Since 1957, Nigeria has been a major oil exporter but most petrol is imported. A curse or blessing? In 2003, petrol was available on the black market for 400 naira ($3) a gallon – about four times the official time coupled with our epileptic electricity supply. My beloved Nigerian, who cursed us?

A spiritual mapping about the present state of things in Nigeria points to an unending fight about ‘dark days return.’ A brief chronology of the Nigerian oil economy based on the oil discovery three years before our independence made oil the basis of our mono-economic growth with Shell as the first commercial driller and followed by Mobil and Agip. It is on record that oil profitability was the greatest during the “Golden Decade” of the 1970s, when Nigeria became the wealthiest country in Africa. Since 1957, Nigeria has been a major oil exporter but most petrol is imported. A curse or blessing? In 2003, petrol was available on the black market for 400 naira ($3) a gallon – about four times the official time coupled with our epileptical electricity supply. My beloved Nigerian, who cursed us? We can see the glimpses of days of Shagari, Abacha, Obasanjo, Jonathan of corruption, smuggling, looting, and mismanagement that led to massive petrol queues and poor electricity supply.

Yesterday, 23rd December marked the 16th remembrance of the assassination of Chief Bola Ige, a former governor of Oyo State (1979-83) in the South West political landscape. Chief James Ajibola ‘Bola’ Ige, politician and lawyer and the former Attorney General of Nigeria, born September 13, 1930 was assassinated in his bedroom while his police guards disappeared to have “dinner” on December 23 2001. Just like that of Dele Giwa, the founding Editor of Newswatch magazine, Bola Ige’s death remained unsolved like several other high-profile political killings in Nigeria. Bola Ige, the Cicero of ESA Oke with his uncommon fluency in all the three major Nigerian languages, Yoruba, Ibo and Hausa fluently first studied Classic at Ibadan. In his vision to stabilise our energy supply, Obasanjo appointed Bola Ige as Minister for Mines and Power. Bola Ige with all his promise to restore NEPA with 6 months faced a stiff opposition and his re-posting to ministry of Justice did not save him from many toes he has step upon in the face of national corruption and greed.

Dr Omololu Olunloyo, also a former governor of Oyo State once asked Bola Ige if Nigeria was worth dying for and in response by Bola Ige, ‘Nigeria was worth living for but he was not so sure that it was worth dying for.’ It is on record that all of those accused of killing Bola Ige ‘have now been freed by  Ibadan courts  – Adebayo Adedamola aka Fryo, Daramola Ezekiel, Sgt Oye Oniyanda, Nelson Kumoye, Kareem Lawal, Adebayo Adegoke and Oluwole Ogunjimi,  in a judgement delivered by Justice Atilade Ojo on October 14, following the release on June 25  of Iyiola Omisore in judgement delivered by Justice Akin Sanda,  and on July 20 of Alani Omisore, Lambe Oyasope, Kunle Alao and Jelili Adesiyan in a judgement delivered also by Justice Ojo.’

The question is are the killers of Bola Ige still at large and part of the people complaining about the fuel scarcity and lack of power supply? Nigerian, we cannot turn our back from the truth and expect prosperity. What are the roles of the post-independence generation of Nigerian elites, church leaders, politicians and youths in addressing the fuel and electricity, a common debacle during the long period of the military rule in the 1980s and 1990s and the long civilian period 1993- 2015? Professor Jerry Gana, a former Information Minister in 2003 ‘blamed unnamed “political enemies” for causing the shortages in order to discredit the government in the run-up to general elections in April’ 2003. I hope the current Information Minister, Lai Mohammed will not toe the path and use the words of Gana that it is because of 2019 election that “some people thought they could make some subterranean moves just to discredit us.”

Nigerians must be ready to identify our ‘political enemies’ that continue to make us a major oil exporter and importer. Nigerians must be ready to speak with one voice what to do with our broken-down refineries, striking oil workers, petrol hoarding. The ‘political enemies’ that killed Bola Ige that will not allow our electricity to work are becoming powerful day by day and will not allow our broken-down refineries to work. Without you and me speaking against the systemic corruption, in Nigeria, 10s of Buhari and Osinbajo alone cannot perform any magic. Greed, comfort and easy money are now the order of the day in Nigeria and no nation prospers that way. Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson in their book, ‘Why Nations Fail: Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty,’ denounced the influence by extractive colonial institutional histories coupled with incorrect hypotheses and policy managed by independent elites and politicians.

The killing of Bola Ige is one example among many that suggests Nigeria problem is beyond fuel scarcity and poor electricity. We need self cleansing and identification of our common ‘political enemies’ and ‘spiritual enemies’ who are becoming wealthier at the expense of the poor masses. In such a time as this, we need a strong leader with integrity at the centre to lead the way against these enemies of Nigeria who will not allow anything to work.

WHO KILLED BOLA IGE?

O LORD, EXPOSE EVERY POLITICAL AND SPIRITUAL ENEMIES OF NIGERIA IN JESUS NAME.