On National Honours


A DISHONOUR TO NIGERIA NATION.

The people a country chooses to honour speaks volume about the values the govt. of that country holds on their list of preferences. Well, with a few distinguished exceptions, the national honours list released about a forthnight ago is a tribute not to superior achievement but to mere competence, to being in the right place - or holding the right job - at the right time, and most importantly to cronyism.

Though the national honours list boasts of genuine heroes like Adebayo Faleti, a cultural icon & a veteran broadcaster who could only get OFR (Officer of the Order of the Niger) - the 6th highest national honour; for his numberless years of distinguished public service, it's crested by others like David Mark, a former soldier and the current senate president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, whose right to the seat he now occupies is being contested in the law courts. In addition, contrary to his promise, he has not made a public declaration of his assets, and there're some unresolved questions about the appropriations for remodeling his official residence. Yet, he's being decorated with the GCON (Grand Commander of the Federal Republic) , the nation's 2nd highest honour. But, Mr. Mark's award is only a sickly metaphor of a sickly system, which spawns sickly rewards.

Mike Okiro, the current police boss, who is also being decorated, has not yet been tested as an Inspector - General of police was also a beneficiary. If we go back on memory lane, the case of the former I.G of police ( Tafa Balogun), who was awarded GCON sometimes ago, will readily come to mind. Yet, he was convicted of gargantuan graft. Anyim Pius Anyim, as senate presido, hastily got awarded a GCON. Yet, the same govt. that honoured him, actively plotted his impeachment!

Also, on the list is the personable Dimeji Bankole who has barely settled in the speaker's chair at the House of Representatives. Even at that, he's being made a CFR (Commander of the Order of Federal Republic). If his predecessor,Patricia Etteh had not been forced to resign in a cloud of scandal, the CFR medal would have gone to her, not on the basis of any outstanding performance in the legislature, but simply for being the speaker.

Is this then all there's to national honours - the ruling class sharing, among themselves, honours they hardly merit, with no known criteria other than whims & caprices?

By the way, why, since independence, has a non-politician not merited the highest honour in the land, despite Nigeria producing people like Prof. Wole Soyinka, Africa's 1st Nobel Laureate in literature, Prof. Chinua Achebe, perhaps the best known Nigerian novelist, and a slew of other world-class academics & professionals? Who knows the answer?

Consequent upon these, i submit that Nigeria's national honours roll be allowed to transcend political elite vanity and begin to reward real heroes. Otherwise, it would continue to be the joke it has become.

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