Ostentation, the Mother of Corruption

So by every modern definition, I am a lowlife. I’ve lived on this plane long enough, but I’ve never owned a brand new car. Two reasons would suffice – I can’t afford one and I don’t see the need. My definition of a car is a vehicle that takes you from one point to another. […]

So by every modern definition, I am a lowlife. I’ve lived on this plane long enough, but I’ve never owned a brand new car. Two reasons would suffice – I can’t afford one and I don’t see the need. My definition of a car is a vehicle that takes you from one point to another. I agree that new ones tend to be more economical on ride and service, but at the end of the day, we all get to our destinations. I buy the car that I could afford and try to take as much care of it as best as I could.

I’ve nothing against sparkling tear-rubber and I have enough good credit to lease one. Indeed, the smell of the few new vehicles I’ve been driven in should be nice to people with good lungs, asthmatics tend to pray that something doesn’t go wrong. Except I win that lottery that I do not play or Aliko Dangote adds me to his charity beneficiary list, I am unlikely to buy a new ride soon.

I respect those who buy new cars as much as I respect the biker on the street, no more, no less. In Canada where I sojourn everybody who is somebody uses public transport – occasionally. Young people here take pride in their first rides and tend to spend a little more on wheels. So do retirees. The youths feel that compelling need to belong; the retiree has mortgage and all other debts fully paid, children put through school. They’ve been saving for retirement and could now afford a little bit of show off. As they age, they declutter, moving from mansions into condominiums and later to retirement homes. That’s the metamorphosis of people here. The rest of us Joneses either lease a vehicle or buy a pre-owned (I mean second-hand) to commute if need be. Canada makes cars locally and for import!

That’s not the case in Naija. A society and a people like ours that produces little to nothing live beyond our means. We work twice as hard but the income is hardly enough to meet our presumed social pecking order. We are the archetypal people who borrow money to buy the things we do not need just to impress people who do not give a damn about us. We live the dream when we could least afford it and wonder why we’re ravaged with poverty and odious crime.

The problems we often blame the government for is actually ours. The economy, as beaten and battered as it is, is capable of meeting every need, but not our individual and collective greed. About 95% of Naija social commentary is political and it should be, but man is first a social animal. Except we change our social perception of what’s important in life, our political reality would always reflect our social disequilibrium.

In this and perhaps a staccato series of writings, one intends to look in the mirror of society to reflect on the split image. Conventional wisdom and the holy scripts teach that the world we live in is a market. People go to markets with money to buy or with goods to sell. In our world, people live here as if they’ve just been moved from a face-me-I-face-you dinghy to a duplex. When people making intercity commute haul suitcases meant for vacation, something is awfully wrong.

As a consumer nation, our sense of entitlement is the top of the commercial chain. We’re obsessed with ‘making it’ at all costs. We don’t just ride cars; we aspire to get the best models – Ducati, Mercedes, BMW, name it. For the level of poverty exhibited on the scale of global poverty index, we live above our means. Most of us are as indebted as the nation. If we look at the origins of those debts, they are incredibly frivolous. That frivolity is carried over to the political realm. We embraced the American presidential system, but most American senators sleep in their offices because they cannot afford to rent a space where they convene. They are not treated any different because they chose to come to serve.

In Naija, our lawmakers do not pass a budget, no, they first fix something good for themselves. Those among them who have held political offices and have negotiated jumbo severance packages for their short service continue to milk the nation at all levels. With fingers in incredible pies, they must keep up to the façade and of course recoup the expenditure for their elections, stash some away because we would not vote based on our conscience or competence, but on stomach infrastructure. Yes, politricians are odious, but we are no better, they do most of what they do because we drive them – yes, we do encourage them to steal provided they drop a few crumbs for us during the election season. We are not ashamed as communities, to seat under the trees and share rice and beans knowing that our children are learning under trees, sitting on cement blocks or bringing their own chairs from home.

…to be concluded next week