Political Agenda For Mbieri By H.U.C Chukwudire (ksm) A paper presented at the “Mbieri Conference 2007”, held at the Mbieri Renaissance Club Hall, Mbieri; January 1st and 2nd 2007. Introduction I am called upon to discuss the topic, “Political Agenda for Mbieri”. I accepted and that is why I am here. It is not just that I am here, I have already started to discuss the topic. I am convinced that every true son, daughter or wife of Mbieri a who has attained some political maturity have some idea about what should be the political agenda for Mbieri today. Since I am selected and given the task to lead the discussion, I have to start somewhere and somewhere. My duty is to provoke thought among you. For the purpose of the discourse, I have the following subheadings to guide me. I. My understanding of Political Agenda II. Concept of Human Behaviour and its influencing factors. III. Some proverbial statements and their possible influence on Mbieri Character. IV. Mbieri and Mbieri People-Yesterday V. Mbieri and Mbieri People- today VI. Mbieri –tomorrow: The way forward. VII. Conclusion. 1. POLITICAL AGENDA FOR MBIERI The word politics refers to what politicians do. A politician is one versed in the science and art of government, on engaged in political life of statesmanship. Politicians are characteristically interested in party politics and authority sharing. Politics is a game of a kind and has its rules, procedures and characteristics. It is a clean game when played according to defined rules but dirty when politicians with dirty minds abuse the rules and share money. One of its characteristics is that it is a game of number. A politician with large follower-ship is likely to win a contested seat at any level of government. Another character is that in clean politics, there are no permanent friends or enemies. Politicians are harlots of some kind that is why they jump from one political party to another, in pursuit of their objectives. Because of their selfish agenda and the uncertainty of election results, it is not advisable to put all your trust on a politician or a particular political party. Politics is a game of chance. The word Agenda, on its part refers to “things to be done”. It refers to the programme of business for a meeting. Political Agenda, therefore, implies things to be done or course of action within a political framework. To talk about political Agenda for Mbieri is to consider what Mbieri and Mbieri People should do to respond to the political needs and aspirations of the people which will ultimately ensure socio-economic development of Mbieri and social welfare for the people. 2. CONCEPT OF HUMAN BEHAVIOUR To be actively involved in politics including mapping out political agendas for a people involves a lot of activities, some of which people can easily see and others not easily noticeable to the human eye. In short, political behavior occurs in several ways. The question then is what is behavior? The discipline of psychology within the broad area of social sciences is concerned with the behavior of human beings and even animals. For psychologists, behavior is what people do; what people do may, for the purpose of this discourse, be grouped into three domains of areas of consideration. First, man thinks, reasons and engages in various forms of intellectual activities. This, in this Forum, we are thinking about the fate of Mbieri in the Politics and governance of the day, whether at the Mbaitoli level or the Imo State level up to the national level. How far have we fared in the last 8 years of civil administration in Imo state? Look at all the roads leading to Mbieri. See how deplorable they are! Any state or Federal Presence in Mbieri? We can simply ask why all this, and go no further! At the second level of behavior, we consider affective correlates such as feelings, emotions, interests, and attitude. The way most Mbieri people feel about the present Imo Stat government is largely influenced by what they think and know about the Government attitude towards Mbieri and her people. At the third level of behavior are the overt or observable actions. The thoughts and feelings of a person which are largely unobservable can be translated into observable actions. If we combine the three levels of behavior-thinking, feeling and acting, we arrive at a situation where one influences the other. For instance, if Mbieri people think and seriously come to the conclusion that Mbieri has been marginalized in the outgoing Government of Imo of State, our feelings and attitude towards the government operatives are boud to be negatively affected. Outwardly most Mbieri people are likely to orchestrate the failures of the Government more than its achievements. In a way, this may affect the voting pattern of the people during the expected 2007 elections. In summary, while we consider what should be the political agenda for Mbieri (in the future) we should consider thoughts, feelings and actions that are functional, goals-oriented and good enough for Mbieri. 3. FACTORS THAT INFLUENCE HUMAN BEHAVIOUR. Factors which influence or determine human behavior may be grouped under Biological, Enviornmental and Supernatural. (a) Biological/hereditary/genetic factors. These are those characteristics offspring usually inherit from their parents. They include intelligence, body physique, temperament….and diseases like diabetes, asthma, high/low blood pressure and cardiac problems. We can refer to this group as “what comes from blood- (Ihe sin’obara/aburu.)” For this reason, a snake must produce long replicas. People are often dismissed with a sweeping statement”. Leave him, it is their characteristic behavior”. Let me ask my listeners, do Mbieri people have characteristic bahaviours”? If we do, the functional and still relevant ones should be upheld and reinforced while obsolete ones should be discarded and expunged form Mbieri culture. (b) Environment/Interactional factor: Factors in this group include the effect of socialization, acculturation, traveling, meeting and association with people within and outside Mbieri. We may refer to these factors as “Ihe sin a Mmekorita mmadu na ibe ya” As we interact across our geo-political and socio-cultural boundaries, we should copy and emulate what is good and commendable and drop what will not be helpful to us as a people. Mr. Hegoat (Nwamkpi) under scored the importance of traveling when he confessed that but for his visit to his maternal home, he would not have learnt how to curve the upper lip when sucking the mother’s breast. (c) Supernatural/Spiritual/beyond the world factors. Obviously some human conditions and experiences are explainable in terms of forces beyond human control. Either good and bad angels or spirits affect our life experiences and some ways. The bad omens are blamed on the devil. It is a matter of belief system. However, we can refer to those supernatural forces as “Ihe sin a chi”. My purpose in this segment of the discourse is to establish a case that genetic, environmental and spiritual forces can influence human thoughts, feelings and action tendencies. They can alter the fate of an individual or a community of people. The critical question is what options are open to us? What do we select and what do we reject? In our corporate existence as Mbieri people we should combine the first, heredity (Ihe si n’obara) with environmental factors (Ihe si a mmekorita) to forge ahead and deliver Mbieri. We cannot remain dormant, waiting for “Ihe sin a chi” to take all vital decisions of life for us. We have to have a new beginning, decide to move ahead as one people. Whatever comes our way, we give it a critical look. We have to start from within Mbieri to purge ourselves. To conclude this segment, it is my thesis that Mbieri people are naturally blessed with high level intelligence which we apply in different spheres of life: Industry, commerce, academics, governance, marraiage etc we should, at the same time look around us, watch our neighboring communities to find out what makes the tick, copy and adapt attributes that have made those communities succeed as a people over the years. We started the race of socio-economic transformation of our community long before some towns woke up from their slumber but in the process some of them overtook us. This is an irony of history and development. Like The sea breeze singers would say, “anyi abiakwala ozo”, this time to plan not only to catch up with them but reposition ourselves into where we ought to be. 4. SOME PROVERBIAL STATEMENTS FREELY MADE AMONG NDI MBIERI. I wish to draw our attention to a few proverbial statements which are freely and fondly made among Mbieri people. The essence is to see if and how the statements affect or explain some of our behaviours as a people. Let us recall that a prverb is a short familiar sentence expressin a supposed truth or moral lesson. It is therefore a saying that requires explanation. Six examples will suffice. (i) “Mbieri gba oso mmiri mgbe o machara he ahu” Literally, Mbieri people stay in the rain until they are fully soaked before looking for a shelter. How true is that? This statement seems to indict us on our characteristic slow and lackadaisical approaches to issues of concern which demand priority attention. Anyway, it is better late than never. Even the late realization of being soaked in the rain has its merit in the sense that self-consciousness is infused in the sphere of reality and situational analysis. (ii) Mbieri buru azu, haanaghi ekwe ekele.