So have you finished basking in the glory of Nigeria's fight back to little big brother South Africa which resulted in the deportation of a plane load of our rainbow brethren in retaliation for the treatment meted out on our citizens in Johannesburg? Our very own Murtala Mohammed Airport was the backdrop to this sensational saga. InsideLagos was unable to gain a full measure of satisfaction from this action. Not that we support the actions of the South African immigration officials. Indeed, unless they intended to start a diplomatic row their actions were at best foolhardy. But before we break out in argument about who has more to loose if there was a mass repatriation of personnel and funds, let us categorically state that InsideLagos sees no winners in this melee. We both look like chumps, like little boys squabbling because one teased the other.
Yes, it was good to stand up for ourselves and protect our citizens. It is always a rare pleasure to see some action by the federal government, however token, that shows it cares in some small way for it's own. Like airlifting Nigerians from Libya during the crisis. Yes this is commendable. However like most things, Nigerians refuse to dig to the root of the issue and deeply examine what may have happened to kick off this saga in a dispassionate manner. Let us paint you a picture that might give some context.
Imagine you are a conscientious immigration official (I know this is hard to believe with our hoards of beggars in uniform, whom again our government have created by over bloating the civil service so much no servant earns a living wage as they divide the limited funds amongst real and ghost workers) on duty at the Joberg airport. It is late; you are hungry but before you can go for some pap and roast meat to revive your flagging stamina, the long delayed flight from Lagos finally arrives and catches you at your desk. You had been of half a mind to dash out to eat, but every time you asked the Nigerian airline officials if you had 15 minutes to get a quick bite you are told to wait for five more minutes as 'they are coming now now'. The first time they said that was an hour and a half ago.
So you are upset, very irritable and now here they come. Loud, noisy, and coming to disturb your peace. And now you need the toilet! Then they wave those green passports and tatty yellow cards at you and brazenly lie that they have valid documentation. Sure the visa is real, the passports maybe, but you are pretty sure that almost 90% of the yellow cards are fake. You've had enough. They lay claim to be the giant of Africa, the brightest and the best. They were the ones voted most likely to succeed in high school yet never delivered. Yet you know that, even though the infrastructure and progress in your land was built by European invaders, there are African countries whose indigenes are doing the continent proud and running their countries well. Giant of Africa! You can't even regulate something as simple as an inoculation card! Get out of my country! Get out! GET OUT!
Okay, we are being melodramatic. Still, how do we expect respect when we have a federal government incapable of regulating anything in this country. We don't know how to drive or the rules of the road, yet in the last 30 years 99% of Nigerians have gotten drivers licenses without being tested in theory or practise. Getting a Nigerian passport is as easy as paying the fee and sitting in line with a few forged papers. Quack universities are selling degrees both piecemeal and wholesale. Doctor's certificates cannot be verified as there is no system to do so. A yellow card costs less than N500, and what is even stranger is that Nigerians of all classes, even the most educated ones, have no qualms about stopping by that guy outside city hall to pick a fresh one up before they jet out. ID cards are a joke (someone faked a friend's fathers driver's license with his name and address, though he was 40 years younger, and used it to open accounts and obtain money from institutions his impostee also used) and we have post codes that no one uses. Know your customer? Hah! Our banks have no clue who we are or where we live. Getting references and guarantors is a sham as many a time the officials sign off on their clients applications. There is no national database for tax, health, birth, register professionals or any means of positively identifying citizens, and where partial ones exist they are not cross referenced. We were all told that phone lines would be cut off if we didn't register them and what happened? Nothing. We had just done a huge biometric exercise for the election yet the NCC didn't have access to any of the data and repeated a very expensive exercise. Should we go on?
So Lagos, before we get too excited and shower the Minister of Foreign affairs with more that 15 minutes of fame and a national honour for kicking out those Boers, we should realise that absolutely nothing is being done to correct the ills that led to the situation that cause so much scorn to be poured on us. The yellow cards will still be fake, the officials will still beg us for 'something' as they check us in, and we would not have changed anything for the better, because we are satisfied with the way things are. Or are we? What are we, as Nigerians, and our aircraft carrying around the world?
What do you think Lagos?
No comments:
Post a Comment