Military rule can never be the solution

Located between Iyaro and Uselu, two of the oldest motor parks in Benin City capital of Edo State, is the Psychiatric hospital. It’s there that mentally ill patients with “European defined” psychiatric disorders are treated with modern medicines. Outside the City limits are the traditional medicine homes where those with “local” psychiatric disorders are chained to trees in the bush while home grown remedies are applied. Anyone suggesting that the Military should once again intervene in our national affairs is not only unpatriotic, but evidently delusional requiring immediate treatment in one of these two types of psychiatric institutions. Both the Chief of Army Staff, and the British High Commissioner to Nigeria have sounded warnings on the rumours that some politicians intend to encourage the military to upstage the political class.

If truth be told, bitterness against the manner in which politicians are running our society is growing daily. The prevailing injustices, disgraceful living conditions and nonsensical sham of democracy we are lumbered with is fostering public outrage. Fortunately for politicians rather than taking to the streets Nigerians of all ages are voting with their feet to flee the country. Who can blame them? If our President can’t find a single hospital in the country fit to treat whatever is ailing him, why should anyone else remain here? But this is no justification for those who remain here to encourage military intervention of any sort. This would be a step backwards not forwards. It’s an indictment of the political class that the human rights denying, massively corrupt military era is seen as a lost paradise compared to today. But those who are old enough to know better will remember the collective overwhelming sigh of relief when the military were finally disgraced out of office.

The antics of Military adventurists set the nation on the path to ruin, and also turned what was once professional, disciplined, loyal, and patriotic armed forces into a corrupted ill-motivated rabble incapable of overcoming a rag-tag insurgency group. Anyone inciting the military to take action to supposedly save us from this current crop of clueless, corrupt, unprincipled, election rigging and uncaring politicians lacks knowledge of history. There is no doubt that our “new breed” politicians are to blame for the mire into which the nation has sunk. The National Assembly is becoming the biggest impediment to progress in the nation. Their lack of commitment to reducing their obscene remuneration; failure to enact impactful legislation; failure to prevent corruption through effective oversight functions; and incessant scandals are a national disgrace.

The recent indecent purchase of Senator Dino Melaye’s grammatically substandard book by the National Assembly leadership for a reported total sum of N23.4 million at public expenses is just another slap in the face for Nigerians. Legislators are mistakenly interpreting silence as a signal that all is well, rather than understanding that their monumental gracelessness has rendered most Nigerians speechless. Under normal circumstances things should be getting better as the nation imbibes the lesson of history, but those in charge of our educational system ensured that for so many years History was not a compulsory subject for our children. Over the years’ the Federal Ministry of Education has been headed by Professors and Doctorate Degree holders in every specialisation except common sense! They ruined a good education system by unnecessary tinkering the end result being that we have now produced a generation of ill-informed, poorly educated, politically unconscious youths. History primarily teaches patriotism. It teaches the youth where they are coming from, the mistakes of the past and the ideals of their forefathers. Nowadays Youths from the South-East romanticise Biafra. History would have taught them that it wasn’t some sort of high-point for Igbo people, but rather an unmitigated humanitarian, political and economic disaster. Youths agitating in the Niger Delta feel that the nation owes them something.

History would have taught them that they have been cheated by their own leaders most of whom became Billionaires by syphoning off funds meant for their development. Despite it being crystal clear that the current crop of politicians is our problem, there is no shortage of alternatives to the way and manner in which our nation is being run aground and military intervention isn’t one of them. Patriotic Nigerians need to reexamine the age profile of our political leaders and the basis for our unity. The new French President was six years old when President Buhari last ruled Nigeria. It’s time we abandoned governance by the elderly and let the future be decided by those to whom the future belongs. The rest of the world has moved on while we are still stuck in the past.

A major problem with educating our youth to imbibe the lessons of our post-independence history is that so many of the actors who contributed massively to the decline of our nation and who history will condemn, are still alive and playing active roles in our body politic. They say that the stone you see coming should not blind you, but Nigeria appears to be walking wide eyed into a major political upheaval.