Hon. Jibrin
Eugene Upah|30 September 2016
Hmmm Nigeria my country.
When former British Prime Minister, Mr. David Cameron referred to Nigerians as “fantastically corrupt” some few months ago, President Muhammadu Buhari and Nigerians at home and in the diaspora condemned the utterance as false, damning and an attempt to give Nigerians a bad name. Same was the reaction when United States Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump said about Nigerians been very corrupt and lazy. And just about a decade ago too, Nigerian Hip Hop star, Edriss Abdulkareem sang in one of his songs “Nigeria jaja jaga. Everything scatter scatter. Poor man dey suffer suffer…”, former President Olusegun Obasanjo at the time replied Abdulkareem saying “it is his mama and his papa that is jaga jaga”.
In spite of Nigerians saying all of this to defend its image internationally, how much has Nigerians as a people done to reject corruption? How far have we gone to salvage our own image and integrity locally amongst ourselves? Are we a mere mouth and paper propagandists, or we are on a mission with no root destination? Is there still an iota of integrity among our elected public servants and other high office holders? Are we on a mission to build a new Nigeria or we are still making trends towards deceiving the younger generations that there is a better tomorrow when actually we aren’t doing anything to actualize this dreams?
A few weeks ago, Hon. Abdulmumin Jibrin, representing Kiru/Bebeji federal constituency, Kano State in the House of Representatives, blew a whistle about an ongoing budget padding scam among some three key members of the House. Thereafter, the Hon. Member went ahead to petition the presidency, EFCC, ICPC, Inspector General of Police, and other appropriate authorities on the deal. At some point, the polity became heated which led to a division among members. The pro-Jibrin lawmakers swore to protect him while also asking to know why the budget was padded in favor of this three members. Nigerians stood at akimbo to see how events would unfold but only to the disappointment of many today to learn that the whistle blower himself has been suspended for a hundred and eighty official days by the same members who swore to “protect him and get to the root of the matter”.
I think that there should be a law to protect whistle blowers and secret leakers in this country, because as it stands now, one won’t like to expose a lie and be left preyed to his hunters. The Speaker of the House, Hon. Yakubu Dogara himself came out to say that padding is not a crime. So what is? This was in defense to the allegation by Hon. Jibrin. What I don’t get is; was it wrong for Hon. Jibrin to have exposed this scandal? Why is he been suspended? I still don’t get it. Is the Presidency and other organizations supporting crockery? When next such a thing happens, can another member garner courage to expose a similar thing? Hmmm Nigeria my country.
Such is the fate in our university systems were male lecturers are taking advantage of the female folks. Till this point of my writing this, the Nigerian higher academic environment does not have a system that can discipline any lecturer who take advantage of a female student. Where are we heading to in this country? Until all this anomalies are fixed, and the necessary parameters put in place, we will continue to make one step forward, and two steps backwards.
Eugene Upah
Writes from Calabar
simplyeugenik@gmail.com
