Political Corruption In Nigeria
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Political Corruption In Nigeria
Chapter one
1.0 Introduction
Nigeria’s political difficulties sprang from the British’s casual takeover, administration, and abandonment of the Nigerian government and people. British administration made little effort to bind the country together and connect the disparate groupings of people. Despite the fact that many of our modern conveniences are the result of their enlightenment, they left us hanging.
According to Adewele Ademoyega in his book Why We Struck 1981, when the British arrived, they forcibly rubber-stamped the political situation of Nigeria’s ethnic groups and maintained that status quo until their departure. According to him, nearly a century after their departure, the people continued struggling for their political rights.
When the British arrived in Nigeria as an imperial nation to take over the country’s rulership in 1861 (with the cession of Lagos), they found the people of the south completely free, observing and controlling their own kingdoms and institutions.
Chinua Achebe’s novel Things Fall Apart (1958) attempts to depict the lives of Africans prior to and during the introduction of Europeans in Nigeria.
Things Fall Apart portrays the tragic story of Okonkwo’s rise and fall, as well as the equally tragic story of the disintegration of Igbo culture, represented by Umofia’s agrarian society, under the persistent encroachments of British Christian imperialism.
According to Achebe, Mister Johnson exemplifies the worst form of European representation of Africans. To him, the image was all the more discouraging because John Cary worked hard to obtain an honest depiction, as opposed to many British authors throughout the imperial colonial period who purposefully, and often cynically, exploited stereotypes of Africans and African societies.
Because John Cary was a liberal-minded and friendly writer as well as a colonial governor, Achebe believed the record needed to be corrected. Achebe’s goal thus is to write about and for his own people.
His early works span almost a century of Igbo civilisation. When Things Fall Apart begins, the Europeans had yet to enter Umuofia, the location of the first novel.
When the novel concludes, colonial rule has been established. His other novels discuss the various transformations that occurred before and after independence.
The British administered Nigeria indirectly through their traditional rulers, leaving the genuine leader of the masses hobbled and suppressed. Because Africans were granted ability to reign over their own people, they saw it as an opportunity to mistreat those who had wronged them, extort those who had more than them, and sell his or her own brother or sister in exchange for favours from the superior leaders – the British. (Adewele Ademoyega, Why We Strike).
These actions by local and foreign elites prompted the people to seek independence. Many of them were no longer thinking clearly. Many people now felt compelled to blame others for their mistakes and use them as an excuse.
The current leader blames the colonial overlords and front-runners for independence for failing to perform what was expected of them, as well as mismanagement and theft of public finances.
They allege that their colonial masters trained them to do so. Political elites steal in order to become wealthy and influential in society, then blame the economy and leaders. No one accepts responsibility for their own crimes and mistakes.
Between politicians and the military, they blame each other for a bad government; no one accepts that the other is superior to himself. People in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region do everything possible to steal from petroleum firms because they believe it is their right, that bunkering, which is a regular industry there, is not stealing.
That is why Tanure Ojaide uses his novel The Activist to educate people on what is going on in the Niger Delta region. He claims that individuals who pretend to be literate in society are the primary criminals, destroying one another. Everyone in the country is suffering in some manner as a result of the negative effects of political corruption; we are psychosocially dysfunctional.
Kole Omotoso’s fictions focus on identifying flaws in Nigerian society and suggesting solutions. He spent his childhood and adolescence sharing nationalist dreams of peace, progress, and prosperity; however, as an adult and a writer, he was forced to witness the systematic deferment of these dreams after independence.
For decades after independence from colonial rule, Nigeria was cursed by civil strife, including a civil war (1967-1970) and incessant military coups d’état. These events, along with undemocratic leadership, political chicanery, and bureaucratic cynicism, resulted in a gradual fall in the quality of living in a country that, as the most populous black nation on Earth, is frequently regarded as typical of the black race.
Omotoso attempts to utilise fiction to discuss societal decline and instability, but he does so in a less realistic manner than Armah did in The Beautiful Ones Are Not Yet Born.
Political corruption is defined as the use of legislative powers by government officials for illegitimate private benefit. Other forms of political corruption include the suppression of political opponents and general police brutality.
Corruption takes many forms, including bribery, extortion, cronyism, nepotism, favouritism, graft, and embezzlement. Corruption may help illegal enterprises such as drug trafficking, money laundering, and trafficking, although it is not limited to these activities. Political corruption is an illegal abuse of authority, and psychosocial dysfunction is the mental reaction that results from it.
A psychosocial disorder is a mental condition caused or influenced by maladaptive cognitive and behavioural processes.
1.2 Statement of Problem
Because of the political tyranny and the country’s high rate of malnutrition and poverty, many people are suffering from problems caused by the many ways they are handled and managed.
Their way of thinking has been distorted by the belief that stealing or killing in order to survive is not a crime because their leaders are also thieves who loot national riches and deposit it in foreign accounts.
As a result, citizens are psychosocially dysfunctional and their minds have become polluted. The main issue is the government. Because of the corrupt nature of society, the government sells its pride and honour to foreign corporations and businesses.
These people now treat the natural residents of the places where the companies are located as if they were animals with no dignity. For example, consider Nigeria’s Niger Delta, which is an oil-producing state.
The main issue is between the people and their government. Both are psychologically and socially ill. The anguish of hunger and starvation combined with excessive money has ruined people’s minds to the point where they can no longer think or reason clearly.
1.3 Aims and Objectives
The research aims are as follows:
To identify the issues created by political corruption,
To make recommendations for preventing political corruption and psychosocial disorders and finding a means to entirely eliminate them from society as a whole.
1.4. Significance of the study
Political corruption and psychosocial disorders using Tanure Ojaide’s The Activist and Oke Ndibe’s Arrow of Rain will be useful research materials for students.
This book will demonstrate how the government, individuals, and foreign enterprises contributed to the corruption of society and its environment, and how the act of corruption has disrupted everything.
1.5 Scope of Research
This project focusses on political corruption and psychosocial disorders, drawing on Tanure Ojaide’s The Activist and Okey Ndibe’s Arrow of Rain, as well as other related literary works by Nigerian and African prose writers and critiques on corruption.
The research is divided into five chapters, the first of which includes an introduction, a definition of a term, a statement of the problem, aims and objectives, the significance of the study, the scope of research, and research technique.
The second chapter is a review of related works; the third is a textual study of Tanure Ojaide’s novel The Activist; the fourth is a textual analysis of Okey Ndibe’s novel Arrows of Rain; and the fifth is a summary and conclusion.
1.6 Research Methodology.
The primary source for this research is textual analysis of The major basis of this research is a textual analysis of Tanue Ojaide’s The Activist and Okey Ndibe’s Arrow of Rain.
Secondary materials include library books, texts, magazines, and works on African prose writers.
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