CHAPTER ONE
1.0 INTRODUCTION
Nigeria’s
political problems sprang from the carefree manner in which the British took
over, administered, and abandoned the government and people of Nigeria.
British administrators did not make an effort to weld the country together and
unite the heterogeneous groups of people. Though, many things we have today is
due to their enlightenment, they still left us hanging. According to Adewele
Ademoyega in his book Why We Struck 1981, he said that when the British
came, they forcibly rubber-stamped the political state of the ethnic groups of Nigeria, and
maintained that status quo until the left. According to him upon their
departure nearly a hundred years later, the people resumed fighting for their
political rights.
When
the British came to Nigeria
as an imperial nation to take over the rulership of the country from 1861 (with
the cession of Lagos),
they met the people of the south totally free, only observing and regulating
their own monarchies and institutions (Adewele Ademoyega: Why We Struck).
Chinua Achebe in his work or novel Things Fall Apart, 1958, tries to
portray the life Africans lived before and during the arrival of the Europeans
in Nigeria.
Things
Fall Apart tells the tragic story of the rise and fall of Okonkwo and the
equally tragic story of the disintegration of Igbo culture, symbolized by the
agrarian society of Umofia, under the relentless encroachments of British
Christian imperialism.
For
Achebe, Mister Johnson represents the worst kind of portrayal of Africans by
Europeans. To him, the portrayal was all the more disheartening because John
Cary was working hard to achieve and accurate depiction, unlike many British
authors during the imperial colonial period who deliberately, often cynically,
exploited stereotyped of Africans and African society. It was precisely because
John Cary was a liberal-minded and sympathetic writer, as well as a colonial
administrator that Achebe felt the record had to be set straight. Achebe’s
purpose then is to write about and for his own people. His first novels form a
continuum over one hundred years of Igbo civilization. The Europeans have not
yet penetrated Umuofia, the setting of the first novel, when Things Fall
Apart beings. When the novel ends colonial rule has been established. His
other novels talk about the different changes that took place before
independence and after it.
The
British governed Nigerian indirectly through their traditional rulers, as a
result, the true leader of the masses hamstrung and held down. Just because
Africans were given authority to rule over her own people, they saw it as a
means to maltreat those that have wronged them, extort from those that have
more than them and sell his/her own brother and sister for favours from the
superior leaders - The British. (Adewele Ademoyega: Why We Struck).
These
actions by the local and foreign leaders made the people to sort for
independence. Many of them were not thinking straight any more. Many people now
saw the need to transfer their faults to others using others as an excuse. The
present leader blame the colonial masters and fore runners-for-independence for
their actions for not doing what is expected of them well and also for the
embezzlement and stealing of public funds. They claim that the colonial masters
taught them to do so. The political elites in other to become rich and
influencial in the society, steal and blame it on the economy and leaders. No
one takes responsibility for his own crime and faults.
Between
the politicians and the military they blame one another for a bad government no
one agrees that the other is better than himself. In the Niger Delta region of Nigeria, people
do all type of things just to steal from the petroleum companies they believe
that it is their own right and bunkering which is a common business there is not
stealing. That is why Tanure Ojaide uses his novel The Activist to
enlighten the people of what is happening in the Niger Delta areas. He says
those that claim to be literate in the society are the Chief Criminals
sabotaging one another. Everybody in the country is in one way or the other
suffering from the harms political corruption brought, we are psychosocial
disordered.
Kole
Omotoso in his fictions focuses on identifying the problems in Nigerian society
and proposing solution. He lived his childhood and adolescence, sharing the
nationalist dreams of peace, progress, and prosperity, as an adult and as a
writer, he was forced to watch the systematic deferment of these dreams after
independence for decades after freedom from colonial rule, Nigeria was cursed
by civil strife, including a civil war (1967 – 1970) and incessant military
coups d’etat. These events, together with undemocratic rule political chicanery
and bureaucratic cynicism resulted in a steady decline in the quality of life
in a nation that, because it is the most populous black nation on earth is
often looked upon as representative of the black race. Omotoso tries to use
fiction to talk about the decay and chaos in the society but he tries to make
it less real like Armah did in his The Beautyful Ones are not yet Born.
1.1 Definition of Terms
Political
corruption is the use of legislated powers by government officials for
illegitimate private gain misuse of government power for other purposes, such
as repression of political opponents and general police brutality is also
considered political corruption.
Forms
of corruption vary, it include: bribery, extortion, cronyism, nepotism,
patronage, graft and embezzlement. While corruption may facilitate criminal
enterprises such as drug trafficking, money laundering and trafficking, it is
not restricted to these activities. While political corruption is an illegal
abuse of power, psychosocial disorder is the mental reaction one gets from it.
Psychosocial disorder is a mental illness caused
or influenced by maladjusted cognitive and behavioural processes.
1.2 Statement of the Problem
Due
to the political dictatorship and the high rate of starvation and poverty in
the country, many of the people are suffering from problems caused by the many
ways they are treated and controlled.
Their
manner of thinking have been blurred with the idea that if they steal or kill
to survive, it is not a crime because their leader are also thieves who loot
the national treasure and put is in their foreign accounts.
Again
due to this, the citizens are psychosocially disordered and their minds
corrupt. The key problem is the government. Because of the corrupt nature of
the society, the government sells her pride and glory to foreign companies and
enterprise. This people now treat the natural inhabitants of the areas where
the companies are located like animals without dignity. Example is the Niger
Delta area of Nigeria
which is the oil producing state.
The major problem is between the people and her
government. Both are psychologically and socially sick. The pain of poverty and
starvation in abundant money have destroyed the peoples mind that they no
longer think or reason straight.
1.3 Aim and Objectives
The
objectives of this research are;
To identify the problems caused by political
corruption and
To provide suggestion to the prevention of
political corruption and psychosocial disorder and find a way to eliminate it
completely from the society in general.
1.4
Significance of the study
Political corruption and psychosocial disorder
using The Activist by Tanure Ojaide and Arrow of Rain by Oke
Ndibe, will serve as a good material to student’s researchers.
This
work will show how the government and the citizens and foreign companies helped
in the corruption of the society and her environment and how the act of
corruption has disordered everything.
1.5 Scope of Research
This
project is restricted to the study of the political corruption and psychosocial
disorder, using Tanure Ojaide’s The Activist and Okey Ndibe’s Arrow
of Rain and other relevant literary work of some other Nigerian and African
prose writers and commentaries on corruption.
The
research is divided into five chapters, chapter one consist of the
introduction, definition of term, statement of the problem, aims and
objectives, significance of the study, scope of research and research
methodology. Chapter two is the review of related literature, chapter three is
textual analysis of the novel The Activist by Tanure Ojaide, Chapter four
is textual analysis of the novel Arrows of Rain Arrow of Rain by Okey
Ndibe and chapter five is the summary and conclusion.
1.6 Research Methodology
The
main source of this research work is textual analysis of The main source of this research work is
textual analysis of The Activist by Tanue Ojaide and Arrow of Rain
by Okey Ndibe.
The
secondary materials are from the library, texts, magazine and some works on
African prose writers.