Okay, so now I’ve got a post about Melbourne out of the way it’s time for me to say a little something about Nigeria. With the exception of a week in October when I need to clear out my apartment, I’ve pretty much left Nigeria. My assignment there officially finished on 31st July, although I will have to return for business trips over the course of the next 3 years because the project I am on in Melbourne is for Nigeria.
Somebody once said that there is much to write about Russia, but when one tries you can never find the words to write the first line. Nigeria is much the same, and indeed there are many similarities between the two countries. I have tried to describe Nigeria to people who have never been there, and failed on most occasions. A colleague of mine stopped telling people back home about the place because he was getting a reputation as somewhat of a bullshitter, even though he didn’t exaggerate anything. I was at a seminar in Paris some time ago and I was describing the working life in Nigeria to a group of Frenchmen. One of them quipped that I was exaggerating and that “it couldn’t be that bad”, which prompted another Frenchman, sitting beside me, to nudge me in the ribs and remark “wait until he does his Nigerian assignment”. He was based in Port Harcourt.
Nigeria has a reputation, and I knew about it before I arrived. Most of what I’d heard proved to be completely true. Almost all of it, in fact. To get a general picture of Nigeria, just read the news, and you’ll not be far wrong. It isn’t a place like Russia, the US, or France which surprise visitors when they see the contrast between what they’ve imagined (based on exposure to their tourists or foreign policy) and the individuals they encounter. But beyond the general picture, there are some subtleties worth mentioning.
It’s first important to understand that degree is as important as form. Russians, faced with criticism of corruption in their country, often retort that corruption is found everywhere, even in the UK. Which is true, but in many countries it does not infest every authority, office, and institute like it does in Russia. It is the degree, or extent, of corruption which makes Russia different from the UK, not the form. Understanding this concept is important in describing Nigeria.
There is no getting away from the fact that corruption in Nigeria has infested almost every aspect of life, work, and society. I can’t think of a single area where I didn’t encounter a scam of some sort. Some of them were pretty normal – policemen hassling motorists for bribes, for example – with others being less common elsewhere. Filling brand named alcohol bottles with local hooch was widespread practice. Not so bad in itself, but these were being sold through supposedly legitimate suppliers and turning up in established bars. Others were unique to Nigeria. I knew a guy in charge of oil shipments for a foreign oil company who received a call from somebody in the authorities saying he was not going to release the multi-million dollar cargo until somebody had bought his cousin $10 worth of phone credit. My acquaintance found himself going to the shop, buying a phone card, and handing it over to some scruffy bloke who showed up at his office in order to allow his crude oil out of the country.
The corruption, theft, and graft can take many forms: falsifying a CV (I don’t mean enhancing, I mean pretending you’re a Lead Piping Engineer of 12 years experience when actually, until yesterday, you were a fisherman); selling positions in a company; stealing diesel from the storage tanks you’re paid to protect; issuance of false material certificates; impersonating an immigration officer to access an office, from which you then tap up the people within to fund your latest venture; selling land which isn’t yours; deliberately running down the country’s refining capacity in order to partake in the lucrative import of fuels; falsifying delivery notes of said refined fuels in order to receive greater government subsidies; deliberately restricting the country’s power generation capacity in order to benefit from the importation of generators (which must be run on imported fuel); theft of half-eaten sandwiches and opened drink containers from the office fridge; tinkering with fuel gauges at petrol stations to sell customers short; conspiring with company drivers to issue false receipts indicating more fuel was supplied than actually was; supplying counterfeit safety equipment; falsifying certificates related to professional competence (e.g. rope access work); paying employees less than stipulated in their contract (or not at all); cloning satellite TV cards, meaning the legitimate user gets their service cut off when the other card is in use (the cards are cloned by the same people who issue the genuine cards); the list is literally endless. There is no beginning or end to corruption in Nigeria, it is a permanent fixture.
Nepotism is rife: family members are employed and promoted before anyone else. Outright theft is rife: from a pen lying on a desk, to billions from the state coffers. Dishonesty is rife: from the state governors to the street urchin, lying to enrich yourself is the norm. You name the scam, it is being done in Nigeria. Eventually, nothing surprises you.
As I said before, you’ll find such practices everywhere, but to nowhere near the extent found in Nigeria.
Apparently it wasn’t always like this. There was a time, probably from around the 1970s to 1990s, when Nigeria had a reasonably diverse economy. Besides the oil and gas, they had agriculture, manufacturing and assembly (Peugeot set up an assembly plant in Nigeria in the mid-1970s), brewing (there is a both a Guinness and a Heineken brewery), refining, construction, and pharmaceuticals. Some of these survive today. There were decent universities, and students wishing to graduate had to apply themselves. Security wasn’t much of a concern to the average citizen.
I don’t know the details, but at some point in the 1990s one of the military dictators decided to flood the place with oil money in order to buy support. This had the effect of drowning every other form of enterprise and ensuring that oil and gas was the only game in town. This is bad in itself, but by no means unique to Nigeria. What was worse is that this quickly instilled a mentality across Nigeria that there was a lot of money up for grabs, and getting your hands on it wasn’t in any way related to honest efforts or applying yourself to something constructive. Nigeria became a place where if you’re not getting your hands on some of the oil money, either directly or indirectly, then you’re going nowhere. With oil money washing over the whole country like a tidal wave, soon everyone was trying to secure their own piece of the action, using fair means or foul. Imagine throwing a huge box of sweets into a playgroup shouting “Grab what you can!”, and the chaos that ensues will be similar to what happened to Nigeria on a national scale.
At least, this is what I gather happened – I may be wrong – but for sure, the current situation reflects what I’ve described. The economy is funded almost exclusively from oil and gas revenues, and everything else is merely feeding off that. The new hotels in Lagos, the growth of capital city of Abuja, the importation of luxury goods, the Audi and Porsche dealerships, the sky-rocketting real estate prices, the money earmarked for infrastructure projects, the increase in flight passengers, all of it is directly or indirectly linked to the oil money. Okay, maybe there is some hyperbole in there. Agriculture still makes up the lion’s share of GDP, and the services sector is booming. Advertising is a big industry in Lagos, although the most common thing you see advertised is advertising space. But nobody is going to get anywhere herding cattle, picking pineapples, or working in a sawmill. Even the owners won’t be earning that much, not if that’s their only income. There is very little opportunity to get rich, or even advance, unless you are somehow connected to the supply of oil money.
One of the results of this national free-for-all is the formation of groups, societies, associations, and unions whose raison d’être is to obtain as much money and benefits for their members as possible. This isn’t much different from Europe in respect of trade unions, but groups and subgroups form at micro-levels with sometimes comical precision. The Lagos Association of Road Maintenance Engineers, Roundabout and Lay-by Division, 4th Department. The Nigerian Association of Water Truck Drivers, Lagos Chapter. Membership of one or more of these associations is both essential and compulsory: essential because an individual would get trampled very quickly in the general melee of Nigeria, and compulsory in the sense that you have almost no chance of being allowed to quietly ply your trade without paying dues to some group or other. It’s not clear what the legal standing of a lot of these groups is, but it’s often hard to tell how they differ from a standard extortion racket. One of the most powerful unions in Lagos, the transport union, used to shake down any okada (motorcycle taxi) driver passing through their checkpoints, claiming the money was used “to protect them from the police”. I doubt the money was used in such a manner, but people do need protection from the police in Lagos. Not that the okada drivers had any say in the matter: membership was automatic, and the union muscle would beat any non-compliant driver or confiscate his vehicle. The power of the oil and gas workers unions is legendary, ensuring their members enjoy pay and benefits which are the highest of any local staff in the world, and often outstrip those of the expatriates.
This in itself might not be so damaging, but ubiquitous to all competing factions is a rapacity the likes of which I doubt can be found anywhere else on such a scale. There is a culture so prevalent that it is a defining characteristic of Nigeria whereby no amount is ever enough, and no sum too small to be pilfered. There comes a point in the career of most people who have gotten rich, either legitimately or otherwise, where they stop chasing the small stuff and are only interested in adding to their pile if the increase will be substantial. The police chief of a sizeable Thai resort town has his fingers in many pies, but he’s not interested in shaking down street vendors. His minions might in order to supplement their salaries, but generally once the boss has his cut of most of the action, he’s not interested in sweeping up every last baht. As a result, commerce can continue relatively unmolested. The same is roughly true amongst the Sheikhs of the Middle East. Bung the Crown Prince a few million for the contract, and he’ll allow the project activities to go ahead pretty freely. He’s not interested in making an extra $10k by insisting you hire his brother’s lorry fleet to transport the gravel. Such restraint may also be practical: the dodgy official in the UK isn’t going to be interested in taking pennies if he risks getting fired or going to jail, he’ll have a minimum price he’ll work for.
But Nigeria has the same problem I saw in Russia: an almost pathological insistence of securing for yourself 100% of everything that is available, and not a kopek or kobo less. I have observed before that Russians would rather have 100% of nothing than 50% of something, and the same is true – but on a far greater scale – in Nigeria. The inequality in Nigeria is horrific. The middle-classes are tiny, those who are neither stinking rich nor mired in poverty. As it happens, most of the Nigerians I worked with fell into this category: lucky enough to have well-paying jobs, but not ordering Porsche Cayennes for each family member. Statistically, almost all Nigerians are dirt poor. A very few are stinking rich. Again, a manageable problem in itself, but the rich haven’t finished yet. Indeed, they’re only just getting started. I spoke to a couple of Angolans in a seminar once, and they said that although their ruling classes had enriched themselves immeasurably, they were at least spending some money on the country, and improvements were noticeable. The reason the Russians accept with a shrug the siloviki helping themselves to millions is because they (rightly) feel this is inevitable and – more importantly – life is actually improving in Russia and has been doing so since they came to power. Sure, it’s a slow improvement and life is still hard, but they are at least moving in the right direction (for how long is a discussion for another post). There have been improvements in infrastructure in Russia, the new Sheremetovo airport to name one example.
By contrast – and I challenge any Nigerian reading this to disagree – there have been no discernible improvements in Nigeria in the past decade (outside of Abuja, where all the politicians happen to live). The infrastructure is crumbling, electricity shortages abound, Lagos airport is a national disgrace, project after project gets sanctioned but rarely started, never mind completed, before the funds disappear, and unemployment is rocketing. I heard somewhere that 2m people are added to the workforce every year in Nigeria. To do what, exactly? There are no jobs. One source of employment for young men was to drive okadas, until they abruptly got banned in Lagos last year. The roads are now much better, but you now have tens of thousands of young men with no source of income and no hope of a job. Since the ban came into effect, crime – robberies, car-jackings, burglaries – have increased by an order of magnitude, even in the rich neighbourhoods of Lagos previously thought to be safe. It’s not difficult to see why.
Meanwhile, Nigerian senators – of whom there are 109 – enjoy an official package worth $1.5m per year, which they recently requested to be increased to $2.2m per year. By contrast, the US President gets an annual salary of $400k. Given the unofficial incomes of a Nigerian senator through graft and backhanders is probably 3-5 times that, we can probably estimate most of these guys are taking home something in the order of $4-5m each year. Yet they put in for a 46% increase, in a country where 45% of the population lives beneath the poverty line. This is hardly surprising for a group of politicians, and far from unique to Nigeria. The problem is, this behaviour is repeated through every strata of society from the very top of the government to the lowest street urchin: whatever is there, I want all of it; and I want more. I saw wealthy middle-class Nigerians move to ensure drivers did not enjoy a fringe benefit worth about $10 per week. If you threatened to report a low-level official for corruption, he would usually tremble with fear of his boss finding out: not because his boss shuns corruption, but because he will want to know why the proceeds of this particular scam haven’t been coming to him. We already had the example of a multi-million dollar oil cargo being held up until somebody’s relative received a kick-back worth $10. If any amount of new money arrives in the economy – due to a new oil project, for example – those who are already wealthy, via their societies, organisations, unions, and political connections will ensure 100% of that new money will go to them. Insofar as sharing and dividing the spoils goes, it is between groups who are already of the same wealth. If any trickles down to the next layer, it is almost by accident, and to be corrected at the first opportunity.
I came to the conclusion about 2 years into my assignment that Nigeria is probably the only genuinely classless society I have seen. Class is very different from wealth. Upper class people can be dirt poor (bankrupt dukes) and lower class people can be fabulously rich (Russian oligarchs). Class is about behaviour and attitudes, not wealth (a point made very well in Kate Fox’s excellent book Watching the English). And insofar as behaviour goes, I didn’t see a shred of difference between the top politicians, down through the officials in the national authorities, through the middle class professionals, through the service providers, right down to the area boys. The behaviour was identical across all strata: I want more money, and I will do absolutely anything to get it. If you were to replace the politicians – let’s say our 109 senators from before – with 109 random people from the Nigerian citizenry, you would get no change in behaviour. You could repeat the experiment a thousand times, and you would get no change. There is no ruling class in Nigeria, there is just a set of rulers. Where any change is expected to come from I don’t know.
I believe one of the root causes is the bizarre situation where being dishonest is not socially frowned upon. Not really, anyway. If somebody is caught with his hand in the till, he is not shunned by his peers. The whole situation is treated with utter indifference, and sometimes admiration (if the scam is particularly imaginative). Societal pressure plays an enormous role in shaping the behaviour of a population, probably more so than the brute force of the law, and whilst all Nigerians complain about the crime and dishonesty so prevalent in their country (it affects them far more than the expats), they remain utterly silent when a perpetrator is identified from within their peer group. At best, you’ll get a shrug and a statement to the effect of “that’s just how it is”. If you’re a Nigerian caught running a scam against your employer, your colleagues aren’t going to think any less of you.
In fact, the only behaviour I managed to identify which would cause a Nigerian to be shunned by his peers and made an outcast, is if he decided he wasn’t a believer and therefore wasn’t going to be showing up in church (or mosque) any more. I don’t think I met a single Nigerian who didn’t attend either church or mosque, and religion plays an enormous – possibly the key – role in Nigerian society. I’m not going to go into this topic, mainly because I’m not reflexively anti-religion, but I do suspect that a lot of Nigerians justify unsavoury behaviour during the week by going to church on Sunday and washing themselves of sin. In this respect, the place is very similar to the Gulf States.
Now a reminder of what I said at the beginning of this post. Degree matters. You will find every type of individual in Nigeria, including the kind, funny, generous, honest, and everything else that is good in a person. You’ll find lots of them too. I had the pleasure of working with some great individuals, who were genuinely skilled, could apply themselves, held positions on merit, and were extremely well-mannered and respectful. The team of Nigerians I managed was one of the nicest bunch of people you’d ever hope to meet, and easy to manage as well. (My theory is that engineers are often like this: if you’re bone-idle and want to earn money dishonestly, there are easier things to do than an engineering degree.) The problem these decent people have is that they are vastly outnumbered by those who are not. For every Nigerian who is honest, well-mannered, and diligent you’ll find a hundred whose only goal is to get some money whilst expending the minimum amount of effort possible. If they can use personal connections, lies, or trickery in lieu of learning a useful skill and applying it, they’ll take that option every time. It’s a numbers thing: if 50% of Nigerians were more like 10% of them, the country would be okay. And that’s the fundamental problem of Nigeria summed up in one sentence: way too many dickheads.
When I was bored in our morning meetings – which was on most days – I would canvas my team’s opinion on certain things, often the state of the country. They were by and large in despair. Nigerians are famously optimistic, but this is often through desperation. Nowhere was this better demonstrated than on the occasion when a bank put a Christmas tree up on a roundabout with “presents” at the bottom, and the next morning all the presents had been ripped open. If somebody thinks a box under a tree on a roundabout contains an X-Box, then you’ve gone way beyond optimism and into desperation or delusion.
My lads were a happy enough bunch – as Nigerians usually are – but had no hope of things getting better any time soon. I ventured the suggestion that a return to military dictatorship might be on the cards, and I got no objection. One of them explained that during the times of military dictatorship, it was only a handful of people at the top creaming off money. Now, with democracy, it’s tens of thousands. And during the military dictatorship, crime was much lower, and few had concerns about personal security. Democracy is all well and good, but I’ve often said that it is a means to an end, not an end in itself. I am sure the world will howl with outrage and impose sanctions should Nigeria undergo another military coup, but few can deny that democracy is failing to deliver peace, prosperity, and basic services to Nigeria. I remain far from convinced that many Nigerians would not welcome such an event.
So what did I think of my time in Nigeria? In truth, I didn’t like it, but not for the reasons you might think. The worst thing, by far, was not being able to go anywhere and do anything at the weekends. The security situation did not allow us to travel beyond a very restricted area of Lagos, and even if we could there wasn’t much to do. I like walking about with a camera, camping, exploring by going to a town and drinking lots, skiing, driving around, visiting people, riding a bike, and hill walking. There was no scope to do any of that in Lagos, for reasons usually related to security. That meant for weekend after weekend after weekend there was nothing to do but watch sport on TV, go to the gym, and lie by the pool. Those with families did whatever families do; the single guys went to bars and clubs and picked up Nigerians girls; guys like me – married, single status – didn’t do very much at all. I used the time well, learned French, read countless books, improved on the guitar, and got fit. Nigeria has excellent weather, and even better pineapples, but I would much rather have spent my time doing something else in another place.
Those restrictions were by far the worst aspect of my Nigerian assignment. Insofar as the daily life in Lagos went, with all its challenges, that was manageable. You get used to anything eventually, and at some point I was able to shrug off almost everything Nigeria had to throw at me. I never quite got used to the traffic, so used to plan my day to avoid the worst of it. Dealing with the Nigerians took some getting used to, a process that was eased considerably when I figured out they weren’t the most difficult factor to consider. There’s rarely any point in getting upset about locals anywhere, because they are the raw material you have to work with. If you go to Nigeria, you will have to work with Nigerians, so deal with it. Some aspects of it were frustrating no doubt, but what can I do? Nothing.
What infuriated me more was that some of the expats I encountered were hopelessly unqualified and too inexperienced to be there. Nigeria is a difficult place to attract talent to, and as such – like a lot of oil towns worldwide – those who end up coming are usually way below the standard that should be demanded. Unbelievably, incompetence and stupidity seem to be imported at great expense into Nigeria. This annoyed me considerably, as it did when I encountered a similar state of affairs in Sakhalin. If you are going to come into somebody else’s country on the basis that you have skills they don’t, you’d better make damned sure you have those skills and they are on full view. If I had a quid for every time I’ve seen somebody fail this basic test in the oil business, I could retire and bump yachts in Monaco with Roman Abramovich. I’m pretty sure I upset a few people in Nigeria, and maybe there were a few who didn’t want me there, but nobody could accuse me of not adding value. Nobody could point the finger at me and ask “Why, exactly, do we keep this guy?” If nobody else, the lads in my team didn’t mind me. I gave them direction, support, and cover and got somewhere close to the best out of them. What infuriated me more than anything was coming across a Nigerian with a reputation for being useless, and on further investigation learning that they’d never been given a job description, never been given any meaningful direction, had no understanding of the context of their job in the department or the department in the company, and had just been plonked at a desk and expected to do something. I came across this far more than I should have, and it pissed me off. Fair enough, if somebody is useless then call them useless; but first you have to give them every opportunity to succeed, and only then can you call them useless if they don’t perform. Hey, you could even call this practice management! There was a serious lack of it in Nigeria. How many half-decent Nigerians are shoved in the corner of an office and written off as useless in this manner I don’t know, but I’ll bet it’s a lot, and it does the place a serious disservice.
As final proof that I didn’t dislike the place that much, I signed up to another 3 years of involvement when I had the opportunity to get away from Nigeria for good. I learned some things during my assignment in Lagos, and that knowledge is useful. I know Nigeria, and what it’s like to work with Nigerian companies and Nigerian people on a Nigerian project. A lot of people don’t. I’m used to it, it doesn’t hold any mystery or reason for fear as it did when I first arrived almost 3 years ago.
I’ll be back there at various points in the future, but honestly I hope I don’t have to live there permanently again for the reasons I stated. I don’t consider it 3 years wasted – far from it – and I didn’t hate it. There were moments, plenty of them, where I positively enjoyed it. And as assignments in Nigeria go, that’s not too bad.
UPDATE
In attempt to address some of the reoccuring themes in the comments to this post, I’ve written a follow-up here.
I’m a Nigerian, currently resident in Nigeria, and I agree 100% with this post. It’s a sad but unfortunately accurate assessment. Well done….
Fair view.
I’m so happy I finished reading the article. I must say it is well said and 100% accurate. Everything here has been exactly as it is and I’m sure every Nigerian knows this. It is the fact that we try to deny this things that makes it almost unsolvable for us but we are optimistic and hope the future will bring a better Society and country for us all. I’m just short of words right now
Thanks for the brutal honesty. Perhaps one day, we’ll sort it out. If you return I’d like to grab a cold STAR with you. I assume you will touch down Lagos.
Cheers.
Hello to you guys in Nigeria, sorry to hear about all of this, hang in their lads.
Okay son, I will take your word for it, I am now convinced that I will never visit Nigeria and I am the type of guy that likes to go to places. What is really scary is some of the population growth predictions that are being published on Nigeria and Africa in general. Nigeria nearly reaching 1 billion by 2100! even if its half right its a worry. Maybe some of the local posters could comment on these population predictions?
There is nothing else for it lad than your next assignment and posting being in a job extracting hydrocarbons from the Bowland Basin in the UK Badlands and then you can live in Manchester full time.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/07/16/the-amazing-surprising-africa-driven-demographic-future-of-the-earth-in-9-charts/
Bardon,
It’s foolhardy to make such projections too far into the future. If you asked King Leopold’s successors in 1913 whether Congo would be free from Belgian rule in 2000, they would have laughed you off.
I don’t think there will be a nation called “Nigeria” in 2100, Africa’s borders would have changed and migration within Africa (which is negligible today) would be very significant.
If you look carefully at Africa, there’s a lot of land and there are no real natural barriers to emigration (like the Himalayas separating India and China). There’s nothing to suggest that there wouldn’t be significant improvements in infrastructure; so a lot of Nigeria’s population (even if it gets to half of the number) will migrate from Nigeria.
I can’t but agree with all the points raised, but instead of coming together to provide solutions the race to control the largest share has begun. I don’t see us getting there anytime soon so enjoy your stay over there.
Couldn’t have said it any better
Spot on. 100percent right
This piece encompasses everything my heart churns out through my quill on my blog. As a Nigerian , it is indeed disheartening! However , what really hurts most is the fact that, its not just the persons at the helm of affairs who are corrupt, the youths who ought to be the messiahs to right this wrong , have sadly followed suit in this endless game of corruption! No one is interested in properly educating themselves…all they desire is MONEY, regardless of how it is derived! I fear for my country! Pls read http://www.amazon143.wordpress.com
One of the first things the country needs to do is stop taking on expatriates and employ the skilled Nigerians. Shock horror? Skilled Nigerians? Never! Well, actually, they are there, here and everywhere and this white-ass licking has to end. Talk to the people trying to make a living there and they will tell you how they are being treated as less than human in their own country by foreigners.
I weep anytime I see my country described like this…. I weep cos this is an unbiased and saddening account of what happens in naija everyday. I am almost losing hope cos I don’t see a change coming. Even if i decide to die for what I believe in, where is MKO Abiola? Kudirat Abiola , Ken Saro-wiwa and other folks who died believing that change is coming? I weep cos people usurp political power to loot and to oppress. I weep cos my generation is turning out to be worse than my father’s generation……. I weep cos soon, the oil money shall finish and behold, d great depression will re-visit Naija. Can’t our looters, sorry, leaders do sth about our mono-economy? Are they of this earth who live that earth may die(Niyi Osundare)?
I can’t agree less to the presentation of your observations. It is a pity. However, I will disagree that corruption in Nigeria is a permanent fixture. Nigeria will witness a system overhaul, not in my generation unfortunately but in generations to come.
As brutal as it may sound, this unfortunately is an apt representation of Nigeria. Once upon a time, narratives such as this were greeted with stoic reprisals, most of which have slowly vaporized into the thin air, in exchange for a staunch acceptance of the situation on ground – it’s called reality.
Corruption, nepotism, ethnic jingoism, religious bigotry, indolence and celebration of mediocrity, can only lead to one destination: an impending Armagedon. The “do nothing solution” is the primary reason why our once microscopic problems have been escalated upwards to the upteenth floor, where suddenly NEPA took light. Implied to mean that we are stuck where we are, and unless something revolutionary (such as constant NEPA) happens, we shall soon fall off the cliff of progressing Nations.
There is a reason why the 10% you alluded to are in a state of despondency. It is because Nigeria is not a meritocracy, where genuine effort – backed by procedure – equals result. Instead, what we have here is result devoid of a coherent procedure. Unfortunately, it is this 10% that can deliver Nigeria from the jugulars of backwardness, a myth which unfortunately might never occur in my life time. As you can see, my misplaced optimism skipped desperation, in hurried acceptance of the Nigerian reality. And this subtle message you have delivered in your sermon.
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painfully accurate.
My brother! You care more for Nigeria (by largely writing the truth) than many of the best of us. However, it’s more like 80% of the population living below the “poverty line” if you apply western or global standards or definitions. Think about it, how many Nigerian homes outside Abuja, Lagos and PHC have the expected availability of “white household goods” in them? How many Nigerians attend well equipped schools or are able to read and write effectively? Many Nigerians (I proffer 70-80%) lack these things (“white household goods” and other globally affordable comforts as well as sound basic education or in this case “the mix”). If you add affordable healthcare, dependable security and power to the “the mix”, we are in serious trouble with our percentages. Your observations are largely accurate and buttress many things I have argued about myself. The solution (as asked by Hassan) has to come from Nigerians understanding that we have gotten it completely wrong and as such need to start building our society again from the bottom to the top. Our socio-economical and socio-cultural structures (such as Government, religion, traditions etc) have to be rewoven or re-patterned in order to form or produce a “neo-societal design” or “neo-societal foundation” upon which a new Nigeria must be built! Unfortunately, we are burdened with a readily available primary income source (Oil and gas) that is currently sufficient enough to survive the poor and afford the exorbitance of the super rich. Within which (exorbitance and excess) mind you, our religious infrastructure takes full root! What must occur therefore is war, rebellion or a sustained action of civil disobedience (where many will die!). In a normal environment this can apply. Sadly, in one such as this where docility is entrenched in our DNA, where we aspire only for materialism and remain appraised only by how much more of more we have, it is utterly difficult and I dare say nearly impossible! What else must then occur for lasting change to come? Our primary income source (Oil and gas) needs to dry up! Since this is also implausible (at least in the near future) we need to either be re-colonised (maybe economically and this is where the Chinese are coming) to the extent that we as a people having been robustly strangulated by our new colonial masters will again rise up to fight for a new Nigerian state. The truth is, we are in BIG trouble and our days or years of reckoning will definitely come. But hey, what do I know?!
Sad but True narration on my Motherland!
As it is I doubt if any change can come, The only solution is a bloody revolution but it will never arrive!!
We can only hope for the breakdown of Nigeria as this is the only way out of the Connundrum!
Thanks for posting this could you please send this to any of our news papers so that they can publish it in the papers for our people to read. God will bless you for your honest and good luck with you in your new assignment.
Hello Tim,
A very good and true representation of Nigeria. However, I would like to ask if you and your contributed to the continued rot in Nigeria or tried your best possible to help us. You mentioned your friend based in Port-Harcourt, so he most likely stayed in the PRODECO, or Intel Camp. What did he do about the condescending behaviors of expats in those camps or was he a part of those problems also?
In my organization, I have witnessed also “quacks” employed as expats, but in most cases, it’s their fellow expat friends and associates that gives them the jobs with bogus salaries and not Nigerians!
Also, the love you claim to have for Nigeria that makes you and other expatriate come back to Nigeria is the huge amount you earn as allowances. It’s only the allowance of going to China that’s higher than that of coming to Nigeria in the world!
Thanks for the impact you have had on your team and am certain young Nigerians still has a lot to tap from committed expats like you, but please don’t rub it in our faces, you aren’t doing this for free!!
I am a Commissioning Engineer in the Nigerian Oil and Gas sector. I have about 5years of experience. I have so far started up 2no Solar Mar 100 Turbine Compressors and 3no Saturn 20 Gas Turbine Generators complete with Glycol Dehydration Systems, Flare Ignition Systems and Utilities. I am currently on a foreign assignment working on a Gas gathering compression platform project.
Articulate and Spot on. Great article
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This is unfortunate but true. But let me say that there are people that are good and if you come across them, you will have positive things to write about my dear country. There is hope for us and this we can achieve by letting this information get circulated to others and I am positive a lot of us who wish this Country well will change some of the behaviours that have earned us this negative factual remarks. I weep for my father land. I appeal to you all to let us be determined to turn things around for the best. Long live Nigeria. God bless my father land.
“(I don’t mean enhancing, I mean pretending you’re a Lead Piping Engineer of 12 years experience when actually, until yesterday, you were a fisherman)”
Just being a grumpy Brit aren’t you. Unfortunately, the system allowed you expatriate to come humiliate Nigerians so I don’t blame you. And to think all of these are however true but with references only to Russia, Nigeria, Australia and The US while leaving out ‘The Most Holy’ Britain, I find it very worrying. This is much like a (government) brainwashed grumpy Briton believing that Ghadaffi was a dictator and so are Assad, Sadam, Mugabe, Mubarak et al. and yet forgetting that Britain has since forever remained under the dictatorship of the Windsors.
The level of brainwashing that goes on in Britain through the education system is quite alarming. The people of Britain believe other governments are suffering their subjects whilst forgetting that the wars in those countries are directly yielding positive impacts on the economy of Britain through arms and equipment sales and the exportation of highly-paid pretenders in the name of aid workers to these areas thus reducing British unemployment rate. A Briton talking about nepotism whether it affects him/her directly or not is extremely laughable considering the level of official racism that exists in Britain which they sheepishly hide behind a pretentious grin.
Look around the world, Britain basically instituted corruption in all of its empire and this can be found in all these countries today.
Yes! Some of these are true. And YES!!! a lot of them are also found here in Britain as well.
And for any Nigerian reading this comment, don’t blame this bloke who posted this. Blame the Nigerian elites who prefer a medical tour of England, Europe and America instead of having same facility in Nigeria. Blame them for running cap-in-hand to the west begging for a non-existing aid money. Blame them for believing so much in western universities instead of investing much into Nigerian universities and sponsoring researches. Blame the elites who believe it is until a Nigerian Studies abroad, he is not educated yet. The Nigerian government, under the leadership of these rogues as elites would prefer an expatriate to a qualified Nigerian even if they are a product of the same institution.
And for you Mr Tim Newman, one day, just one day Nigerians will rise up against these elites and blokes like you will not come to us as expatriates any more but as an individual who ‘only has a reasonable’ contribution to make in our ‘then’ Nigerian society.
Very soon we shall send away our religions and break the boundaries called tribalism. By then, we will confront the truth with common sense and logical reasoning.
Thank you.
I am a young Nigerian, I love my Country and have been optimistic about change in my generation. I have always understood we have had (many) problems as a Nation – power, corruption, education, poverty. Nonetheless, I have always remained optimistic. This article now makes me fully realise why the older generation have lost all hope of change.
I would get upset when they would express their hopelessness, now I fully understand. I have only now realised how bad things really are, and it has almost made me lose all my hope. That’s because I am used to hearing about the problems in isolation – a corrupt official here, an ‘avoidable’ accident there, the poor state of education; my optimism could handle that one blow at a time, but what this article has done is to condense all the issues and it has created a clearer reality for me. As a student I have not had to contend with the issues in all sectors, and have already been saddened enough by the challenges in the education sector. But now, I fully understand that in the ‘real Nigerian world’ Nigerians face these issues fully – day after day, year after year. I can now understand why the older generation feel hopeless, I can no longer blame them.
I am very saddened, this had made weep – literally; because I love Nigeria. This article, as well as another titled You Lazy Intellectual African Scum are the two most brutally honest readings I have come across about the state of Nigeria. This, more brutal as well as equally honest than the other because it refers not to Africa as a whole but Nigeria in particular. I bookmarked that article, I will surely do the same to this.
While I acknowledge a few of the points in this article, I refuse to agree that Nigerians are lazy by any estimation. This is stereotype! Nigerians are hardworking and this is acknowledged by all and sundry. How this Tim of man came to his conclusion rankles. I accept any categorisation of Nigerians but not that they are lazy. No! Nigerians are not lazy. Tim, part of your article is fallacy. Nigerians are also very hospitable. You are the first foreigner, I hear, who says Nigerians are not warm. I have met and still meet foreigners, who often tell you that Nigeria is a contradiction because you get in there, you see a different kind of people who are very friendly and warm but you generalised here. Unfortunately, so many Nigerians are here massaging your ego for consciously stereotyping them. I don’t know your country of origin but I know it has got its own ills too. I wish you good but learn how not to stereotype a country for whatever reasons. I know most of you from the developed north find it plausible to demonise African countries, when most of the problems in Africa are caused by your interferences in Africa’s internal Affairs. Non-sense!
Lengthy article, but BY FAR the most accurate, unbiased and truthful expose I have read in a very long time.
Every single point in that article was exactly the way I see/feel/experienced Nigeria and Nigerians before and after I left Lagos…
The saddest part is that I truly do not know when and where the change will begin…last year when Egypt purged Mubarak and his cronies, I secretly wished that Nigerians will take cue..unfortunately, I look at the chaos there today and i’m going hmmn…
But sometimes, things have to get really bad before it can get better right? But I weep for Nigeria…for a country that God has blessed with so much, to offer its people, image and reputation so little in return…I weep…
Hi Tim,
Thanks for your detailed and lively blog post. As much as it gives me great pain to admit that a lot of what you said is quite true, I would argue that you’ve reached your conclusions based on experiences in confined areas of Lagos and Abuja to make sweeping generalisations about the whole of Nigeria. Don’t forget that Nigeria has 35 other states in addition to Lagos and Abuja. Lagos is less than 10% of Nigeria’s 170million people.
In your blog post, you mentioned that:
“The worst thing, by far, was not being able to go anywhere and do anything at the weekends. The security situation did not allow us to travel beyond a very restricted area of Lagos, and even if we could there wasn’t much to do.”
Does this mean that you actually haven’t visited other parts of Nigeria outside the commercial and oil-fuelled nerve centers of Abuja and Lagos? Do you realise that even within Nigeria and among Nigerians, Abuja and Lagos are regarded as “different” and relatively more “advanced” than other parts of the country which are remarkably diverse? You do realise that such hubs of oil-fuelled commercial activity and rapid urbanisation create a fast-paced and highly competitive environment which would also influence the behaviour of the residents, making them more likely to be more “ambitious” and “greedy” than others around the country, right? Its almost like generalising about the whole of the UK based on experiences of living and working with Londoners, who might behave relatively differently (ambition, work ethic, values etc) than people in more laid back parts of Britain, in parts of Scotland or Northern Ireland. Or using the behaviour of New Yorkers to generalise about all Americans especially those in more quiet parts of the deep southern states.
I would suggest that next time you are back in Nigeria, perhaps try and visit other parts of the country, such as Osun or Ekiti in the South-West and especially parts of the North such as Kaduna, Katsina and Sokoto and you’ll realise that not everyone is as “dishonest” and “greedy” as you seem to think. In fact, people in parts of the far North who may be less likely to exhibit this competitive and ambitious behaviour brought by pressures of rapid urbanisation are stereotyped as being “lazy” and “unambitious” in Nigeria.
There are genuinely good people, living decent lives in these places. While these areas may lack the shiny and sparkling “infrastructure” in Abuja or Lagos, the oil-fuelled urbanisation may actually be the causal factor which tremendously shapes people’s attitude to life and economic activity.
I was in Nigeria several times in the late 1970’s and to be honest I recognise many of the same issues even from then. Certainly compared to Accra, where I spent most of my African time, Lagos was hugely more dangerous even back then and corruption was far more pervasive. Ghanaian corruption was also pretty common but was vastly more pragmatic and simply less mindlessly rapacious… and I have a great story about that I would love to share with you over a beer some day in London 😀
I posted the link to your article on my facebook with this comment: “This is a very long article by a British expat. I am only putting it down (pasting it here) as “Exhibit A ” towards the case for a government hijack.” And I mean, a revolution won’t happen because of the endemic nature of corruption. You can’t revolt against something you secretly admire. What will turn the tide is a group of right-minded folks to take over the rudder and stir the ship of the nation in the direction of prosperity for all. Your blog, rightly or wrongly, serves as a good evidence in making that case. Thank you. You have done well your part.
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I agree that most of this writing is correct, however I believe that this was written by a Nigerian posing to be an expatriate and trying to look at things from that perspective, there is too much detail in here for an expatriate to know.
ITA with all that you have written. Sad but true. I have worked as a foreign trained Nigerian engineer with expatriates in Nigeria. As many dickheads as we have in Nigeria, the amount of dickheads we import from other countries as expatriates to come and earn huge amounts of money and add no value is nothing short of tragic! I’m glad you noticed and mentioned that.
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When the pain reaches the limit of endurance, the pain itself becomes the medicine. There is no doubt in my mind that Nigeria shall be healed and transformed. For those who are good history student, Britain before the Industrial revolution was once worse than Nigeria. Poverty, Vice and Corruption was synonymous with Britain once, and the wealth of the British empire was built on world over robbery. They actually thought us corruption. Poor colonisers!
Well…thank you for reminding us of the need to change this pitiful status quo Tim; a positive transformation is underway. Give us a little more time, a better generation is coming to rewrite the history of our nation.
The context of this post is undeniable. Plain truth. I agree with Zainab’s comment regarding security and Tim’s inability to freely move around. I also agree with people in commercial nerve centers being more aggressive and competitive. After all that is why they are there. However what is unique to Nigeria is there are a lot more Nigerians, careless of there location, some even in the diaspora who are willing to go above and beyond the shiny things of life. You will see this as Tim mentioned in the Security guard of warehouse in Akure, Ondo State, in a clerk at a general hospital in Okrika LG in Rivers State, a senior level state employee in the Secretariat in Alausa, Lagos state or staff of a Federal Ministry in Abuja.
Tim analysis is shallow, exaggerated, pedestrian and prejudiced. No one is contesting the fact that Nigeria’s corrupt or the ruling elite is irredeemably corrupt but to write with a bold face that nothing has changed since return to civilian rule ( I won’t call it democracy) is nothing short of fallacy. Nigeria has made a lot of progress in every spheres.
It’s even laughable that Tim’s romanticizing military return. Was it not the military regime of Babaginda that institutionalized corruption in Nigeria? The military spent most of its ruling years buying off opponents, assassinating stubborn ones but had little time to execute any developmental plans. There’s correlation between what Nigeria has become and the duration of military rule. The military started the culture of mediocrity which is more pervasive and more deadly than corruption. Corruption does not necessarily impede development if the system still allows a measure of competent hands to rule. There are many corrupt nations with minimal progress.
Nigeria’s problem derives more from pervasiveness of mediocrities everywhere than much mouthed corruption. There’s a section of the country mostly governed by the opposition where tremendous progress is being made, not as a result of less corruption, but on the basis of competent leadership. Even within the ruling PDP, there are few performing states with tremendous progress and competence is the key word here.
Nigeria is not a hopeless country as a section of the West tries to portray her. If we can manage to do a few things right, Nigeria will “roar” back to life.
Let’s not dilly dally about the brutal honesty of Mr Tim on the Nigeian story. It is awfully sad and we must appreciate the views of an expat on these matters because we tend to be easily consumed in our ways while the rot is eating us right under. However, it reminds us Nigerians the reason why we must now sit and demand responsibility and accountability from our leaders. Both the governed and the government must made credible by our collective and relentless demand for prudence in our system. The time is now. I speak up for our public education because when we get it right there, the powers that be will become a story of the past. I believe in Nigerians and Nigeria. We can do it. http://www.thelearningcraft.blogspot.com
Tim, I am a Nigerian living in London and I thank you for this accurate but generalist article on Nigeria, it encapsulate the core of what is referred to as corruption in Nigeria, I am saddened and annoyed by the scale of the rot in our political, economic and social system which has much to do with mediocre leadership at all levels (I stand to be challenged on this) and a disenchanted follower-ship. I completely understand how a foreigner can immediate spot and analyse the problem but fail to proffer a solution as that might be somewhat tricky.
Well, we need more objective people like you in the western world who are not bias but most importantly who can push for a change from the outside while we Nigerians do the ground work.
Solid piece. While certain parts might be hard to believe, it by no means makes this article false, or An attempt by a foreigner to paint Nigeria black. I see some comments avoiding the MAIN issue, I don’t see ONE comment that can fault the article as a whole, except you attack specific bits. That’s part of the problem with Nigeria today, we refuse to tell ourselves the brutal and honest truth we’d rather bury our heads in the sand and tell ourselves things “are not THAT bad”. Fact is, they actually are and we need to stop deceiving ourselves and attavking everyone who points this out.
Great job. Unfortunately, all is but whistling in the wind!
I left the shores of Nigeria about 7years to settle permanently in the west. I was hoping that things would be getting better but, judging from this post of somebody who recently left Nigeria, nothing has improved.
My prediction is that sometimes way into the future, earth’s mineral resources will become increasingly depleted to the extent that the stronger nations will invade the weaker/disorganized nations. When that happens probably the weaker nations will wake up to the fact that they need to put their acts in order to keep on existing.
I totally agree with Emeka, olaniyi, missarewa and Zainab.
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that was a precision guided missile landing straight on target.
That is the truth , the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
From the unions to the vultures feeding of the future of the pauper’s child,nigerian has been cursed right from the beginning.
The land has been piloted by one incompetent fool after the other.
From tafawa balewa to Shagari ,all the way to obasanjo and down to the present embarrassment called GEJ.
Zainab here claims that people are honest in the other places . Well take a look at the masses of alumanjiri in the north. If that is not worse than corruption ,what is?
The country is being held together by the oil .
There is simply no way out .
I cannot see any.
While it is possible to see some flashes of excellence here and there ,the Lagos governor for example, their efforts are being held back by the centre in Abuja .
The country need restructuring fast or else the centre will give way one day.
And am afraid ,there will likely be a river of blood.
Thanks for this piece. As a Nigerian it is really sad and demeaning to swallow this crispy bolus, but you’re right…to a large extent. However, judging a river by just two of the fish species therein is as erroneous as saying all Britons aren’t dickheads!
Brilliant engineers I know are good statisticians. Last time I checked, a sample size of two(2) out of a population of thirty-six(36)
seemsis ludicrous! My point; an utter generalisation is wrong!The way forward should enshroud the regale of the negatively refulgent state. The Crystal Menace gave one (two, maybe), in addition to the few others seen in the comments. The change will only start from us; Nigerians and expatriates alike.
The optimism remains.
God bless Nigeria.
I say brilliant! Brutally honest and insightful confirms my impression and experience of modern day Nigeria. Sad but touching. Where there is no vision a people perish……
This article is very well written and sadly very accurate. I have many a time wept for my country just thinking about the myriad of problems we have. I am however hopeful that people are getting sick of the status quo, and we are on the verge of making real change. We will get it right!
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