satellite telephone from Marcos, who was having some difficulties keeping pace with the leading car while following a conversation in far away Florida. As the leader snatched the handset Jacob impulsively turned and per chance caught a glimpse of David’s wound and thought it was nothing to make a song and dance about at that point. He then took a good look at the objects of their mission as though making assurance doubly sure that the two completely dumbfounded men sitting next to his leader were the actual people the team had come half way round the world to rescue, and not some impostors. Not that he had any foolproof way of differentiating the chaff from the wheat, but the exuberant ex-commando was depending solely on his animal instincts to alarm him if something was amiss.

Speechlessness was as often as not caused by shock than addled state of mind; neither Vice President Alhaji Sai’du nor Honourable Nwankwo could tell with any accuracy whether or not the group of men into whose hands they presently found themselves were indeed friends or modern day Jacobs in the skin of Esau of old. The foreign minister had seen reels of movies where hostages moved from one set of kidnappers to another in very precarious circumstances. And on a sub-continent where abductions hardly made news such dramatized fiction as soon translated into living reality. Since taking French leave of their respective bedrooms nothing in the purported rescuers’ demeanour suggested to the dignitaries that they were once again liberated men, what with the unsettling discourteousness in which they were presently enveloped and the belligerent countenance of the purported rescuers. Even with that heavy air of uncertainty still shrouding their fate the two Nigerians seemed marginally pleased with the present situation; one of them had actually quietly exclaimed ‘‘What a great relief it is to be let out of that prison after four consecutive weeks!’’ the moment they sped past the steel gates. A nineteenth century sage had remarked that none could appreciate freedom more than a people who had been completely denied it for long.

A goodly while after the convoy of four had left Machala the elderly VIP suddenly remembered the existence of the Most-Beneficent-and-Most- Merciful, and spontaneously commenced telling his beads even though he had understandably left those precious-looking stones back whence they came. David involuntarily turned towards the familiar soliloquy and just as involuntarily uttered ‘‘Shalom!’’

Afam Nkemdiche is an engineering consultant; October, 2019