At the dawn of this democracy, masked musician, Lagbaja, looked at the value of a million naira and asked in disbelief: “Ṣé mílíọ̀n pọ̀ tó yẹn ni?” (Is a million naira really that much?). Today, he would be speechless—perhaps even songless. Millions have become loose change; billions now circle like vultures over the carcass of a hippo washed ashore.
Some two hundred years ago, a man in Oyo-Ile boasted that no load of cotton could ever be too heavy for him to carry. The elders smiled and told him he had probably carried only a handful. It is the same with this democracy. If anyone says it is not sweet, chances are the person is not among those shopping freely in its bazaar.
Last week, the Bola Tinubu administration named the ongoing ₦16 trillion Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway after President Bola Tinubu. It is not every day that a president has a highway named after himself by his own government while it is still under construction. As I read the queer news, one question came to mind: how many billionaires has that road already produced before carrying its first full load of traffic?
A former Accountant-General of the Federation is standing trial over an alleged ₦109.5 billion in public funds said to have found their way into his boxers. A former Minister of Power has been convicted for empowering himself with ₦33.8 billion meant for a power project.
There are cool billions everywhere; even the temple of justice has become a thriving marketplace. This past week, a former Attorney-General of the Federation made headlines. He is facing ₦8.7 billion money laundering charges, while 57 properties valued at ₦213.2 billion are under forfeiture. A former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria is standing trial for allegedly central-banking ₦154.39 billion into his personal purse and seasoning the haul with 753 housing units, now forfeited to the Federal Government.
The thieving gentlemen mug-photographed with those billions are merely the fallen angels of yesterday. They are unfortunate today because they took refuge in the wrong political tent. But if a man runs away from shame and shame catches up with him; what remains is to struggle against death. That is a Yoruba proverb incompetently translated by me. It simply means, so long as there is life, there is hope for the fallen. As soiled as they are today, the accused may yet be found to be saints when today goes on trial tomorrow.
Those in the dock may not be the filthiest of the lot. Just inhale the stench from the fawning, croaky courtiers garlanding the President up and down with uncompleted projects. Also, many more former-this and former-that are today sheltered beneath the protective wings of the reigning archangel. Otherwise, they too would be numbered among the thieves on the right and the thieves on the left.
Billions are the new millions. That is this democracy’s sweetest arithmetic and its biggest achievement. But our politicians know more than this mathematics; they are also keen students of poetry. They have learnt well the old English proverb, popularised by Geoffrey Chaucer: “Great oaks from little acorns grow.”
On the money tree of this democracy, the millions planted by yesterday have blossomed into today’s golden billions. Its fruits hang low for the giants in power; they remain forever beyond the reach of those outside the orchard. To them, the harvest recedes like the coy moon. We run a government of billionaires, many of whom have no shops outside the marketplace of power. Remember the popular 1980s television drama, Basi & Company, and its famous refrain: “To be a millionaire, think like a millionaire.” Today, only the crippled still dream of becoming multimillionaires. Big boys perch on the branches of billions; the biggest cannot even count the zeroes before their fortunes.
Politics is sweet and its practitioners have lived out François Rabelais’ timeless observation that “the appetite grows by what it feeds on.” The inevitable result is this Nigeria which Shakespeare foresaw in Hamlet; a country where “One woe doth tread upon another’s heel.” A nation where one calamity barely arrives before another overtakes it.
The older this democracy gets, the sweeter it becomes for those feeding on it, in and out. Those who started the race in 1999 were cautious. Those who inherited the baton became bolder. Each succeeding relay runner has broken the corruption record set by the previous one. The scorecard is written in the billions and billions in the dock above.
I told myself that this piece should have been titled “Statesmen, sycophants and the real black man” because the farther we have travelled from colonialism, the more we seem to have depreciated in the prudent management of our affairs. Do not blame me. The past acted with a measure of restraint; the present is jẹun kóokú; chop and quench; eat and die. Democratisation of misbehaviour is the sole business of the day.
Who was the teacher that taught us this nonsense? Or did it just follow us from our Maker? There was this provocative observation by the late Professor Ali A. Mazrui. I will revisit it here. Writing on Africa’s colonial experience, he posits that while colonialism was political bondage, it was also, paradoxically, “a mental liberation.” He pushes further that colonialism exposed Africans to new systems of administration, public accountability and modern statecraft, including principles of justice. One may disagree with his conclusion, but it forces us to ask uncomfortable questions about ourselves.
We have behaved worse than the foreigners who came here and enslaved us. It is not only in the matter of public plunder that we have diminished ourselves. Even in defending what is right, we have become miserly. We will not fight for others; too often, we will not even fight for ourselves.
Eshugbayi Eleko was deposed as the Eleko (Oba) of Lagos on 6 August 1925. He challenged his deposition and deportation all the way to the Privy Council and won a landmark affirmation that executive power must remain subject to the rule of law. Some of today’s traditional rulers would prefer to prostrate before presidents and governors than invoke the institutions of the state to challenge executive misconduct. What the crown does is not different from what the courtiers do.
My point is that as democracy matures here, the long years have not translated into moral and administrative maturity. We inherited offices from the founding fathers but discarded the discipline that gave those offices dignity. Obafemi Awolowo, Nnamdi Azikiwe, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa and Ahmadu Bello were all products of the colonial era. They fought the colonial state, yet they also learnt from its procedures. Among themselves, they quarrelled fiercely over ideology, but they largely respected institutions and protected the law.
They built people as they built universities, farm settlements, industrial estates, broadcasting houses, civil services and regional economies whose shadows still stretch across the land. They were ambitious for themselves, but they were even more ambitious for their people. Then came the Second Republic. Whatever their shortcomings, many of its leading actors were political apprentices of the founding generation. They had watched the old men at work. They inherited the party structures and, especially, the conviction that public office carried obligations. Reputation mattered to them. History kept and is keeping records. They knew or believed that posterity was a court before which every public official would one day stand trial.
One after another, that generation departed. With them went an entire political culture. Today, we are left with what I call the truly post-colonial political class: the real black man with his abandonment of values. We have produced leaders who are highly educated but poorly formed, politically sophisticated but morally underdeveloped. Public office has become less a public trust than a private investment from which maximum returns must be extracted before the next election.
Nearly three decades ago, Australian political scientist, Robert E. Goodin, wrote that the task of the statesman is to pursue the common good. To do that, he argued, politicians must be seen “steering by the stars”—taking their bearings from moral truths as timeless and unchanging as the stars in the night sky. We glimpsed that ideal in the years leading to independence. Then came independence, followed all too quickly by decay. Today, the stench has risen so high it competes with the very stars that were meant to guide us.
The decline is not confined to those in government. Society itself has adjusted. Citizens who should speak out now first calculate the cost in naira and kobo. Intellectuals who should question power now negotiate for appointments and positions. Patronage has replaced principle; survival has replaced conviction. To be a judge and not own a billionaire’s fortune and a mansion in Abuja is almost a sin against oneself. Religious leaders who should rebuke sin now bless it—for a price. The media that should bark too often wags its tail. When cries of injustice rend the night, many first look to see where power stands before deciding where conscience should put its feet. Silence has become a marketable, bankable commodity.
The new civic creed is painfully simple. In Yoruba street lingo: “Kànmí dà níbi òkú ìyá Àdèlé?” (What business does Kanmi have at Adele’s mother’s funeral?) In other words, if it is not my affair, let it burn. If the fire is not consuming my own roof, why worry that the neighbour’s house becomes ashes?
We have strayed too far into decay. Like miserable serfs, we either sing ‘On Your Mandate’ or squat like cats beneath the banquet table of power, patiently waiting for crumbs to fall. A nation of proud citizens has slowly become a congregation of expectant pets.
Let us destroy this temple and rebuild it. No house can be this deformed and remain standing. No walls can be this badly cracked without eventually collapsing. But what happens when the house finally falls? The roof does not ask who applauded the destroyer and who merely stood by watching the destruction. It comes down like the heavens themselves and buries everyone—without exception.
Also published in the Nigerian Tribune on Monday, 20 July, 2026
