Ebola Victory: A Metaphor of the Nigerian Spirit

Ebola Victory: A Metaphor of the Nigerian Spirit

Power corrupts, but lack of power corrupts absolutely.

-           Adlai Stevenson

On Monday, October 20, the World Health Organization (WHO) officially declared Nigeria Ebola-free. This is after having gone a whooping forty-one day period without recording any new case of infection and also after all of those under surveillance had successfully gone through the window period of the virus without manifesting symptoms and thus certified free of the infection.

The disease had found its way into Nigeria, early July, after a certain Liberian diplomat, Patrick Sawyer, smuggled himself into the country, knowing full well that he had been infected from taking care of a relative of his before she died of the disease. Many Nigerians suspected malice or a conspiracy of sorts in Sawyer’s action but his wife would put up a defense for her late husband that he actually sneaked into Nigeria because he believed he would be able to access better. Whatever his real motives were, he alone knew them and he lies with them in his grave today. For all of his failings as a human being, may God have mercy on him and grant him peaceful repose. Out of the nineteen recorded infections in Nigeria, eleven persons survived while eight others died joining Patrick Sawyer. We will never forget the courage of Dr Adadevoh and the young pregnant nurse, whose first day at First Consultant Medical Centre, Obalende, would expose her to her death; they were gallant. May God rest all of them.

But the Ebola exposure has brought out the best in and from Nigeria and Nigerians. Nigeria went full swing into the battle and came out victorious. Today, the nation is a reference point on how others can combat the epidemic. The government took the lead and every Nigerian joined unreservedly in the campaign. There is a legitimate good feeling in the country for having achieved this success. The government is justifiably basking in the unassailable victory. Confidence is welling up among Nigerian no matter how little. Talk about lemonade out of life’s lemons.

This is an eloquent metaphor of the kind of people and nation that await purposeful leadership in this country. Nigerians have been dubbed skeptics and cynics for not believing or trusting their governments; but indeed cynics and skeptics have been made out of them because of successive dashed hopes. They have trusted and have been let down. They look at peer-nations like Singapore, Malaysia and Ghana and see strides made even under military juntas and wonder why theirs have only brought them suffering and deepened mutual suspicion amongst fellow compatriots. They look at others like Botswana and Rwanda and wonder how their own foray into democracy has not been able to place them on the path of progress. Even if they do not know or realize it, it’s not as if Nigerians expect some magic of overnight success. They just want to see clearly that they on some path that leads to good. Any leadership that puts them on such a path Nigerians will follow before long; and this has been proven.

Before Fashola no one ever believed that Lagos will be what it is today. But even before Fashola himself, then Col Marwa sparked that hope but successive governments never picked the gauntlet. Fashola did it and, in spite of the initial discomforts, Lagosians gave his government their full backing hence, this laud we are singing of the state. Another hitherto thought difficult state is Kano. Just like Lagos, people thought that little facilities such as traffic lights were incapable of working in the town. Kwankwaso came and proved everyone wrong. Traffic lights and many more amenities were put in place and rules enforced; even commercial bike operators were expelled from the town; street begging was outlawed. To the surprise of all, Kanawa did not just fall in line but fell in love with such purposeful governance. Before then, the lawlessness on the streets of Kano and the swarm of beggars were enough to snuff the living daylight out of one. These are not the only examples: there are Cross Rivers and Akwa Ibom states.

All of the above have proven very eloquently that all Nigerians need is the kind of leadership that walks the talk; one that is ready to set them on the path to good and is seen unequivocally on that path. They are ready to sacrifice to follow. The Ebola campaign has shown that to the whole world. Infact Nigerians will go to lengths to work for their individual, hence collective, good. Or what can one say of the “salt-baths” across the country on the night of August 7? Funny as it seemed, it demonstrated the survival quotient of the average Nigerian and his readiness to fall in line given the right environment, if the law of invisible hand, which states that in order to satisfy ones desires one necessarily has to satisfy those of others, is anything to go by.

We congratulate this government, of Goodluck Jonathan, for the success of this Ebola campaign. They have seen how Nigerians have cooperated. If they had approached many other issues in this manner, they would have long had Nigerians in their kitty.

BLUEPRINT Newspaper; Oct 23, 2014; p3

St Joseph’s Minor Seminary, Zaria, at 50!

St Joseph’s Minor Seminary, Zaria, at 50!

Zwahu, Y.E

“There is a school I will take you to, you’ll love it there,” she said.

“Which school is that?” I asked rather disinterestedly, rather thinking of the Nigerian Military School, Zaria, where my friend already was and whose appearance in smart military fatigue I admired and so longed to spot.

“It is a school where young boys are groomed to become priests… Reverend Fathers.”

“Ehen,” my interest spiked. Images of immediate past parish priest, Fr Thomas McNamara, whom I so loved flashed through my head, and then those of the new one, Fr Lawrence Bakut, too. I was always in awe of Fr Lawrence who had just been ordained. He was young, spoke English the way I longed to, and just never missed the opportunity to sing the Mass in Latin, no matter how little. I loved the solemnity of the Latin chants even though I never understood the language; they just communicated the sacred.

Those images seemed to exorcize the military fantasy out of me in a flash. I imagined myself in white soutane with the cape flying about in careless abandon to the whims of the breeze. “What is the name of the school?” I asked my mother.

“St Joseph’s Minor Seminary, Zaria,” she answered, happy I was liking the idea. “The entrance forms are out, I’ll pick one for you tomorrow when we go for choir practice.” I had been a choir boy all my life; a church boy. That was in 1984.

On the 15^th of September, 1985, I, along with other freshers, resumed Form I at SJS, as we would call the school. The school was sparsely built: the academic block which housed the five classrooms, the Staff Room, the Vice Rector’s office, and the small Chapel the size the classrooms; then two hostel blocks of thirteen dormitories named after saints, each of which housed about ten students. The entire population of the school was 125. Each class was one arm then.

The very next morning, we assembled in the Chapel for the term’s opening Mass and the choir prefect, now Fr Joachim Makama, intoned the hymn “Here I am Lord, Is it I Lord? I have heard You calling in the night; I will go Lord, if You Lead me; I will hold Your people in my heart…” and I thought to myself, “this thing is serious business.”

A minor seminary is a secondary school but with Catholic formation and discipline to prepare lads for a vocation into the Catholic priesthood. St Joseph’s Minor Seminary, Zaria, was established in January 1964 by Archbishop John McCarthy, then archbishop of Kaduna, to serve the vocations grooming needs of the diocese and beyond. The founding Rector was Fr Joseph Hughes. Unlike its neighbor, St Enda’s Teachers College, Bassawa-Zaria (now FGGC Zaria, having been Bassawa Teachers College until 1988), St Joseph’s managed to escape the 1973 government take-over of mission schools because of its special niche. The two schools had used the same major chapel, St Enda’s Chapel.

School fees were a hundred naira per term then. My parents only managed sixty or so naira upon my resumption with a promise to make up the rest as the term went on. The amount would remain so until we graduated. Even at the time, that amount was not enough for tuition and feeding. Teachers had to be paid; the school had to be maintained. The Church struggled to supplement to keep the school going. Little wonder that earlier, in 1978, the then Archbishop, Peter Jatau, decided to phase out the school but for the passionate intervention of poor catholic women, the Zumuntar Matan Katolika, who offered to help in the feeding of the children. The Archbishop reneged and the women taxed themselves and continued to feed the children monthly, parish by parish. We will never forget them.

A very sad event happened on March 11, 1987 when, at the outbreak of the famous Kafanchan Riots in the old Kaduna state, Muslim arsonists burnt down the entire school and the St Enda’s Chapel sparing only the Rev Frs’ house and the staff quarters. Many churches, from Kaduna all the way to Katsina, were razed down in a curious spontaneity on that one day. Graciously, no student was harmed, thanks to the wisdom of good old Mr Patrick Dagun, our English Language teacher, who prevented the older students from putting up any resistance. We took refuge at the nearby Army Barracks in Bassawa. That crisis would mark the beginning of religious crises in the north as a whole. We never knew.

The Seminary formed us indeed. We were taught the value of work. St Benedict was always drummed into our ears, “laborare est orare,” (to work is to pray). We were taught the value of working for the community above the self, which was why a student could be expelled for not doing his morning duty while spared cutting classes or chapel. The thinking was that cutting classes or chapel affected only you the offender while failing in your morning duty affected the entire seminary community. It was a drill in the virtue of service.

St Joseph’s has also continued to maintain a sterling academic pedigree to this day even in the face of the groveling educational standard today especially in northern Nigeria. Apart from the many priests that it has produced, among whom are two Bishops, George Dodo of Zaria and Mathew Kukah of Sokoto who himself was the second Nigerian Rector of the school in 1980/1981, the school has produced a vast many others who have excelled in their various fields of endeavour.

Tomorrow we begin a two-day Golden Jubilee celebration which includes an Oldboys’ evening where Rev Dr Gerard Musa, a professor at the Catholic Institute of West Africa, Port-Harcourt, will lecture on the topic “March 1987 and Interreligious Dialogue in Northern Nigeria”. Fr Gerard is an indigene of Katsina State and was a final year student in 1987 when the school was burnt down.

On this occasion, we say to our Alma-Mater, no matter how worn out your breasts are, your milk is still sweet. To the Church we say thank You!

 

BLUEPRINT Newspaper; Oct. 16, 2014

Religion and the Manipu... (Is Shekau Really Dead?)

Religion and the Manipulation of politics in Nigeria

Rev Fr Anthony Zakka

Nigeria seems quite a religious society. Religion is very deeply enshrined in this country. And
often it takes quite conservative, sometimes violent forms. What your thoughts on religion
in Nigeria and what it means for anarchism and organizing society might be quite different from mine. Whatever your thoughts, religion and religious practices have entered a new phase in Nigeria. Before the advent of colonialism, our people were mostly traditional religionists, who worshipped small gods – gods of thunder, gods of river, and such other gods. With the coming of colonialism, the two main global religions – Islam and Christianity – became a predominant force in the lives of Nigerians.

The rivalry and competition between the two religions has tended to play down the fact that not all
Nigerians are Christians or Muslims. Even in the North-central, you are talking about pagan tribes and different forms of African religion that take place in those places. But today Nigeria is profiled and stereotyped as a Christian South and a Muslim North. Yet, in the North you find a lot of non-adherents to Islam, you come to the South as well you find a lot of non-adherents to Christianity.

But in the past twenty to thirty years the singular influence of Christianity and Islam has been considerably negative on the Nigeria society in the sense that both religions have become sources of manipulation, political manipulation of ordinary people. Whenever you hear there is a religious riot in the North, a religious riot in the East and you go down and examine the issues, they are not basically religious. Politicians are usually being accused for using religion to manipulate the ordinary people into fighting for the political positions and beliefs of the elite.

Religion seems to become an instrument of manipulation, exploitation, deceit, and large-scale blindfolding of ordinary people in Nigeria. It is one of the elements militating against social consciousness and the development of the working class, as a class, in Nigeria. The development of a class of the dispossessed, the oppressed, the marginalized, who feel and share common interests and are keen to fight for those common interests. Religion is thrown in as a wedge, as a source of conflict among ordinary people. Like Karl Marx said, religion becomes the opium of society. Every little thing is covered and given a religious coloration, when it is actually not. It is a tremendous setback to the development of social consciousness in Nigeria and the rest of Africa as a whole.

Nowadays, however, it seems religious leaders are manipulating political leaders. Or how do you explain a situation where religious leaders create a case of apprehension by organizing prayer sessions, crusades, night vigils, sacrifices, etc in the name of protection for politicians who are desperate. Who is manipulating who when politicians turn imams or pastors overnight? Who is manipulating who when politicians become impoverished after leaving office while their 'anointed' clerics fly their jets years after?

(Fr Zakka is the Director of the Media Service Centre, Kaduna.)

Is Shekau Really Dead?

That was my friend, Fr Zakka, asking the question about religion and politics: which manipulates which?

Two weeks ago, the media was awash with news of the death of the leader of the Boko Haram insurrectionists. We saw a picture of a bearded corpse, marred with blood, in red trousers. To drive home the fact that it was surely the Shekau, his live picture was juxtaposed with that of the corpse with arrows in both pictures indexing a slight lump on the forehead, a proof that indeed it was Shekau and that indeed he has been killed. Many Nigerians on social media jubilated and showered adulations on the Nigerian armed forces.

We saw some short video clips to that effect on social media but none was particularly telling whether or not he had been killed. There was this particular one with a title that suggested that he was actually caught alive, interviewed and then killed. But then it is a very short clip that shows the supposed Shekau sitting in those red trousers clearly wounded, and then a soldier is heard shouting something to the effect that he should be wasted. Then we suddenly see the dead man’s still picture; the same one used to index his forehead as proof of his identity. The problem with that clip is that it is only five or so second. We don’t hear anything of the said interview – or is it exchange with the said Shekau.

However, there is a more telling video. It is a clip of about ten minutes by some persons in Konduga. They videoed a lot of corpses, that littered the street, in the aftermath of some clash with the insurgents. What is not clear is who actually engaged the insurgents, because the kind of wounds on the corpses show the use of rather crude weapons instead of sophisticated ones that the Nigerian Armed forces would use. But the interesting thing is that at the end of the clip, that same corpse of Shekau(?) is seen.

But last week news began to filter in, first from the French media which the insurrectionists always send their videos to, that Shekau may not have been killed afterall. We have now seen a video of him gloating over Nigeria that he is alive. He even makes reference to Chinda, the pilot of the missing military fighter jet, and how they killed him after days of detention.

My older daughter is confused. She has asked me whether or not Shekau has been killed. I am confused too. Please Mr President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, has Shekau been killed or not? Parents are at a loss of what to tell their children. At least Obama spoke when the Navy Seals took out Osama Bin Laden.

BLUEPRINT Newspaper; Oct. 9, 2014

Oritsejafor: The Miry Dance

Oritsejafor: The Miry Dance

Lately, Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, the President of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), has been in the eye of the storm for the most controversial of reasons. The South African authorities, about three weeks ago, apprehended two Nigerians along with an Israeli on their shores with an undeclared sum of 9.3million US dollars on a private air plane belonging to the CAN President. The Nigerian government rose to own up that the said amount was meant for the procurement of arm for the Nigerian Armed Forces. Ayo Oritsejafor himself, upon enquiry from the media, said he never knew anything about it other than that he leased out the craft to an air operator, Eagle Air, who rented it out to a third party, thus the plane ending up in South Africa. He is said to have a controlling share of Eagle Air. Many people do not believe him, especially President Jonathan’s opponents and also many of the nation’s Muslims.

The real intent of the people, money and plane in South Africa is not the subject of this piece. What we are concerned with is the fact that the “number one” Christian in Nigeria is once again in murky waters and it doesn’t matter whether he dove into it by himself or he was pushed; and, by the way, from preceding event since he became CAN chairman in 2010, anybody may as well conclude that he dove into those waters. The question might just be about what he went looking for in the waters when he took the dip.

Never in its life has Christendom in Nigeria been as divided as under the leadership of Pst Oritsejafor. Ab initio, he never tried to mask his relationship with President Jonathan. Of course he was never expected to severe any relationship that had hitherto probably existed between them, but it was expected that in the light of his new position as the leader of CAN, considered to be the moral compass of the nation, he would device a way of balancing, even delicately, his personal and official life. But alas, the man of God would speak concerning Goodluck Jonathan as a Chief Edwin Clark or an Asari Dokubo would. It got to a head early in the day that, in September 2012, the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria withdrew from CAN at the national level, citing Oritsejafor’s closeness to the president and the presidency as uncomfortable and debilitating to the independence and the rectitude of the Association. The Bishops indicated that in the two years, then, of Oritsejafor, CAN had deviated from its founding precepts and concepts. That is also beside the man’s own style and temperament in engaging national matters, which many have considered rather caustic and hormonal, lacking in the deep reflection becoming of sage bodies like CAN. Little wonder, matters concerning him brought about steep, virulent and polar reactions among Nigerian Christians, not to mention the Muslims who see in him the enemy numero uno.

Therefore, when, in November 2012, Pst Oritsejafor acquired the gift of a private jet to mark his fortieth anniversary in ministry, it was another hue among Christians. When Bishop Kukah, in a paper at a Baptist Church in lagos read by a representative priest, remarked generally that “the embarrassing stories of pastors displaying conspicuous wealth as we hear from the purchases of private jets and so on clearly diminish our moral voice,” hell broke loose. Pst Tunde Bakare, a Pentecostal like Oritsejafor, had made similar remarks. Sunday Oibe, CAN’s spokesman, lashed back, suggesting that both religious leaders might have something against Pastor Oritsejafor, and were merely hiding under the cloak of the gift of a jet to attack him. He said “If there is any clergyman in the country whose constituency is government, it is Bishop Kukah, who served every government in power in the last decade”. Reacting to Oibe, the Concerned Northern Nigerian Christians (CNNC) retorted, saying that Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor cannot match Bishop Kukah in integrity and morality. The acrimony did not stop at those levels; it went right down the ranks.

Clearly, it appears that Oritsejafor has been incapable of disambiguating between life as the pastor of his Warri Church and the headship of CAN. Of course no one talks at that level of Oyedepo or Adeboye or Oyakhilome, who are said to have about ten jets between them, because they have not come up to represent the entirety of Christians in Nigeria. They are entitled to their morality and those who troop to them are entitled to their choices. He has also not realized the fact that he is CAN President at a difficult time in the nation’s life: with an insurgency that clearly feeds on unabated corruption, a corruption that this government has not been seen to help but to perpetrate.  He has not been able to see that he needs uncommon wisdom and self denial to navigate through these waters. Now his controversial toy, the private jet, has brought him needless attention, in the dimensions of money laundering or arms race. And as I say here, perception is powerful. But then correlation is not necessarily causation.

Oritsejafor has not realized that the present insurgency and what it stands for is a great embarrassment to some quarters and since they cannot wish it away, they will stop at nothing to drag him or the body he represents to the mud, if only to manage to let the embarrassment go round.

He needs prayers for he has danced deep into mire. He may just need to do the needful: he should resign. But can he? He’s a Nigerian too.

 

BLUEPRINT Newspaper; Oct. 2, 2014