Mr. Tobi Wisdom Dafe is a Member of Business Intelligent Group of Nigeria, a Political Analyst, and Social Entrepreneurer. In a Tv program with Quest Television, Face 2 Phase monitored by Politics Governance, Dafe who spoke on the security challenges facing the nation said, “Challenges of Insecurity can be curb when we check our value system as a people.
Excerpt:
When we take a look at the Nigeria we are and the challenges of insecurity today, where will you say we are getting it wrong as country?
Well, first we have to ask ourselves how did we get here, where did we start from This is not the idea of supposed Nigeria that our founding fathers had in mind and it all has to do with our value system. Our value system overtime has changed, back then, we use to place our values on potentials and credibility but today the value is on money and in a society where everyone care about just the money and nobody cares how you make the money, it tends to be a very high level of insecurity because the society is not asking questions.
When I was a banker, there was what we call, KYC, Know Your Colleague. If you notice your colleague is living above his means, it is your responsibility to blow a whistle. But we are in a country were a young man of 19-yrs can go to a car dealer and buy a car of N5m, pays cash and nobody will ask any question on how he made such money.
When you talk about security, it has to do with a state being safe, but how safe are we as a nation? This is affecting our economy inasmuch we are trying to shy away from it, you don’t expect foreigners to come and invest in a country that lacks security, anytime you see the whites coming here for business, you would see the number of security agents that are attached to him or her. But that is not the case when Nigerians go to abroad to invest.
If really Nigeria is a safe country, why do pastors go to church with escorts? It tells you the high level of insecurity we have in Nigeria. Warri for example is not the way it used to be use be and all the investors have left. Every single company that was lucrative at some point has left Warri, now youths have nothing rather than ‘Deve’. If you buy a land in Warri, you will be made to pay twice the amount you bought the land because you want to develop it. Would you want to go to a place like that to do Business? NO and it amazing that till today, nobody is saying anything about it.
The funniest aspect of it in Nigeria is that, the people in government are also asking themselves how do we do because we seem to be confused, we have never sat down and come out with a blueprint on how to actually solve this problem that is evolving, going beyond. It is like seeing a little snake that has just been hatched and you over look it and that little snake will grow to become a boa one day that you cannot control again.
The level of unemployment is on the increase on daily basis, the universities are producing graduates on a daily basis, we don’t even have the statistics of the number of graduates we are producing as a country, neither did we have the statistics number that are already there. We don’t even have data base, so when you talked about security, the challenges are very high in Nigeria because it is the basic challenge and problem. There are two major problem we have in Nigeria and they are Electricity and Security and if we can fix these problems, you would be amaze what Nigeria will achieve in no distant time. But if we fold our hands and allow these things to continue, the question where would will be going from here?
Like I always say, it is better to train a child than to repair and adult. Nigerians including myself lack discipline as a people.
When you say that we lack discipline as a people what do you mean
Yes! Because when talk about discipline we are talking about the willingness to deal with others, we are found of disobeying the law because we believe that can get away with it as long there is money. But if we can design a system where you need to obey the law irrespective of who you are, it would help us to attain some level of security. Look at all the killing place, how many people have been found guilty and prosecuted.
You catch a criminal today and he gives good money to security officers; such person is gone and free. The people has lost faith in the security system, even the security operatives are not well treated in terms of salary structure and appreciation when lack contentment as a people and nation so what do you expect them to do?
Our moral value is so poor that even some pastors compromise.so, it’s like a virus that has eaten us so deep as a people, but we have to go back and look at our ways and our culture as a people because culture is the body of characteristics that makes up a place.
When I was in Accra and was to catch up with a flight, and the cab I boarded stopped at traffic light, I told the driver to move that the road is clear, before I could finish talking to the driver, another cab driver disobeyed the traffic and my cab driver said, ‘That must be a Nigerian’ and I was humbled. That tells you how bad is our reputation in foreign countries as a people. The fifth law in Robert Green book, 48 Laws of Power says a law depends on reputation-guard it with your life. Our reputation as a people is very poor and these has affected us because we have neglected it for too long.
Buhari government was popular during the military era because of the level of discipline, himself and Idiagbon were able to instill it on the people in the country through War Against Indiscipline, WAI, and I can assure you that, that was one of the reason some people gave him their votes while he was contesting for president because some people who saw Buhari at that time were expecting that kind of system restored back. But now, no control system anywhere and where there is no control and discipline, everybody live their lives the way they want it and in a place where there is no discipline and control, you will expect chaos and that is where we are heading to now if we don’t curb this on time, then we are heading for doom.
Many of these things are happening because the down point of this is money, it is about interest and it is said that a corrupt man has a price, but a man with integrity believes in value. The value system that we have is our greatest problem and we need to ask ourselves this question, where is our value, what do we value as a people when a child of 18yrs comes home and is giving his parents a million naira without being questioned?
Look at the cases of herdsmen in Abraka, what action has been taken? Nothing. The former House of Assembly man from Ethiope East constituency, Hon Evans Ivwurie who led team of security to go there and chase them out that place was not voted for during his reelection bid by these same people probably because he did not put money on ground for them to share.
Though I am not taking side I just looking at where we place our value on, we need to get it right as a people, we need to understand what and where our value should be and until we get that right, we are steps behind.
