Nigeria And The Frog In A Kettle Syndrome -By Abolaji Adeniran

One of the fables I grew up to know in my formative years was that of a frog in a kettle syndrome. What piqued my interest in this fable must have been it relativity to human struggle. As a pedant that I was then, usage of this axiom was always a means to showcase a pseudo depth of my vocabulary ability or often than not, an avenue to unnecessarily confuse my audience. Either ways, it always achieved it objectives as my audience are often left in awe as to the dexterity of my lexical knowledge. Knowledge they say is power anyways.

The axiom of a frog in a kettle syndrome certainly, now transcends beyond my early primitive understanding. A frog in a kettle syndrome often depicts a scenario in which a frog is being slowly boiled alive. The premise is that, if a frog is put suddenly into boiling water, it will jump out, but if the frog is put in tepid water which is then brought to a boil slowly, it will not perceive the danger and will be cooked to death. The story is often used as a metaphor for the inability or unwillingness of people, to react to or be aware of sinister threats that arise gradually rather than suddenly.

In the 1996 novel: The story of B, environmentalist author: Daniel Quinn used the metaphor of the frog in a kettle syndrome to describe human history, population growth and food supply. Also, Harry Dalton mentioned it in the 1997 disaster movie Dante’s peak in reference to the accumulating warning signs of the Volcano’s reawakening.

Just like the sorry case of the frog in the boiling water, Nigeria is also boiling just that no one is sorry about it or perhaps we are oblivious of this reality. Take for instance; Nigeria practiced a federal system that is often referred to as feeding bottle federalism. The 36 states across the country go to Abuja every month for FAAC meetings where revenues collected by the federal government are been shared. The chunk of this money collected by state governments are often used to settle state’s recurrent expenditures with little available for development of the state. Only few states across the country generate considerable revenue internally. Despite the plethora of resources that abounds in the nook and crannies of the country, it is bizarre to note that state governments have become so lazy that they have to depend solely on the money received from the federation account for their operations. This explains the constant call for bailout fund by the state governors from Federal Government.

The tragedy of this is that the country is volatile to any inconsistency in the international crude oil markets which serves as the live and blood of our economy. Put simply, the existence of Nigeria for unforeseeable period of time hinges on how long crude oil continues to serve the nation. This explains why politician will never support political nor economy restructuring. Alas, this present arrangement has never worked and would never work; the opportunity to embezzle the nation’s commonwealth by these greedy politicians is far more precious than a restructuring exercise which the country need urgently.

Also, the rising debt profile of the country is another case that continues to call for a serious concern. How the country debt profile continue to rise in spite of the purported recoveries of looted funds from corrupt government officials, Abacha’s ‘generosity’ and obnoxious tax regime represents another level of abracadabra happening in this government. Between the start of June 2015 and March 2020, Nigeria’s debt profile has risen from N12.12trillion to N33trillion. With little or nothing to show for this humongous borrowing, it is very obvious that this APC government is indeed penny wise and pounds foolish. While in the views of government officials, there is no cause for concern with regards to these borrowings. However, could it be that these officials are not aware that N2.3trillion (approximately 23% of the total budget) was approved for debt servicing alone in the 2020 national budget. The question now is who bears the brunt? Definitely not President Muhammadu Buhari.

The president body language appear not to be passing across any message again as probes into government agencies often come with damning report of humongous corruption and after weeks of media trials, the status quo remain the same. Indeed, it never rains but pours and the quick succession at which misfortunes now smiles at the country is a testimony to how badly the country is being ruled. The two leprous hands of APC and PDP disguised as political parties are the instrument through which pain is been inflicted on the masses.

For this nation to get out of this boiling water before it gets too late there is an urgent need for reawakening of all those who still have the interest of this nation at heart. We must go beyond the tribal, religious and ethnic chauvinisms that have kept us down for long.

We must be bold enough and unite in demanding for justice and accountability from our leaders. Our political structure is too expensive, ambiguous, unproductive and time wasting. So, we can’t continue to be wasting money on an adventure that is not rewarding. It is very obvious that our problems in this country are quite complex and every expected solution seems to create another problem. In this wise, there is a need for the president to look into the 2014 National Confab recommendations and Mallam Nasir El Rufai report on restructuring. The more resources we continue to waste on this error called federal system, the more the country plunges deeper into crises. Like the frog in the kettle syndrome, trouble beckons and heaven is far while the search for messiah continues. A stitch in times saves nine.

Abolaji Adeniran is a Media Enthusiast and Policy Affairs Analyst.