Nigeria: Has the man died in all of us?

By Promise Adiele

Born in 1934, Nigeria’s god of literature, Wole Soyinka is a protean figure. It is only by grace, that inscrutable principle of unearned good fortune, that Soyinka is alive today having dedicated his youthful days combating executive rascality.

Through his writings, he has affected the consciousness of many people around the world especially those who read his books at one time or another to pass their exams.

Soyinka is an enigma of some sort. Arrested, harassed, exiled, and intimidated many times by different military junta for his commitment to realign an ineffectual status quo,

Soyinka defied all the odds to win the prestigious Nobel Prize for Literature. In 1986, together with Chinua Achebe and JP Clark, he marched to Dodan Barracks to plead with the then military president, IBB, to spare the life of Mamman Vatsa who was accused of plotting a coup.

During the Nigerian civil war, Soyinka was imprisoned by Gowon for his attempts to stop the war through dialogue and peaceful negotiation.

His prison memoir after the war, The Man Died provides the galvanizing impulse for today’s piece. Conspicuously enshrined in the book is the expression “the man dies in all who keep silent in the face of tyranny”.

“The man dies in all who keep silent in the face of tyranny”, conveys the obvious reality which confronts Nigeria today.

In the context of the quote, the word “man” has no gender specification. Rather, it connotes all the attributes of resilience, determination, doggedness, and perseverance irrespective of the gender category.

So when the “man” dies in all of us, it means that the attributes mentioned above are all dead in all of us and when these attributes are dead in any person or group, it means that existence has become synonymous with death.

The situation in Nigeria today and the sedating complacency by the populace suggest that the man has died in all of us.

Nigeria today, as headed by Mr Muhammadu Buhari is rudderless.

Even the most ardent supporters of this administration are aware that our country is being tossed about by an invidious whirlwind.

All the indices that daily push our country to the precipice are familiar. Life has become unbearable in our country.

Social structures and institutions are comatose. The economy is in a steady decline with untold precariousness at the global stage.

Corruption among government officials has hit an all-time high, therefore, one recognizes the sanctimonious opiate inherent in such deceitful platitude like “fight against corruption”.

Suffering, hunger, poverty, and death have all become our regular companions. Insecurity has never been this bad in the history of Nigeria, perhaps second to the conditions of the civil war.

That these situations threaten to bludgeon Nigerians to damnation is certainly not a problem.

Countries across the world face hardship from time to time. Nigerians have faced hardship under various military regimes.

However, what defies explanation is the inexcusable docile acceptance of these anomalies in our country. This is not Nigeria.

The present government has capitalized on the apparent air of lethargy blowing across the country to foist hardship on the people.

Shockingly, Nigerians are quiet, suggesting that the man has died in all of us. Could this be the same Nigeria of warriors and heroes, a country where the military was chased out of power?

A country where the citizens defied military sadism to enthrone democracy? Suddenly, Nigerians are asleep while poverty status is mindlessly conferred on them through reprobate economic policies.

Nigerians are suffering and smiling and it seems we have resigned to fate which reminds me of Ola Rotimi’s admonition that “to resign oneself to fate is to be crippled fast”.

Something has happened to us, if not, why would we all sit down in our homes, fold our arms and swallow these vulgarities from the present government?

What is the justification for the hike in electricity tariffs and petroleum pump price?

Please, apologists of this macabre dance of death should spare me of all the economic jargons that do not make sense to the man on the streets.

Unfortunately, and I say this with every sense of responsibility, the current generation in Nigeria does not know what has hit it.

We seem not to realize the depth of the abyss into which the Buhari administration has plunged us and eyeball to eyeball, we are watching one another gradually roasting to death.

Part of the tragedy of this generation, the army of youths in Nigeria, is that they are expecting people like Wole Soyinka, Tunde Bakare, JP Clark, and other old men to fight this battle for them.

Soyinka and co have played their parts. It is left for us to play our parts too.

I think it smacks of idiocy for anybody to expect an 86-year-old Wole Soyinka, a man who has dedicated his life to fighting for the common man, to match to the streets protesting against price hike and hardship in Nigeria while our youths eat popcorn, cross their legs, watch BBnaija, Telemundo, and discuss European football.

I was in Lagos, fresh from secondary school in 1993 when the civil society groups confronted military regime on the streets.

I remember NADECO, I remember PENGASSAN of those days. I remember many other civil society groups formed by young men who were committed to salvaging Nigeria.

It tells of a doomed generation of youths who still expect those people, actors of the 1993 era to continue the fight today.

Those people have played their parts, I am playing my part through writing, and after all, writing is a resistant, revolutionary mechanism.

Everyone must play a part. We must not become self-glorifying, double-speaking, social media reactionaries while unconscionable government lead us to Golgotha for crucifixion.

The Ojota demonstration ground is still open. There are many other demonstration grounds across the country.

If the people who slap us are not challenged, they will continue to slap us.

If we do not react now, if we do not resist this hardship in our country, if we do not say no, further hardship will certainly be inflicted on us while we watch and pray.

What crime did Nigerians commit to deserve this level of savagery contemptuously inflicted on them? Our country has become a police state where, if you voice your frustrations, DSS will hound you to death.

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It is satanic to beat a child and ask the child not to cry. If we do not react, if we do not stir in some ways, death is imminent and this is the painful reality.

Has the man died in all of us? Yes, the man will die in all of us if we continue to keep quiet in the face of this Nigerian tyranny.

I believe, as I have always done, that the will and determination of our people to survive cannot be broken.

The current phase of hardship inflicted on our people will not last forever. However, I am worried about the dilapidating effects these gruesome policies will have on our psyche.

The damage will be irreparable. Let us act now or forever be consigned to an economic necropolis.