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Especially now that a brother can kill a brother, sister can kill a sister etcetera, because of political positions, the game of politics and its practitioners in our country are in trouble. They are rotters in a ritzy country. Their conducts are synchronous. They made, in syncopated rhythm, the strong beats are weak and the weak beats are made strong. This is an issue swelling my head, swelling it to burst. And none of my personal issue it is, but it is an issue that has tainted our political institution, our country, our men and women, our youths, our cultural values, and our moral and lucent backgrounds raising hand from the pit it fell into but many people eye rights.
So far, every problem that has affected us as sovereignty could be traced to politics: autocracy and democracy. These two kinds of government have snatched away the good spirit of honour and sincerity from us.
I am far from saying the Democracy is not good, but the quest to outsmart an opponent in democratic contests has paved way for vilifications, murders and assassinations. And we can now see the definition of our own kind of Democracy. For the quest of ascension to political positions, a lot of people have been pummeled to the soil by the bullets of assassins. Houses, cars and other valuables worth billions of naira have been lost during elections in our country. Judging by that was why laymen defined politics as a dirty game, especially the kind of politics we practice here.
Because of the perceived dirt in our politics, it will take any self-respecting and immeasurable moral person to join our political fora, except that the person will do away with the good conscience and the high-earned integrity.
Having a well-fed or recruited thugs and assorted kinds of weaponries handed miscreants, is the fad to become a politician in Nigeria. And this development has made our politics, democracy, come to stay with intrigues. Does the name Nigeria mean intrigue? Quite disappointing!
Juxtaposing to that, with the myriad of do-or-die politicians that we have experienced so far, have aborted, bastardized our political institution; while all forms of corruptions are exhumed.
One amazing thing is that when many Nigerians talk, they talk that our politics is still battling with puberty. But we do forget that politicians handling the affairs of our politics are not teenagers, they are gray haired men and women. Nigerians, where is the wisdom in elders which was said comes with old age? The Nigerian elder is the obverse!
Our elders have taken to rascality and crudity. Our elders have taken to telling lies and embezzlement of money supposed be kept for the future hope – youths.
I thought that it’s a general phenomenon that when a man or woman attains a certain level of age the person begins to tell the truth, begins to make peace and begins to prepare the soul for eternity, but the obverse is what I have seen among our elders. This is why many youths have taken American and European elders as role models.
Because of these questionable conducts of our elders and the definition they have given to politics, many youths are no longer interested or do not want to know what positions our elders hold in politics, but that of foreigners. There is no normative approach from our elders.
I know that a man will have many things thought be achieved in life, but many things he will not achieve. Notwithstanding, I pray and hope to see the time when our bleeding adolescent politics shall become a healthy adult. I pray and hope to see the time our politicians will stop to entertain arms, mudslinging and vituperations et al all in a bid to attain political positions which has made our politics become dirty.
Copyright 2007 Odimegwu Onwumere
(Published in The Nation (Nigeria) 19/8/2007.
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Odimegwu Onwumere
Odimegwu Onwumere, a poet and an author, is the Founder, Poet Against Child Abuse (PACA), Rivers State , Nigeria . +2348032552855. apoet25@yahoo.com
If it's prose, he writes stories,
If it's poetry, he writes poems,
If it's drama, he writes screenplays,
And he has achieved some poetry nominations, in the USA and in Canada. He was born in Accra Ghana. A Nigerian by origin and is in his early thirties.
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