ICT and Governance

One of the most memorable songs of late Musa Dankwairo was his eulogy to the late Sir Ahmadu Bello, Premier of the defunct Northern Region. Towards its end, Dankwairo graphically described the Premier’s return trip by road to Kaduna, mentioning how each town, one after another, from Shuni to Rigachikun, received him and wished him safe trip. I am never tired of listening to that portion of the song. Beautiful.

That was when road was the chief means of travel for the Nigerian ruling class, including premiers and governors. Today, if Governor Tambuwal of Sokoto will visit Kaduna or Abuja, he would never go by road. The same with Governors Ganduje of Kano, Bindow of Adamawa, Lalong of Plateau, and Dankwambo of Gombe and Darius of Taraba.

While the road accorded Sardauna the opportunity to read the heartbeat of his people at grassroots and first hand information on the state of the roads they use daily throughout the region, air transport has today conspired with corruption to make our governors ignorant, forgetful or negligent of our plight in road transport. They neither experience the killer potholes and craters, nor run the risk of attacks by kidnappers, armed robbers and ethnic champions. Even after their tenures, the chances that they will expose themselves to the fatal adversities of these killer roads is nil because they have amassed so much wealth to afford them air travel for life. Their scandalous pension scheme is enough a guarantee to their present standard of living.

Otherwise, what can explain the continuous state of horrid delapidation of Kaduna - Jos road, or Cham-Numan segment of the Gombe-Yola highway or Numan-Jalingo road if Vice President Atiku, Boni, Nyako, Bindow, Dariye, Jang were plying them?

Unfortunately, the supremacy of air technology, with its speed, safety and convenience, is defeating, not only to the roads but also to us. Technology is an irreversible, infinite chain reaction. We do not expect that governors, for the sake of site seeing, to abandoned planes and return to the wheel. The “meetings” in Abuja are becoming too frequent also, turning most of them into absentee governors. Two of them even had the privilege to charter flights in order to attend a birthday ceremony in the capital city recently. Baki na da goro. 🙊

We may seem helpless, therefore, in the face of our new indomitable master. Yet, as humans,our intelligence should provide us with means of compelling our President and Governors to know the extent of our plight.

Interestingly, technology is here to aid us, after aiding with the leadership to escape feeling our plight. ICT, with its scores of mass communication channels like social media is a veritable friend on our side. We no longer need to rely on writing letters to mainstream media before our wailings could be heard after a month or two, if we are lucky. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, to mention but few, are there to aid us to inform, advise, terrorize and scandalize leaders on the poor state of affairs.

The only impediments are the courage and determination we lack. Many of us do not care, just happy as Africans to live long enough to witness tomorrow, regardless of how the tomorrow would be - and it is always hard for most of us. We can keep up with any degree of underdevelopment so long as it will not threaten our lives immediately. But once it poses an instant threat - like Boko Haram invasion or bombing - then only our survival instinct would be pricked enough to reveal our discontent. If it does not reach that level or it does not affect us, we simply dismiss the complaint as wailing. 😭

Otherwise, how many articles have I read written by a Batchama or Fulani resident of Numan on the state of the federal road passing through his “chiefdom”? How many have I read from a Mumuye or Fulani residents in Jalingo about the state of the road to their capital? How many posts are there on the condition of Saminaka-Jos federal road written by a Bassa, Anaguta, Hausa or Berom, with graphic pictures of potholes, accidents and deaths, and holding the President, minister or governor accountable?

Very few, if any. That is because the concept of development - that we can and should make tomorrow better than today - is yet to find a place in our African psyche. We seem to be stuck in the primitive level of survival, with its attributes of mutual annihilation through internecine conflicts among members of different tribes. Amidst this self-destructive preoccupation, the corrupt ruling class goes Scot-free.

Let us seize the opportunity that technology presents us to unite in taking our underperforming leadership to task. Never underrate the effect a single post or picture might have once thrown into the public space. Post it. It can save a life today or tomorrow. It can move someone into action. It can make our tomorrow better.

Let our discourse on social media be issue, not personality, based. Personalities divide, while issues unite. This way, we may not need to stand by the roadside, waiting for the President to meet us on his way to or from Daura, as the Sardauna did, before we confront him with our complaints. Governor Tambuwal may be enjoying a cup of tea in the sky and the President may still be in his office when our strong message will hit both and compel them into action.

If all fail, technology again would present us, every four years, with a more veritable tool: card reader, 😳, the nightmare of any underperforming elected official.

But all will depend on our commitment for a better tomorrow which requires our disengagement from the primitive stage, notion and psyche of living just for survival sake.

Dr. Aliyu U. Tilde
29 December 2017