There is a delusion that North sits somewhere dressed in babanriga, picking its teeth and relishing in its ability to make whomsoever it loves the president. This arrogant conception by political opportunists and their excitable rabble is often thrown around in different hues to make ambitious southern politicians supple and servile. A viable Southern presidential candidate, then becomes that man who must display conspicuously his love for the North so that the North can in return glimpse subservience and approve.
When such a politician deviates from political correctness his conduct might be transcribed and brought before the North by his opponents. So that the North can issue a red card or life ban. Beneath the veneer of realpolitik that is often used to mask this sectionalism is the cocky assumption the North is a monolithic political behemoth that is temperamentally so finicky that it could sneeze if irritated and veto southern politicians, who in choosing to be authentic, do not genuflect before it and prevaricate around the sensitive issues of resource control, killer herdsmen and ethnic nationalism. There is no such North.
The sort of North conjured up by a section of the northern elite to dominate politics in the country is a ruse. A North used to exploit the North, to perpetuate the pauperisation of the real North. An artifice by the merchants of ethnicity and religion who play shortsighted politics with the staggering population problem in the north. The South has its share of charlatans who relegate development to fan the embers of religious and ethnic emotionalism.
But the true North isn’t that which kicks when a candidate says the North is poor and needs redemption. The real north is the North struggling with the Niger Republic kind of developmental indices in out-of-school children, infant mortality etc. The overall best interest of the millions of deprived northern children isn’t served by ethnic chauvinism that denies reality or whitewashes ugly data. The best interest of the downtrodden in the north and everywhere else in the country is promoted by the realization of the bitter truth in clear data and the concomitant determination to curb prevalent multi-dimensional poverty.
Charity, they say, must begin from home. The home of illiteracy and multidimensional poverty in Nigeria, according to data from the national bureau, is the north. 133 million Nigerians are multi-dimensionally poor. These are NBS figures. Two-thirds of the poor in Nigeria live in the north. All empirical data show an enduring dichotomy in developmental indices between the North and the South. The argument isn’t about the section that has more billionaires. There is comparatively much more misery in the north. An Emir of Kano once lamented the marked disparity, a dual homogeneousness which he likened to the existence of two separate countries in one. Those who are hypersensitive to such comparisons should enjoy the luxury of sectional/ethnic defensiveness.
The children suffering chronic malnutrition in Almajiri camps need food and health care and not the propaganda of sectionalism. While it might be easy to corral hungry youths into a marching formation to serve the ego of a cunning self-conceited politician preaching fake patriotism while wallowing in a superiority complex, the solution to youth unemployment lies in clear-eyed sober reflection.
National youth unemployment stands at a frightening 42.5%. In other words, half of our youths are jobless or severely under-employed. Engaging idle youths in religious and political fanaticism, to bicker and wither on social media, might benefit opportunistic politics but it won’t lift their standard of living. The sort of rivalry the country needs is that which measures literacy levels, agricultural output, youth employment, access to quality health and education and level of industrialization.
Any section growing in population at a rate that outstrips economic growth isn’t well advised. And if wise counsel doesn’t come from within then it must come from without. So a responsible presidential candidate must have the testicular or ovarian fortitude to take a position on population control without looking at the countenance of the political elite who might deliberately misconstrue it as bigotry to achieve political advantages. The existence of these middlemen should not discourage honest social diagnosis by conscientious people. Poverty and lack are well distributed around the country. But since everything exists in degrees, it can’t be a political sin to highlight the epicenter of the affliction in good faith to prioritize developmental effort.
Lagos, Rivers and Anambra are relatively affluent states. Though they have hundreds of thousands of very poor people, comparatively the backwardness of Zamfara and Yobe is so remarkable that the later states can be used as national examples of poverty without incurring the wrath of moral police on ethnic and sectional defensive duties. The propaganda that benefits the average rural dweller in Yobe and brings his plight to the fore can’t be an egocentric attempt at putting Yobe on a par with Ogun because there are poor people in Ijebu Igbo.
The propaganda that the rural job seeker in Yobe, which inexplicably lacks agro-processing factories, is one that captures the misery and wretchedness of his environment while highlighting the abundant potential in a large youth population and vast acres of arable land.
Rather than castigate a politician who uses the North to exemplify poverty, other politicians should be invited to discuss the poverty in the North. This is what the true North needs.
•Written by Ugoji Egbujo
