150 MILLION DOWN THIS MINE!

“Chi! Chi! Chi! Le! Le! Le! Chile!!!” So sang Florencio Avalos, 31, the first rescued miner from deep inside the bowel of the earth, to a chorus of surface audience of rescuers, medics, relatives and politicians, including Chilean President Sebastian Pinera. Avalos, as the second-in-command of the miners, was chosen to be the first out […]

“Chi! Chi! Chi! Le! Le! Le! Chile!!!” So sang Florencio Avalos, 31, the first rescued miner from deep inside the bowel of the earth, to a chorus of surface audience of rescuers, medics, relatives and politicians, including Chilean President Sebastian Pinera. Avalos, as the second-in-command of the miners, was chosen to be the first out because he was in the best condition.

Ni! Ni! Ni! Geria! Geria! Geria! Sweet sounding, no? We would have sung that, however unpalatably, had an Oracle not told the Lucky One Whodunnit on 01/10, our 911.

So many died and so many were injured from those bomb blasts of October 1 in Abuja that even the media could not keep count those first few days. Various fatalities were bandied about: 8, then 10, then 16, then back to 12, then 16 again. The President visited the ones in hospital but, at least during the early days after the event, the bereaved were not visited at that top level. I remember reading that Mr. Zakari Biu, father of one of the victims, Tahir, lamenting that not one top government functionary had visited to commiserate with the family during those first few painful days. The father is not a nonentity, neither was the late son. Father is a Deputy Commissioner of Police, no less; late Tahir was a staff of EFCC. Perhaps they would have been better off were they miners, and Chileans!

There are two significant points about the Chilean rescue. One was the absolute tenacity of the Chileans to continue to keep hope alive for a whole seventeen days; digging, probing, searching. The other point was the remarkable survivability of the miners.

The rescuers did not give up after the epochal three days; they did not give up after the momentous seven days; they did not give up after the milestone ten days. They just tenaciously kept at it. Kept at it. Kept at it. And it paid after seventeen days. And the trapped miners stuck together through thick and thin, mostly thin, for a total of 69 days. They did not break down, they did not give up. They knew their leaders and their compatriots would not give up on them. Heroes on all sides.

Over here, not even Murtala Muhammad is a hero now. OK, he may be a hero of Africa, according to Angola’s MPLA and Mozambique’s FRELIMO and South Africa’s ANC. And all freedom-loving movements. But Murtala is not a hero according to Nigeria’s PDP, the greatest beneficiary of Murtala’s heroism.

So, if Murtala is not a hero, all these Abuja-loving folk should just pack their luggage and baggage and go back to their creeks and mud-huts, for Murtala conceived Abuja. If Murtala is not a hero, they should unravel this ‘fledgling’ democracy of theirs, because Murtala it was who really handed over in 1979. If Murtala is not a hero…

As for the Rescue Heroes of Chile, searching for seventeen days and never giving up is in itself heroic. Elsewhere (and you know where, for example), after three days those miners would have been declared dead, and more earth would have been heaped upon their caved-in shaft, and funerals by Imam and Reverend would have been performed on them. There would since have been wake-keepings and ‘sadakar ukus’ (‘fidau’ to Lagos Muslims). But the Chileans are not that fatalistic. They had tenacity. And patience. And good luck.

And had those families been Ni! Ni! Ni! not Chi! Chi! Chi!, they would each have been visited by our rescuers NEMA (in Hausa, ironically, NEMA means ‘searching’) and given a bag of rice. And Ten Thousand Naira. And then evicted from their Area 11 residence.

Some leaders are born. Some leaders are made. In Murtala, the age-old argument about leaders being born or being formed raised its head significantly. But, as Wikipedia says, leadership has qualities which include: Charismatic inspiration (attractiveness to others and the ability to leverage this esteem to motivate others; initiative and drive); guiding through modeling (in the sense of providing a role model); initiative and entrepreneurial drive; preoccupation with a role (a dedication that consumes much of a leader’s life); a clear sense of purpose or mission (clear goals, focus, commitment); results-orientation (directing every action towards a mission); optimism (very few pessimists ever become leaders); and rejection of determinism (belief in one’s ability to ‘make a difference’), etc.

The icing on the cake in the Chile story must definitely be the invitation of Hero President Pinera to the Hero Miners and the Hero Rescuers to a football match between the two sides. Winners, said the President, would take the Presidential Palace as Prize. And the losers? Laughing out loud, ‘back to the mine’, joked the President. Hero President. Good talker. Didn’t jump to conclusions about who caused the cave-in of the mine. Didn’t ask the Oracle Whodunnit. Or Who Didn’t Dunnit!

Kai! Help! We need heroes such as Murtala! There are 150 million ‘miners’ down this mine called Nigeria. We need pulleys and wenches and capsules to get us out; one by single one. At the ballot box. In 2011. National Anthem! Arise…