Necessary suicide

By Pat Utomi …
Suicide is not pleasant stuff. In most cultures it is seriously frowned on and considered taboo. Yet we know that a seed has to die to bring forth life. As we go from change as electioneering slogan to actual social engineering that can help the Great Escape from misery in Nigeria there are fears that commitment to old ways for those that profit from it could be so high they will go out of their way to frustrate a desirable new order.
The depth of the fear Nigerians have that the change they seek may not come as they desire, came home to me when developments in constituting the leadership of the National Assembly triggered a spate of emotions, and a quick personal reflection in an Opinion piece titled: They have Hijacked Our Change, Again.
I was shocked by the number of people who stopped me at Airports, public events, and even in church, to engage in a conversation on the subject. The range include those who are deeply pessimistic and simply say it was wishful thinking believing that PDP governors who switched to APC have somehow changed therefore nothing has changed because the Opposition won. Others who think that APC leadership went to sleep and allowed weed to grow among the wheat without weeding out the weed quickly enough before it grew the courage to dare the change voters voted for also had their share of voice. The range of views I was subjected to listening to, whether I liked it or not, included views that many of the elected have mortgaged homes and limbs to get to the National Assembly because the Political Parties did not use the selection of candidates to screen out the many criminals in search of public office, was assurance change would delay.
Those people, they say, would be unwilling to respond to the call for change. Some critics just had given up on the political class and saw no difference, no matter the party. Thankfully, there were those generous enough to believe that if you carefully appointed the right people to positions integrity could reign and change would come.
To these and many more scenarios of pessimism about the possibilities for change I needed to find a response refrain, to fit all sizes of issues. Remarkably what I found was that it is possible to commit suicide to personal expectations for the greater good either from a redemptive conviction, the born again person; from fear of consequence; when the top team is willing to risk it all to salvage a bad situation, or because system redesign just makes it much more difficult to exploit the old loopholes for abuse.
One such system redesign is the awakening of citizenship. When civil society rebirth and citizen consciousness reach a level that people can really call on people power, the system can work from their pressure. This is especially so when they think the power elite are working against their mandate and they call out the crowds. Same will happen an elite not minded to do justice, may, like the unjust judge in the Bible, give the widow justice, lest they be wearied to death by the widow’s persistent quest for justice.

Read also: Graffiti… The challenge of change

I spent a little time in Cairo on invitation from the Afriexim Bank at the peak of the Arab Spring. Witnessing the pride of the Conciege in the Hotel showing off cell phone video recording of his family at Tahir square. I believe people are frustrated enough with Nigeria not reaching its potential that such a movement could be sparked, as was the case during the ‘Save Nigeria’ group activities. All of this could lead to those who are stuck in the Machiavellian premise of those who profit from the old order doing everything to prevent a new order from coming about, Committing “necessary suicide” in embrace of a new order.
I frequently turn to examples from around the world to explain necessary suicide. One worth repeating is the Fernando Cardoso story. The Brazilian scholar returned from years of exile at the Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLA), as Military rule ended, to a Brazil in which inflation was sky high and the span of tenure of finance minister counted in months. He became Foreign Minister and was surprised with transfer to the Finance Ministry before his consent could come.
In trying to find the path away from Brazil’s economic challenges, Cardoso, one the Fathers of Dependency Theory, a conceptual Approach in International Political Economy which generally saw the way forward in de-linking from International capitalism ended on the path of suicide. This leading Dependista, as they were known, would literally commit Role-suicide when in pooling Brazil’s best and brightest young economists they suggested a path opposite to that which Cardoso had travelled on his intellectual journey. In embracing globalization, Cardoso would begin the redemption of Brazil. I am sure he must be feeling good about himself today that he died to self and saved his country. He was of course rewarded with being elected President and ushering in the Inatio Lula Da Silva era when the promise of Brazil went into flight
It is such that lead me to the view that no matter how much the elements in the process who fear change have invested in the old order and in getting to where they are, the right set of pressures, patriotic redemption charge and remorse at what legacy we seem to be leaving to our children, can make men go for necessary suicide.

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