I Thank you, Elereko
I am not thirsty
Hunger has not emptied my home
You make life easy to live
You practised leadership like friendship
You have repaired the world for us
Your reign is like sweetness itself
And so for these I bring my thanks
I greet you
Please accept my thanks Elereko…
Femi Osofisan, Twingle- Twangle: A. Twynning Tayle P.82

In the play Femi Osofisan’s objective is the establishment of a good government and a well-ordered society in which the rights of the people and state authority are expressed in accord with the same high principles. With seriousness of purpose, Osofisan has worked diligently and adventurously to keep this issues in focus.

His achievements, however, has been the creation of a climate of awareness about the need for selfless leadership and good government that will cater for people’s welfare.

He often reminds the people of their sacred duty to protect themselves against the tendency of the state to trample upon their freedom and their rights to have abundant life and good government, and, no doubt, he will continue to find, as in the “Song of Celebration in Ereko” in Twingle- Twangle: A Twyning Tayle, consolation in the purposeful leadership and good government of Elereko.

Recently, the Senate President Godswill Akpabio was marking his 61st birthday ceremony and Mr Olisa Agbakoba (SAN) spoke on the solutions to the problems of the idle giant Nigeria is facing right in the presence of Mr President of Nigeria, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and other dignitaries.

Among other things, Agbakoba boldly and courageously suggested the convocation of Ethnic Nationalities of Nigeria including Ohaneze, PANDEF, Middlebelt Forum, Afenifere, Arewa and all the traditional rulers in Nigeria if the country wants peace, progress and security in order to advance and develop. He spoke about the legal failure in Nigeria and the need for a judiciary reforms that will get the country a new constitution in a new judicial administration that will usher in a constitution replacement.

The electoral act makes a mockery of democracy. Rewrite the Legal System of Nigeria. Revamp the electoral process and unbundle INEC which is doing far too much than being the electoral unpire for the country.

On economic government, he advocated an appropriate trade policy for the country that would not make the nation a dumping ground for all nations of the world with their various products.

Rather Nigeria should be a producing nation and not a consuming country. We should establish our own industries producing what we need and exporting the excess. We should protect and nurture our industries and not allowing other nations to dominate our national space for consumption.

We should also have a national revenue agency that would be collecting revenues from all the government agencies and parastatals, not leaving the revenues within the agencies and parastatals as they may never remit such revenues to government.

The revenue drive should include tax and non-tax agencies as there are more money to be collected from non-tax agencies as there are more money to be collected from non-tax agencies. A credit economy should be available for those who need loans to obtain any commodity in the market under the economic governance.

There should be devolution of power at the centre as the centre is too powerful as it wields above 70 per cent of the power and authority in Nigeria. In a democracy and not a military government, devolution of power is the beauty and pride of democracy.

We need to rejig and resuscitate our maritime governance in order to protect our hidden treasures under the sea by enacting appropriate laws and edits to saveguard them and the need to establish coasts guards to police, protect, shield, and preserve and keep from harm all our hidden treasures like fishes, shrimps and other sea animals.

“The United National Development Programme (UNDP) has expressed concerns over the state of increased privacy and marinate crimes in the Gulf of Guinea as anti-piracy and other criminal have been a source of concern to, not only Nigeria, but also international business actors, who move their goods and services to other countries like Nigeria through the sea” as stated in The Guardian Newspaper of December 6, 2023, page 20.

President Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu has the capacity to transform Nigeria to become a great nation just like he transformed Lagos State to become a mega-state between 1999 to 2007. He improved the internally generated revenue of Lagos State. Tinubu is running a government based on meritocracy like Ben Gurion, the man who created Israel, Lee Kuan Yew, the man behind the story of Singapore and Deng Xiaoping, the man that transformed China.

These three men didn’t loot the treasury but instead practiced meritocracy and good governance to transform their countries by creating unbelievable economic and social development miracles within a few decades.

Tinubu as the President should put Nigeria firmly on the path of possible full economic recovery and revival from despondency to become an egalitarian society. His government should bring economic improvement, political restructuring, peace, a new lease of life to all Nigerians, and indeed the national Eagle will soar high again among the committee of nations.

Tinubu is a man that worked very hard against all odds of fuel scarcity, naira scarcity, security scarcity and food scarcity to emerge as the over–all winner as the President. He weathered the storm and scaled through all the hurdles to emerge victorious.

Tinubu has the political sagacity to address the problems and woes befallen the nation such as poverty, youth unemployment, insecurity, debt overhang, corruption, separatist agitation, poor infrastructure, skewed power distribution, underfunding of tertiary education, poor electricity generation and distribution, and so on.

If he wants to make history and rebuild Nigeria, Tinubu should embark on massive re-industrialisation to make all our moribund refineries to refine petroleum products for domestic use instead of importing the products. To stimulate economic recovery and boost farmer’s productivity, he should allocate about 10 per cent of the national budget to Agriculture encourage youths and women participation in farming. This is because Agriculture and Creative Industry are the two largest employers of labour in Nigeria economy.

“After agriculture, creative industry is the second employer of labour in Nigeria today. The creative industry is the hub for exporting Nigerian culture, currently employing more than four million people. The Nigerian creative industries include: theatre arts, films, music, fashion, fine arts, dance, arts and crafts, photography, culinary arts,” wrote Gregory Austin Nwakunor in The Guardian Newspaper of Sunday April 23, 2023, page 15. Tinubu should tame primitive accumulation of wealth by politicians and use the money for employment generation, health, education and social welfare for the masses.

The lessons leant from Femi Osofisan’s Twingle- Twangle: A Twyinning Tayle, which is one of the masterpieces and timeless plays of Osofisan is that the characters in the play demand social change and good governance like Elereko in favour of the oppressed and downtrodden masses in the society. The play’s posture of revolt to confront bad governance and the betrayal of aspirations, pervasive squandering of financial resources and widespread political corruption that have accompanied Nigeria since independence in 1960, is highly commendable.

If president Ashiwau Bola Ahmed Tinubu really wants to transform Nigeria to global greatness, he must continue to take tough decisions unfriendly but ultimately good for the masses like fuel subsidy removal. He must not be the only one with the idea of a renewed hope for Nigeria but all his cabinet members, all political appointees, all political advisers, all house of assembly members including the legislatures. All must have the same dream of saving Nigeria.

The house of assembly members should be ready to enact laws to back tough decisions taking by the President with consequential legislation. All must have the same objective of not accumulating primitive wealth and the executive, the legislative and the judiciary wastages and leakages must stop.

In addition to Olisa Agbakoba, Tinubu must search for nine other brilliant, patriotic and gifted citizens who believe in and optimistic about the Nigeria project, to become ten ingenious Nigerians who will advise the president and join him in the search to transform Nigeria from the present ordinariness to become a globally great nation. The Agbakoba speech tells me that it is quite possible for Nigeria to become a world power!

Prof. Muyiwa Awodiya, a retired Professor of Theatre Arts, can be reached through 08037424915