The irony of ‘jailed’ funds and free lunatics

Since the story broke on the $43mn ‘jailed’ in an empty apartment in Ikoyi, the idea of becoming a career whistleblower has never been more tempting. I have toyed with many different strategies on how to become the best at that endeavour if I finally decide to retire into the most lucrative job now on offer in the country, but, unfortunately, I’m yet to arrive at the best mix that will yield the maximum return on effort. Should I start by investing in prayer warriors for signs, wonders and revelations of specific lucrative GPS locations or commit resources to technology that can perceive mint foreign currency from outer space? How about putting the hired hands of ‘suspects’ on juicy remuneration in exchange for relevant information? Or will a mix of all the above offer diversification and increase my chances of hitting the jackpot? I’d leave you all to help me find the answers.

In this whole $43mn saga, the most amusing part was the speed with which the money became a plague, whose ownership had to be refuted by a cocktail of lawyers to anybody mentioned in the same breath as the mysterious stash. Thankfully, we were put out of the ownership misery when a government agency, the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) stepped forward to lay claim to the ‘forbidden’ cash. The stories that have followed on how the money came about, have, however, been anything but intelligent. I find it confusing that an intelligence agency, supposedly adept at covert operations for which the cash was released, were outed by gatemen using just their common sense. I also find it bordering on lunacy that such amount of money can be kept unproductive for as long as they claim the money has been in their ‘care’.

The suspended DG of NIA is not alone in this epidemic insanity that manifests in different forms in Nigeria. We have seen people sell parcels of land, which is an asset, to buy car, which is a liability, then beg for money to fuel the car. We have seen politicians embezzle the funds meant to build roads, then use the money to buy ‘fast and furious’ cars with no roads to drive them on. The scenes of the absurdity of a former governor that stole his people blind and was convicted and jailed in the UK, but returned to drums and thanksgiving celebration by the same people he impoverished is ever so fresh in our memories. Our elections, that oftentimes turn out to be ethnic and religious census rather than selection of the competent is also a confirmation of our retrogressive mental state of health.

One question I keep asking myself, to which I haven’t found an answer, is why the average black man is still primitive in thoughts and actions? Why is almost every black nation with natural resources at war? Why are we behind in almost every developmental index? Why do we sell our raw materials then turn around to import the finished products from the same raw materials? Why do we become lame once we get into positions of authority that we need aides to carry our bags and even personal mobile phones? Why do we have terrible maintenance culture? Why do we fund medical and educational tourism from our reserves and then turn around and complain that we don’t have good hospitals and decent educational system? Why is the urge for individual riches greater than our realisation for the need for collective comfort? Why are we so short-sighted? Why are we not telling our own stories? Why haven’t we written our own history?

Now elite Nigerians have graduated to jailing and burying monies that could be put to the good use of wealth creation, while these same lunatics in fine clothing are roaming our streets. The first step to solving any problem is realising there is one, and in our own case, there are several. We need to commit resources to finding answers to why we are the way we are. The people we blame for our misfortune understand us better than we know ourselves. It’s high time we started working towards our own answers.

Olugbenga A. Olufeagba