Nigeria Content Online

In seeking to
establish the countries that provide the best environment for human
existence, the August 23, 2010 edition of Newsweek magazine asked: “if
you were born today, which country would provide you the very best
opportunity to live a healthy, safe, reasonably prosperous, and
upwardly mobile life?” Newsweek chose five basic indices of national
wellbeing: education, health, quality of life, economic
competitiveness, and political environment. The magazine then ranked
the best 100 countries in the world.

For Nigeria, so
uniquely blessed by God, and so uniquely blighted by its rulers, the
verdict is as damning as it is shameful. We took the 99th position,
just ahead of Burkina Faso. Finland, Switzerland (a haven for the ill
gotten wealth of Nigeria’s rulers) Sweden, Australia and Luxemburg took
the first five positions in that order.

The first African
country to make the list is Tunisia, which came 65th. The next two are
Morocco (67th), Egypt (74th). Note that the first three African
countries are in North Africa. The first sub-Saharan African country on
the list is Botswana (80th), with South Africa coming 82nd. Ghana is
86th, Kenya – just back from a terrible, albeit short-lived, civil war
– (87th); Ethiopia 94th, yes Ethiopia is ahead of my country.

Mozambique so
mercilessly ravished and repressed by the Portuguese up to the late
1970s, at 95th is ahead of Nigeria too. Cameroun, our partner in the
club of highly corrupt nations is a nudge better (98th). And the
self-styled giant of Africa ruled in the last 12 years by a thug-like
political party that prides itself as the largest political party in
Africa, came 99th.

The survey also chose the best 10 heads of governments. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia made that list.

The worst thing to
happen to a country is to be saddled with corrupt and visionless
leaders. Nigeria’s tsunami of corruption is by far more devastating
than the flood in Pakistan or the earthquake in Haiti. Apart from the
brief periods of the Murtala and Buhari governments (cumulatively two
out of 50 years of independence), the other years have been the ones
that the locust visited.

I recall that as a
university student in the late 1980s, Babangida’s government deafened
us with the mantra “food, water, health, education, electricity,
housing for all by the year 2000”. The only thing David Mark
(communication minister under IBB and now Senate President) vowed the
poor would not have is telephones. Ironically, 25 years after those
promises, it is only telephony that is commonplace.

Today, just as in
the 1980s, the same rulers (who still behave as if tomorrow will not
come) have promised Vision 202020. For the uninitiated, this means that
by the year 2020, Nigeria will become one of the 20 largest economies
of the world. To date, none of those mouthing this new mantra has told
us Nigeria’s current position in the world economy. I know that USA,
China, Japan, Germany, France, UK occupy the top places in that order.
For someone who aspires to move to the 20th position, shouldn’t the
current position be known? Luckily, Newsweek has provided the answer
free of charge! Unfortunately, our politicians still behave as if we
are a rich nation. The president has just bought three state-of-the-art
jets at a pricey N25 billion (at a time when over 350 of his
compatriots have died of cholera); our National Assembly members, who
in over three years have passed only five bills (apart from the
appropriation bills), are gobbling up billions with padded allowances
and ‘constituency projects’.

In a regime where
the per capita income is below $1000, our lawmakers want to earn 500
times that figure. At the state level, the medieval lords, are busy
stealing us blind. At the local government level, the chairmen are in a
fierce popularity contest with indomie noodles or other fast moving
consumer goods on who should adorn the pages of newspapers just because
they have fixed a leaking roof in a classroom block.

To think that 150
million Nigerians have put up with this for decades defies logic. Do
our rulers know that the first responsibility of leadership is service?

One thing is clear
about Nigeria: there is a dearth of leadership at every strata of
national life. As the nation turns 50, we need people of character,
Nigerians with a zeal for service, who have not sold their conscience
to the god of money. We need Nigerians who have a sense of history, who
know that they will account for their actions here or in the hereafter.
We need men who will stand up to evil and pull down the structure of
corruption to give us a new and prosperous nation. We need them like
yesterday. God help Nigeria.

Akaninyene Esiere is a business executive in Port Harcourt.