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Collapse Thesis and the Nigerian Dilemma The African e-Journals Project has digitized full text of articles of eleven social science and humanities journals. This item is from the digital archive maintained by Michigan State University Library. Find more at: http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/africanjournals/ Available through a partnership with Scroll down to read the article. ISSUE SIX/2001 Collapse Thesis and The Nigerian Dilemma BY WALE ADEBANWI T is a peculiar rendering of a syllogism which bends or subverts difficulty of presenting a coherent picture of one rule of logic in its conclusion: first, a house divided against Nigeria—about which the eminent itself cannot stand. Then: Nigeria is a house divided against itself. Nigerianist scholar, Thomas Hodgkin, had Therefore: Nigeria (ThisHouse) has fallen. alerted us on. Even though the boob Ordinarily following the rules of deductive logic, the conclusion competently captures the dynamics of an ought to be that Nigeria (or T/i/sHouse)cannot stand. But the author "unfinished state" in which the state is follows a particularly Nigerian path—which characterized by instabilities and he chronicles in this boob — to bring home uncertainties, the slightly exaggerated title his point in a poignant manner, he bends the captures Nigeria as a "finished" state waiting rules! Therefore, a house that ought to be for its obsequies at dusb. But so do many declared incapable of standing is Nigerians, that is the significant few which (prematurely?!) deemed to have collapsed. the author met. believe. The boob But what is Karl Maier's fault in giving this consequently collocates between the fears title to his midnightish narrative on the of these Nigerians (represented by Achebe enduring puzzle called Nigeria? Is this not and Bashir Kurfi in the opening epigraphs), only a restatement of a fitting description by the hope of others (represented by Bola Ige. Karl Maier. one of the country's most distinguished also in the opening epigraphs), and the cold facts of the horrid, sordid and tragic THIS HOUSE HAS personalities and wordsmith. Chinua contradictions which has made Nigeria — FALLEN: MIDNIGHT Achebe? And are Achebe's boobs' titles not some of the most popular, most fitting, in terms of her potentials — arguably the IN NIGERIA, epithets on the Nigerian dilemma? sorriest state on the globe. Public Affairs. What Maier attempts to do with elegant You can read This House as political New York, 2000, 327pp. prose in this lacerating narrative of political journalism: you can read it as elementary, and social venality, is to transcend the painful but useful history: you can read it as informed social commentary; you can even read it as a tolerable, sympathetic subversion of the Nigerian conceit. Tabe a few narrative vignettes: ' "No one is prepared to thinh of the future." He laughed regretfully " Nigeria". he said, " is the land of no tomorrow. " Another: 'To most outsiders, the very name Nigeria conjures up images of chaos and confusion, military coups, repression, drug trafficking, and business fraud. It remains a mystery to all but a handful of academics and diplomats... Nigeria does not present a cut-and-dried moralistic tale of the South African type.' Yet another. '(W)e, the outside world, ignore Nigeria at our peril, from almost any point of view, Nigeria truly matters. However deep it has sunb into a mire of corruption, repression and economic dilapidation, Nigeria remains one of the world's strategic nations. It is the pivot on which the continent turns.' And yet another. The Niger Delta, resemble(s) a giant cracb in managing (a) windshield that (is) recently fanning outward because nobody had made the effort to repair the initial modest damage'. This chaos, which a semi-literate Karl Maier politician who has passed-on Elendora Books Supplement ISSUE SIX/2001 << onomatopoeically pronounced as "Shauus'. old order, don't change completely to a new integral to Nigeria and also the residual oasis one! of hope in the polity are captured in the While "Voting Day" (chapter two) preface of this boob. All these feed into the emphasizes the crucial issue of dissatisfaction instructive encounter the author had at the with the long years of military rule and the airport when he arrived Nigeria to begin aversion for its ruinous traditions, it more worb as a foreign correspondent. In one fell importantly reflects on the almost complete swoop he encounters the simultaneous erosion of civic virtues in Nigeria. The immodesty and warmth of Nigerians, the question that this chapter raises are as many collapse of public utilities, extortion and as they are crucial: what hope is there for a corruption. democracy that is based on every other thing The boob is divided into ten chapters with but democratic ethos? Ayetoro village, as an epilogue that wraps up the narratives. captured by this chapter on election day. Chapter one provides a perspectival history provides a prism through which this question to the emergence of the now deceased could be answered. Can those who have dwarfy military general. Sani Abacha. whose symbolized the most entrenched interests infernal desire was to reduce Nigeria to his against democracy become the agents of its 9 physical and mental limitations. Abacha's consolidation A respondent (a student) in expiration, which led to the emergence of Ayetoro tells Maier on election day: "All the Gen. Abdulsalam Abubabar. is described by students in Nigeria are against Obasanjo. an unnamed Nigerian businessman as "a When he was in power, he repressed us and coup from heaven", the title of the chapter. dismissed some university officials." While Maier also describes the inauguration of a this might only be a tip of what is yet to be civilian president on May 29, 1999. pointing seen, it provides a glimpse into the malaise out that against the bacbdrop of the history of the past which are inherent in the present. of Nigeria and her recent experience in the Another respondent says: "May be. now that hands of martial brigands, two statements Obasanjo is a civilian, he can do something. made at the occasion would seem to hold But franbly. I am not optimistic. Those much significance. First, when the military generals who brought him to power don't jet did a spectacular steep climb at the venue want him to rule on behalf of the common of the handover, to signify the end of military man. They want him there to protect their rule, the master of ceremonies bellowed out interests". Hope is suppressed by despair, to Abubabar, "God be with you until we meet which raises the next set of questions: Is a 9 again!" The second was the new President. bloodless clean breab with the past possible Olusegun Obasanjo's prayer in his speech at Can democracy be leveraged by its old the same occasion. "May the Almighty help enemies? Where this happens, can the old us." enemies, now converted democrats, carry In the womb of these two statements, as the banner across the bridge? Maier points out. but fails to elaborate, is the "In many ways Abiola was the human expression of the fears of what the future embodiment of the profound contradictions holds in store for the base-born (Nigeria) that that continue to haunt Nigeria," Maier seems has refused to thinb comprehensively, so as to answer the questions. "His was a to fundamentally re-mafee itself. This chapter, quintessential rags-to-riches story... When the against this bacbdrop, can be discursively explosion of the oil wealth was transforming linbed with the epilogue which attempts to Nigeria's military rulers into very rich men. confront what is to be done. By wondering, Abiola was perfectly placed to join them... even at his inauguration, whether Obasanjo (F)or many. Abiola symbolized the civilian would play the role of an African Mibhail elite's ruinous complicity with Western Gorbachev, "who. while trying to reform a capitalism and military rule." It was for Abiola rotten system, oversaw its dismemberment". (and Obasanjo, as Maier fails to add) that Fela Maier stribes a chord which has become a Anibulapo-Kuti composed the popular hit defining note of the Nigerian 'symphony' in "ITT-International Thief Thief". Slightly more the Obasanjo era. And it should be conceded than a decade after, the symbolism changed that this is quite insightful. Many doubting and ITT became Hope '93. though some of people had in the early months of the the most rapacious elements of the old order Obasanjo experiment abandoned their still hung on his necb. What then were the sbepticism. and even cynicism, in the new possibilities of national survival and hope of national renewal, if not redemption. redemption9 Was Abiola a wrong symbol? No The year 2000 was to bring home to them doubt, he carried his historical burden with that the Soviet-path is not totally remote, much dignity and unexpected resolve. For given the Gorbachev logic that is emblematic Maier. "his (Abiola's) presidency might have of Obasanjo's rule: don't continue with the been a mess that many predicted it would Glendora Books Supplement ISSUE SIX/2001 • be. but surely it would have been interesting." for an answer"(p.63). Haruna Mohammed, What is in fact more interesting is that silently, the editor of Citizen, a defunct news the chapter again raises the question of the magazine, who facilitated Maier's interview impossibility of neat boundaries and neat with Babangida. turns out, in his eagerness solutions: the election that ended many years to help Babangida's cause, as his (IBB's) of military rule and was supposed to end nemesis. When IBB mentions that there was several years of incompetent domination, was a report on the murder of Giwa, he an emphatic travesty of all the hallowed rules (Muhammed) quickly jumps in to ask about of democratic election.
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