[kictanet] Three days in Nigeria

[Bitange Ndemo]

Three days in Nigeria
Standing outside Abuja Airport in the soaring temperatures you get amazed
on how similar to Kenya Nigeria is.   This is Africa's most populous
country.   People idling around and women talking animatedly with their
hands akimbo and they are larger than you can see in Kenya.  I had missed
the person who was to pick me up.  Oga! Those who walked by me remarked. 
I assumed it was some greetings to a brother.  Colours of their clothing
is similar to ours and perhaps the only difference with Kenya is that more
men wore multi-colour kanzus.  Open shoes, Akala type are more prevalent
here.

I walk towards the taxis.  They are gentler than I have read in Nigerian
literature.  They were honest too with the fare to the cities.  I had
begun to settle down and give Nigeria the benefit of doubt but my mind
takes me back to Odili, the narrator in Achebe’s 1966 novel, Man of the
People.  Also not forgetting the many stories told about Nigerians.

For a while I savor the beauty of Abuja scenery.  Green everywhere.  It
must be within the rain forest.  Land is expanse and untilled.  I turn my
attention to my driver Oku Moses.  An affable young man perhaps in his
early 30’s.  I tell him I am from Kenya and in Abuja for the CTO
conference.  He smiles broadly and asked me what I thought of Nigeria as
if he had read my mind.  I said so far so good and immediately I divert
his train of thought to football.  I tell him Nigeria is the main
hindrance to Kenya’s quest to get to World cup.  We became friends
instantly as he opened up to tell me more.

You see that road, he says it leads to nowhere.  Corruption is the only
problem here he adds as his tone begin to sound angrier.  I calm him down
and tell him it happens all over Africa.  The 50 kilometer super highway
from the airport to Abuja is as good as it gets, actually better than
Nairobi Thika highway.  The Hotel I am headed to, is called Chelsea, named
after the English league team Chelsea.  Oku is a fan of Arsenal another
English league team.  He knows all the players.  He asks which team I
support and when I tell him none, he then says that is why you will never
go to world cup.

At the hotel Oku bids me farewell and hands me his card.  Call me he says.
 I will show you the best of Nigeria.  It is still hot and my room was
steaming with heat.  This three star hotel does not have a centralized AC
but I could do with an old cranky stand-alone cooling system.  As I
cranked it up, it made more noise that I could not listen to news on TV. 
Then suddenly the lights went off – blackout!!.  Outside it was raining
heavily.  I said Geez this is home but soon some generator boomed just
outside my room to bring light.  I wished they had shut it down.

Dinner time I joined other colleagues, Sonia, Karin, Robert and John for
Dinner.  Me and Sonia were the vegetarians and so requested for pasta, the
only vegetarian dish on the menu.  Alas! when the food came there was
chicken on pasta instead of tomato.   The young waitress tells me she
decided on chicken since there were no tomatoes.   After a few exchanges
she seems to remember something and says I can make it vegetarian.  Wala!
like magic she comes back with pasta alone.  I said thank you but as I
start to eat, I discover or rather the waitress had forgotten that the
base was chicken and she had only removed the toppings of chicken.  She
meant well and wanted to do well but she missed the point.

As I watched Nigerian channels that evening, I say to myself, Nigeria is
Kenya and Kenya is Nigeria.  We were colonized by the British.  We
attained independence at about the same time in the 1960s.  We have new
constitutions with devolved powers.  Just like Kenya, Nigeria continues to
experience longstanding ethnic and religious tensions.  Although in
Kenya’s 2008 as in Nigeria’s 2003 and 2007 presidential elections were
marred by significant irregularities and violence, but both countries are
experiencing relative peace interrupted by the Al-Shabab and Boka Haram
respectively.

On Nigerian TV as in Kenya politicians complain that they need more power
to states and counties.  They seem not to understand that they are the
ones with the power to change legislation and so when they complain, the
masses have no representation.  They also need more money yet they are the
ones who appropriate resources.  They complain about soaring crime yet
they are the ones who have the mandate to bring better security
legislation.
On the roads, motor bikes ride on the assumption that every motorist
should watch on them.  Careless and dangerous like in Kenya.  If you
admire the cleanliness of Abuja while driving, you will for sure hit one
of them.  Public places including hotels are guarded by armed policemen.

In my speech at the conference I said I was glad to visit Nigeria, land of
Okonkwo from Umuofia (one of a fictional group of nine villages in
Nigeria, inhabited by the Igbo people).   Only a handful of the people in
the audience who knew that I was referring to Achebe’s 1958 novel, Things
Fall Apart.  Later Funke, a prominent Nigerian businesswoman and friend
tells me that intellectualism died in Nigeria.  There was a time in
Nigeria prominent writers were the role model of society.  These were the
people who put our oral history on paper but we decided to chase them
away.  It is sad that Achebe had to die in foreign land alone without his
people.  I tell Funke, it is so strikingly similar to Kenya that our
prominent writers are getting old and wasted away in foreign lands.

Haruna is driving me back to the airport.  He like Oku is polite but with
much better intellect than an ordinary driver.  His grasp of African
matters is excellent.  Out of the blue he tells me, you worked with
government.  I tell him yes and I quickly ask him why.  No I just wanted
to know, he says.  Then he tells me that he is driving a car (VX Land
Cruiser) that he will never afford to buy in his entire life. I note the
ambition in him and tell him that if you know then you are capable of
buying the car.  I am not in government, he says.  I tell him you do not
need to be in government to buy the car.  You see I was in government but
I still cannot drive such a thing.  He looks at me then he says, it is by
choice on your part.  I tipped him $20 and bade him farewell.  He was
stunned.

I leave Nigeria with many fond memories.  It was three days but enough to
grasp the dreams of other people.  Their desires.  Their hopes.  We are
all the same and hopefully one day we shall change the stigma of
corruption by improving the fortunes of our Africa.  God bless Africa.


Ndemo.


University of Nairobi
Business School, Lower Kabete Campus