Rudeness as epidemic

I am impressed by the professional way we fought the Ebola scourge to a standstill even if that success was at a great cost (thank you, Dr. Stella Ameyo Adadevoh et al!) Before that, we had banished polio from our borders only to have it resurface recently. But those are not the diseases that worry […]

I am impressed by the professional way we fought the Ebola scourge to a standstill even if that success was at a great cost (thank you, Dr. Stella Ameyo Adadevoh et al!) Before that, we had banished polio from our borders only to have it resurface recently. But those are not the diseases that worry me today. I am more worried about the social epidemic of rudeness pervading the land.
Turn back the hands of the clock a few decades. When in a public bus or train, you didn’t need any prompting to yield your seat to an elderly person. You felt good doing it. You also had no qualms running errands for older persons. It was your duty. The thought of refusing never crossed your mind. In the few instances where a stubborn child refused to obey an elder’s instruction, such stubbornness was flogged out of the child courtesy of the good old cane which every family worthy of the name had in a corner of the room.
On the highways, zebra crossings were respected. That was one spot on the road where you could safely cross. Motorists stopped to allow pedestrians cross. All that seems to be ancient history now. I have seen near misses in Abuja as daredevil cab drivers tried to run down pedestrians. I am not talking of mistakes but of a situation where a motorist speeds up when he sights you on the zebra crossing. It gives the eerie feeling that the guy is bent on homicide.
There is an epidemic of rudeness in town. And it is eating us up slowly but surely. You can hardly join a major highway from a side road without the driver on the major road trying to ram you off the surface of the earth. It is like a phallic contest. As soon as you indicate your intention, the oncoming car races to close the gap. And if you make eye contact with the rude driver, he could give you a rude finger as bonus.
In our race to nowhere, we have lost all sense of decorum, especially in public places where we jump queues at will. I have seen the feeling of satisfaction exhibited by cheats who rudely beat traffic lights and have no doubt that they think the rest of us waiting in line are fools. So brazen has our lawlessness become that those who drive against traffic on the Airport Road, Abuja, actually do so at speeds in the neighbourhood of 100kph with full headlights and hazard lights on. You’d better leave the road if an early grave is not your portion.
No wonder, visitors to Nigeria are often advised that when crossing a one-way road near a police checkpoint, they should look at the kerb for ‘Okada’ motorcycles and ‘Keke Napep’ tricycles (which specialise in maiming pedestrians on sidewalks), look left for oncoming traffic, look right for those driving against traffic, and run zig-zag to avoid police accidental discharge!
Tunde Idiagbon must be twisting and turning in his grave. Say what you will, the War against Indiscipline (WAI) prosecuted by the Buhari-led military regime in 1984 was one of the greatest achievements of that government. We can indulge in dogon turenci or igilango geesi about the finer points of the underpinning philosophy of that administration, but we can’t take away the fact that for once, Nigerians were forced to abandon their rude ways and embrace civilised conduct.
A friend of mine was fined N200 by a mobile court on Lagos Island’in 1984 for urinating in the gutter between King’s College and the Lagos City Hall. The arresting officer simply walked up to him while he was peeing and respectfully told him,”Good morning sir; you’re under arrest for being a public nuisance”. It was the ultimate humiliation, said my friend, for the WAI officer was the type that wouldn’t ‘under normal circumstances’, qualify to dust his sandals. In between putting away his peeing equipment and being arraigned, he came to the realisation that he could be sentenced to eat ‘iron beans’ just for rudely answering the call of nature!
We need a new WAI; a version fit for our digital age.
I hate to make generational comparisons, but I can’t help noting that we are producing ruder and ruder children who have absolutely no regard for law and order and certainly no respect for elders. Just watch them as they text and drive and at the same time contest the road with you on the fast lane. If you dare make any attempt to correct them, you’ll go home with an earful of invectives. Or on social media where they have gone ballistic? Even if the discussion is about the weather, they must find a way of bringing in politics and insulting their father’s age mates.
Why do you think the policeman on the highway is so rude? Why would a customs officer at the airport ask to see the contents of your suitcase only to beg for a pair of trousers from your newly acquired collection? How do you come to terms with an immigration officer who would gleefully allow fat camels to pass through the eye of the needle under his watch? Our law officers are some of the rudest characters on the planet!
Sometime ago, a policeman flagged me to a stop after midnight around the Galadimawa axis of Abuja and tried to play a fast one: “Ah, Ogbuefi, I didn’t know that it was you. Welcome sir. Wetin you bring for your boys?”  My boys?!
You have to feel sorry for your country if her security is in the hands of such beggars. Any hope for stemming the tide of this epidemic of rudeness?
Is there any mortal as rude as our public officials? I doubt. But I remember the admonition of our elders to wit: Be strong, but not rude; be kind but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant.