WHAT SHALL WE CALL THIS DAY?

When I was a child, when I still spoke and thought and understood as a child, I celebrated on October 1st. I believed then that Nigeria gained Independence on October 1st, 1960. In the schools I attended, we never had school parades festivals or cultural days to celebrate independence, but our nation’s rulers consistently declared a public holiday, and we watched the parades that held in different stadiums across the nation on TV.

I believed what I was taught, even though we were under the oppression of military rule. I believed that we were an independent nation because we were no longer under British rule. When 1999 came, I thought that we had marched into the beginning of the rest of our lives, that our independence had been enhanced by our nascent democracy. I used the word “nascent” in many essays. I did not know “fledgeling” then; I should have alternated with that, for variety.

Photo by Ye Jinghan on Unsplash

Now I am not a child, and I have put away all childish things. And I have been thinking, what shall we call this day? For me, to call October 1^st our Independence Day is to lie. It is a misnomer unless the meaning of “Independence” has changed to mean something other than “free”. Who is independent in Nigeria? What is independent in Nigeria? How are we independent in Nigeria?

When you listen to or read the Independence Day Speech of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, do you see reflections of our freedom? When you walk the streets in Nigeria and look at the eyes of the people, do you see an Independent Nigeria? Are you able to hold the government accountable for how they spend our nation’s resources? When elements from the nation’s security operatives turn rogue and prey on the ones they ought to protect, do we get any justice? Can you take a simple cross-country road trip with your family in the year 2020? Even from the little things that ought not to be complicated, something as basic as the National Identification Number (NIN), do we get justice?

Let me tell you my NIN story. Just like my experience with INEC and getting my permanent voter’s card, which I wrote about in The Leaders We Deserve, the supposedly technology-enabled national identification project has been quite the experience for me. In 2008, I went to a local government secretariat to register for the National Identity Card. I filled the requisite forms, paid five hundred Naira, and was supposed to return in two weeks for the card. That card is still not ready for pick up. In 2018, after the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) updated the framework for the use of the NIN, and I confirmed that my 2008 registration was gone with the wind, I decided to register again.

My first attempt in 2018 was when NIMC personnel temporarily domiciled at the building where my office was situated, for three days, to register as many of us as they could. The organization I worked for, and other organizations in that building, did not give employees any day off to register. The arrangement was that we would go to their stand, write our names down, fill the form, and when it was our turn, we would get a call to come for our data capture. On day one, I was one of the first thirty people to write names down. I filled the form. I went back to confirm if it was my turn for data capture, every other hour. The NIMC team complained that network connectivity issues had slowed them down. By the time they were packing up that evening, they assured us that we would do the data capture the next day.

On day two, the same thing happened. This time though, it was not network connectivity issues. It was the priority given to the senior executives and their family members. The rest of us had to wait for our turns. By the third day, it was still not yet my turn to register, and they said they had lost the first list, and we needed to create a new list. On this new list, I was not even in the top 100, and even though they NIMC team said that they would be extending their stay by two days, I had to travel out of town for work. I could not register then.

Subsequently, I decided to go to one of the NIMC offices at one of the local government secretariats to register. I joined the queue, filled the form, and did the data capture. The NIMC officials at that centre said that I could not get the NIN slip with my unique NIN that day. They asked me to return in two weeks. They, however, printed the enrolment transaction slip and asked me to pay for lamination. After two weeks, I went back for the NIN slip. It was not ready. It was still not ready after six weeks. I could only go to the NIMC office during working hours too, so every visit to their office was awfully expensive. I cannot recall exactly when I got definite feedback on the NIN slip (it was definitely before the 2019 elections though, and whenever I remember, I will come back to update this), but I was told that I needed to register again, and because it was already past noon that day, I needed to come the next day to register.

I registered again. I filled the form, and I attached a copy of my birth certificate to the form. One of the NIMC officials imputed my data on the computer and turned the monitor for me to confirm that the information was correct. It was. She turned the screen away, took my picture, asked for my fingerprints, and directed me to another colleague who printed the enrolment transaction slip. This time, I refused to pay for lamination. I was asked to return in two weeks for the NIN slip. Your guess is as good as mine. It was still not ready. This time, however, the NIMC official gave me my unique NIN. Having the number is not enough in Nigeria though. You still need the slip, so I still went back and complained. It was either network connectivity issues, or no electricity to print the slip. So, one day, I decided to go to another NIMC office, and that day, after waiting for several hours, I got the slip. On the slip, my gender was male. I am female. I was born female, I present as female, and I identify as female. Yet, according to NIMC, I was male. The NIMC official said I needed to go to their head office to sort it out. Gender is a non-updatable field!

While I was still confused about that, I needed to update my data with my pension fund administrator (PFA), and they required the NIN. When I presented the NIN, they informed me that gender was not the only problem with my details, my date of birth in every other document I presented did not match my date of birth in the NIN database. I have never changed my date of birth in my life, yet NIMC had given me a new day and month of birth. If the PFA had not informed me, there was no way I could have known because the NIN slip does not include the date of birth. Date of birth is an updatable field and costs fifteen thousand Naira. NIMC says I must pay for modification for a mistake that I could not have made. Their mistake will cost me more than the required fifteen thousand naira – I have to pay through Remita, write an application letter, provide supporting documents, including an affidavit, go to an enrolment centre, join a queue, fill a data modification form, do another data capture, then go back to the office on another day to collect a new NIN slip, and that is also dependent on network and electricity. How is Nigeria independent like this?

I put it to you that Nigeria is shackled by its rulers, citizens, and external colonial interests. God forbid that I will assault my personal integrity and intellect by lying that Nigeria is anything but in ruins. God forbid that I will spite the many broken people of Nigeria by gaslighting them to believe that the desolation is a figment of their imagination. I want to be thankful and hopeful, but how do we get out of a mess if we lie to ourselves that our garbage dump is paradise? How can we be unshackled, when we call our cuffs bracelets?

Photo by Obed john on Unsplash

Maybe one day I will love Nigeria from afar. Maybe then, separated from the stench, I will see only golden hues. Maybe when I am serving time in another prison, I will long for familiar bondage. Maybe, when shocked by different pain and shame, I will prefer the pain I grew up with, the familiar shame of my first country. Maybe I will gain access to opioids, to numb me from some of the pain, even though they will not save us from the decay, or maybe I will be able to afford blinding distractions. Or maybe I will join the prison wardens and be deceived that I am not imprisoned with my charges. Or just maybe, we will unseat the despots, unlock our collective conscience and intellect, tear down the prison walls and finally be free. Maybe then, I will say, Happy Independence Day, as we journey to build a nation from our ruins.

Until then, please, truthfully, about October 1st and Nigeria, what shall we call this day?