By Donu Kogbara

ELIZABETH II, the 86 year-old Queen of the British Isles and Beyond, has just completed six unblemished decades on the throne. And I was happily watching her spectacular, uplifting Diamond Jubilee celebration on TV in London last Sunday when there was a newsflash announcing the Dana Air plane crash in Nigeria.

In other words, while one of the two countries I describe as “home” was joyfully basking in national pride and engaging in heart-warming jollifications to honour its highly-respected and much-loved Head of State, the other was overcome by grief, despair, fury and absolute contempt for its current and past rulers.

Over 1000 people have perished in no less than l0 plane crashes since 1992.  And there’s no getting away from the fact that most of these tragedies would have been avoided if our regulatory agencies did their jobs properly.

*Charred carcase of the aircraft after the crash

As Michael Kadiri, a visitor to the website of The Will, a Nigerian-American online publication, so succinctly put it: “One of the reasons normal countries insist on a robust regulatory environment is because men in the pursuit of profit cannot always be trusted to do the right thing. Wherever there has been a systemic failure of an industry, it is usually because the regulatory agencies have been compromised and are no longer fit for purpose…”.

Meanwhile, others have been much less polite than Kadiri; and I wasn’t surprised to encounter a barrage of furious anti-government commentaries when I checked out the internet to monitor the public’s reactions to the Dana disaster.

My mother is always telling me that my habit of comparing the UK and Nigeria is completely futile because they are, according to her, “incomparable”. She feels that it is ridiculous to mention Nigeria and the UK in the same breath because it should be obvious to anyone with half a brain that the gap between the two places and peoples is so wide that they might as well be on different planets. And she frequently berates me for expecting too much of Nigeria.

I totally disagree with my mother in the sense that since Nigerians and Britons are members of the very same human race, the former should be able to achieve similar levels of competence, compassion and honesty as the latter. And it drives me crazy when I’m told that I am being overly optimistic.

What is our problem, for crying out loud?

When we go to school with them, we often get better exam results than they do. When we work in their country or for organisations that they manage or own, we work efficiently as a general rule and have even been known to excel within these supposedly alien foreign environments on occasion.

And, sure, I’m definitely more of an Anglophile than the average Nigerian, but I’m not the only Nigerian who wishes that Nigeria was more like the UK. Many of my compatriots, including many of the Vanguard readers who contact me – AND many of the government officials I know – admire the way the British operate.

So why can’t we prove that we are as good as they are on every single level and suppress our baser instincts and dump the avarice, the thieving, the lack of self-control and the hypocritical religiousity that isn’t tied to REAL ethics?  Why can’t we get our acts together and pull together to build a nation in which life is truly valued and planes do not fall out of the sky with alarming regularity?

Why can’t our leaders be genuinely committed to eradicating poverty, developing infrastructure, expanding the economy, nurturing talent and rewarding integrity? Why does all this talk about “Transformation” sound so hollow? Why oh why am I sitting in London absolutely dreading my next trip to Nigeria?

Why do I spend as much time outside the land of my ancestors as possible? Why can’t I have a lovely African home I can be proud of and yearn to return to?

Fond farewell

DR. Levi Ajuonuma, the ebullient, articulate Group General Manager, Public Affairs, of NNPC, was one of last Sunday’s Dana Air casualties. He had critics who griped about the enthusiastic manner in which he cooperated with a system that is rotten to the core and complained about his penchant for defending the indefensible. But most of these detractors are full of s…… and wouldn’t have behaved differently if they’d been given a chance to do his job.

Levi was my friend and I sometimes accused him of being unfair to some of the people around him and of being economical with the truth; and he would just laugh amicably and promise to be kinder and tell me that if you are going to do a job, you might as well do it well. And he was indeed a gifted spin doctor. He was also – more importantly – a basically decent man.

Farewell, dear Levi. I wept when I thought about the anguish you must have been through in your final moments. And I will miss you.

Thanks so much for remembering me on my last birthday. Thanks for making me smile when I was feeling down. May your sweet soul rest in peace and may your family – whom you loved so very much – bear this terrible loss with fortitude.