kayan aiki
on Fantastic Voyage (Nigeria), 03/Aug/2010 13:18, 34 days ago
It’s odd, really, that corruption is such a massive and overwhelming issue in this country.  Despite its completely insane size, and massive number of different ethnic groups, and the two related religions which each construct the other as binary opposites, there is a great deal of pride in and commitment to the notion of one nation.  No-one I’ve had any contact with seems to feel the least inclination to consider themselves as anything other than Nigerian (maybe that has something to do with what happened last time anyone suggested there should be more than one country in this space).  In schools, the pledge and anthem occupy as prominent a space as they do in the US.  It’s a massively religious country, where everyone has (or appears to have) absolutely sincere, profound belief in intense moral codes and eternal punishment or reward.And (unlike the US) there’s an absolute commitment to high government involvement in everything: a really genuine belief that the state should be providing, for instance, a strong and free education service.  And there’s democracy – a democracy that was fought for long and hard.  Most of the military dictatorships of the late 20th century were (at least notionally) just dictating until a democratic solution could be worked out.  Campaign posters are everywhere, for everything– and many already up for the presidential elections taking place this time next year, more or less.But the situation remains that really staggeringly incomprehensible amounts of money are stolen by pretty much everyone in the whole system, pretty much all of the time.  I read something (in a Nigerian paper– no idea how accurate it is or where the figures came from) which said that, since independence (in 1960, fact fans) the amount spent on building / rebuilding Nigerian public services (not including, like, salary costs) is double the amount spent on the post-Second World War reconstruction of Western Europe.  Its obviously had some impact: there are schools; there are hospitals and clinics; there are roads (many of them pretty good, or at least useable); there is electrical supply (in the process of being privatised).  But none of it really works, most of it is inaccessible to most people, and most of it has shown no improvement whatsoever for years.  And it’s hard to escape the feeling that no matter how much time, money, and expertise is poured into the whole setup, it’ll all be a bit pointless. Imagine if the government’s school building programme in the UK (stopped now because of banking screw ups, but it was nice while it lasted) existed, but did absolutely nothing – because all of its budget was transferred into its managers’ and their managers’ and the politicians at the top’s bank accounts.  That’s what’s happened for the last ten years here – and the same in every sector. To a degree, this is just a bit inevitable:‘all histories do shew, and wise politicians do hold it necessary that, for the well-governing of every Commonweal, it behoveth man to presuppose that all men are evil, and will declare themselves so to be when occasion is offered’ (I didn’t remember all that – I tracked it down from my uninotes).  Given that there aren’t really any systems here for tracking anything, and most budgeting isn’t computerised (I’ve had the alarming experience of travelling in a car carrying the monthly allowances of 24 people in order to dish them out from a bulging plastic bag), occasion offers itself pretty often, and it seemsthat pretty much everyone –everyone- has no concerns about declaring themselves‘to be so’.It must also have something to do with the vasty gulf between rich and poor here.  There’s almost no manufacturing industry at all (there’s something quite homely about realising that the cracked and putrid toilet you’re sitting on was made 30 years ago in the UK), and next to no large scale private industry: people either scratch a living being self-employed, or work for the government.  If you make it into the latter, maybe it’s understandable that your mental focus would still be on maximising every possible source of income – even if that means you ended up with billions of Naira, several homes full of squashy furniture, and more wives than could ever be satisfied with the homely charm I wield.Nor is it healthy that (not wholly unlike the UK, I suppose) almost all politicians and people in any level of public life come from the same narrow section of society: the same schools, early experiences, families, and so on.  They’re certainly always from the same party: the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has control over the sinews of power as absolute here as any ruling party in a Communist state. Two of my colleagues found the idea that Nigeria is a democracy utterly laughable on those two points. From the outside, and knowing almost nothing about it, it seems frankly hopeless.  There certainly seems little purpose in retraining inspectors and teacher trainers, and devising new curriculum policies and guidelines when the money to roll everything out– even to print copies of the curriculum for schools – is more likely to be spent on swelling interest payments in some obnoxious little man’s account.  Still,‘I never quite despair and I read Shakespeare’ (I don’t.  I haven’t read any Shakespeare in years.  But you appreciate the sentiment.)