By NICK DAZANG

THE immediate post-Nigeria Civil War era must approximate to Nigeria’s finest hour. Consider: Flush with petro-dollars and blessed with patriotic leaders who possessed vision and gravitas, Nigeria occupied its pride of place in the comity of nations.

Infrastructure such as the Lagos and Calabar ports were being constructed with frenetic speed and gusto. The Third Mainland Bridge was being designed after the exquisite Ikorodu and Badagry Expressways had been constructed.

The National Arts Theatre at Iganmu, Lagos, an architectural feat, was constructed. So was the Murtala Mohammed International Airport at Ikeja. To address the congestion of Lagos, Nigeria conceived, designed and started building a new Federal Capital at Abuja.

Factories and manufacturing concerns sprouted all over the Nigerian landscape like mushrooms and hummed from Lagos to Kaduna. The textiles were agog with activity in Lagos, Kano, Kaduna and Gusau. The defunct National Electric Power Authority, NEPA, seldom outed electricity.

Our refineries were in fine fettle. The automotive assemblies in Lagos, Ibadan, Kaduna, Enugu and Bauchi rolled out beautiful cars of different makes and sturdy trucks and tractors. The country brimmed with jobs and opportunities. The country was tranquil and you could travel or traverse it, unmolested and unharmed.

On the foreign scene, Nigeria provided a leadership unmatched in timbre and tenor. It led the Frontline States of Southern Africa in the fight against colonialism and apartheid. Nigeria succoured other less-endowed African and Caribbean countries. Nigeria’s diplomats, General Joseph Garba, Maitama Sule and Professor Bolaji Akinyemi, shone with brilliance.

The intellectually seminal Akinyemi articulated the case for “a concert of medium states” that would include emerging giants of the Southern Hemisphere such as Nigeria, India and Brazil.

In 1977,  Nigeria hosted the second installment of the World Black Festival of Arts and Culture, FESTAC, to global acclaim. Fela Anikulapo Kuti’s song, Lady, captured the musical imagination and assured a firm place for the Afro-beat genre. Sony Okosuns’ Papa’s Land, became an anthem and inspiration for freedom fighters in Zimbabwe. Nelson Mandela, imprisoned at Robben Island, found solace in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart.

Compare the halcyon 1970s and the dismal Nigeria under President Muhammadu Buhari’s watch and you are pushed to the brink of despair and hopelessness. Not only are the statistics grim and forbidding, they put us in the league of such backwaters and basket cases as war-ravaged Somalia, Yemen and Afghanistan.

The Naira which in the 1970s exchanged at par with the United States Dollar is in free fall. Our foreign reserves put at USD 39.86 billion are less than that of Harvard University’s USD 53.2 billion.The assembly lines which once rolled out adorable, affordable cars have fallen into disuse.

The refineries are comatose and Nigeria, a member of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, OPEC, imports refined petroleum products. Though we hear of a bevy of infrastructural projects being flagged off, hardly do we witness their commissioning.

Our universities which once competed with the best of the best such as Harvard, Yale, Oxford and Cambridge are at the bottom of the ladder of world ranking. Insecurity is the new normal with hundreds being killed on an almost daily basis. The government looks on benignly as if the lives of Nigerians do not count.

It is very true that corruption did not start with the administration of President Buhari. It is very true that corruption had become a major challenge in 2015 and tended to set us back. It is very true that insecurity bedeviled the country before the advent of this administration.

It is very true that the prices of goods and services had gone way up before 2015. But matters have worsened under the complacent and indifferent watch of President Buhari. On a daily basis, hundreds are being killed either by terrorists, bandits, kidnappers, herdsmen or “unknown gunmen”.

As at last week, not less than 100 people were killed in Kanam Local Government Area of Plateau State. Another 25 were killed in Benue State. And yet scores were killed in Taraba State. This is not to talk of many who were kidnapped for ransom last week. The insecurity situation is so grim that the nation is in mourning – and on a daily basis.

A lady in Kaduna on April 4, 2022 took to the social media to lament the killing of her brother by bandits. It is instructive that she framed the death of her brother in this poignant way: “Nigeria has happened to me”. Apart from this lady who cast Nigeria as a tragedy, Senator Matthew Urhoghide (representing Edo South) told a national newspaper on April 7,2022 that: ”If someone wants to commit suicide in Nigeria, the simplest way to do it is to travel from Abuja to Kaduna by road because the person stands 50 per cent chance of not returning…”

Rankled by the terrible state of insecurity in the country, no less an exalted person as the Sultan of Sokoto, His Eminence, Sa’ad Abubakar III, had  asserted that there may not be Nigeria, as a country, in 2023. This writer believes that though the Buhari administration is in its lame duck period, a period when it should be winding down, the insecurity situation is so severe and constitutes such an existential threat as to compel the government to promptly and to squarely address it.

This writer also believes that the President has it in his power to do so given the array of resources, intelligence and martial, available to him. He is also obligated to address the parlous insecurity situation by dint of the solemn oath he took on assuming the presidency, namely: to defend and secure this country. Besides, this President has recently demonstrated a rare capacity to take charge and to avert disaster. Recall that before the recent All Progressives Congress, APC, convention, the party was embroiled in such profound a crisis that the bookmakers wagered that the APC was destined for self-destruction.

Mercifully, the President focused his energies on the party and ensured that the convention took place and national officers emerged. The question arising from this spectacular show of laser-beam focus is: why has the President not brought the same, or similar undiluted concentration, to bear on the issue of insecurity?

Could it be that the precious lives of Nigerians being lost on a daily basis do not mean much to him? Has it ever occurred to the President that the affairs of the APC, which he managed so adroitly, could unravel and come to nought if the insecurity situation continues unabated? Has it ever occurred to him that the insecurity situation in the country constitutes a clear and present danger to Nigeria’s corporate existence?

*Dazang, a former director in INEC, wrote via: [email protected]