Season of Anomie

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What the 94-year-old (no one is even sure how old Mugabe is, anyway) means is that Nigeria as a nation, has gradually become a joke that that to get some comic relief, you just have to tune in to Nigeria.

It is only in Nigeria that a new president will tell you that he belongs to everybody and to nobody, only for his appointments to show that he belongs to one section of the society, damning the so-called Federal Character.

It is only in Nigeria that a government will take six months before naming his cabinet, claiming that it is sifting the wheat from the chaff, screening the names submitted to him so as to appoint men and women of impeccable character, only for him to name the same people who have been in playing in the corridors of power since independence.

Zimbabwe President, Robert Mugabe

It is only in Nigeria that members of the National Assembly will sit from Tuesday to Thursday, fight the whole time over money and irrelevant things, steal our money blind and go on recess for three months, while still collecting their sitting allowances.

Only in Nigeria will a serving Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives will be accused of monumental fraud but instead of stepping aside for investigations to be carried out, will pay other Senators and Representatives to pass a vote of confidence on him.

It is only in Nigeria will a Chairman of an Appropriation Committee in the House of Representatives think he is being patriotic by releasing evidence of corruption in the House only after he has been stripped of his position.

It is only in Nigeria that you find that a party believes that exposing its corrupt members will hurt the party and not the country itself, and thereby place a gag order on the whistle blower.

Only in Nigeria will you see a sitting governor owing his state workers for several months but keeps blasting others for doing the same thing.

Is it not in Nigeria that a governor declared three working days for workers while the remaining days should be engaged in farming?

Only in Nigeria will you see someone steal N2,000 and he is burnt to death by a mob while a politician who stole billions is celebrated, given chieftancy titles and extolled to high heavens.

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It is only in Nigeria will a state governor waste state funds to congratulate a convicted ex-governor who is in prison, calling him the bacon of democracy.

It is only in this great country that a sitting Minister will come out to call it the United States of Nigeria.

So who says Mugabe is wrong in using Nigeria as his comic center?