A NATION WHERE ANYTHING GOES

BONIFACE CHIZEA argues the need to tackle the impunity in the country

I don’t know how many of us elites are as concerned about the state of our country, Nigeria, as I am! It does not appear that anything is working well. And the impunity in the land, along with primitive acquisition of wealth, are walking on all fours.

I just viewed the video of the out of this world palace that belonged to Uche Secondus. Not too long ago, I also watched that of Senator Sekibo. We were also all staggered to see the extent of real estate acquisition made by the immediate past Attorney General of the Federation and Minister for Justice as he is confronted by EFCC as they make their enquiry.

It is as if the politicians are in competition to display obscene wealth. But nobody seems worried about the overall optics. What business or investments gave them such humongous amounts of money to own such palaces in the midst of abject poverty and deep misery amongst a generality of our long-suffering population?

It is about time we girded our loins to wrestle corruption in this land to a stand still. And it is not rocket science to achieve that. We just need determined leadership to be able to do so. But we must accept the fact that corruption at current levels would never foster the desired level of development.

We have just witnessed the national grid collapse twice in four days! Where else do you find such horrendous developments? And we are mouthing the target of one trillion dollar economy by the year 2030! How do we find the productivity to achieve that goal? We must, therefore, be jokers who are simply daydreaming to be targeting this objective considering the prevalent circumstances in the country?

We have been on the matter of tax reforms for some time now. Yes, Nigeria has one of the lowest tax to GDP ratios, and therefore, the urgency of a review can not be over emphasised. But most of us believe that what was needed was to get more people into the tax net. There are many people who should be paying tax but who are currently not doing so, particularly in the large informal sectors of the economy.

But no one ever believed that considering the current hardship across the land that anyone would have the conscience to inflict increased tax pains on anybody. In fact, we looked forward to an amelioration as an attempt is made to end the incident of multiple taxation on the citizens. But what do we have on our hands? How could it happen in a democracy that the version of the tax in circulation is different from what was approved by the National Assembly? What is happening here? Are we running someone’s private estate? And how do we elevate such criminality to the level of state craft?

I believe that the commencement of the reforms must be put on hold for now until we achieve the buy-in of all stakeholders.

How many of us followed closely matters arising from the recent ambassadorial nominations? Sixty eight persons were cleared by the Senate committee to be sent as ambassadors. In fact but for Donald Trump’s intervention, we were not in a hurry to address such mundane matters!

But the posting has begun slowly but selectively. The person posted to Turkey, who was later dropped, we were told was because it was discovered that he was not amongst those earlier screened! How can? Who is in charge here? How come all these several embarrassing reversals come out from the presidency? Have there been any consequences so far for this show of shame? Even the personal integrity of one of those now sent is seriously in question, but he has nevertheless been sent as our representative! Does anyone really care?

Let’s look at the untoward development of the planned move to a one party state in a democracy! The extent of the defections is baffling as it is unheard of. We have never witnessed anything like that before in this country. This is definitely an attempt to make the outcome of 2027 elections predictable.

Why should we not have stringent guidelines that must be followed before such defections are accepted? May be we have them, but in this particular instance, the gatekeepers are the beneficiaries and therefore thoroughly compromised and therefore left with no choice but to look the other way. But we can not have democracy without a viable opposition. It makes a mockery of the very concept of a democracy.

Regrettably, with this development, accountability is made redundant, and impunity is given increased leeway to thrive, and corruption is given further impetus and the nation’s aspirations for development then compromised. There must be a return to the drawing board to make such defections difficult to undertake in the future. It makes Nigeria a laughing stock amongst the comity of nations and must therefore be brought to an end.

Look at the embarrassing spectacle coming out of Turkey as the president had to be held by the hand to support him as he observed the parade. The President earlier fell during the reception, and we are putting up untenable defence that it was due to poorly arranged carpet! Was the President the only person who walked through that space? And this is after all efforts were made to prepare and give him a medical boost for a successful trip! Honestly, we must advise Mr. President to drop his re-election ambitions.

The verdict is that if truth must be told, the ship of state is sailing on rather dangerous and turbulent waters today with its compass disabled, therefore making any development aspirations unrealistic. There is, therefore, the definite need for course correction in our overall interest as stakeholders and citizens of this beleaguered country. But how do we commence such correction, and who is going to champion the process? That is the trillion dollar question! But nonetheless, we must not give up on Nigeria. It is the only country most of us have.

Dr Chizea is a management consultant