Of criminals and the spoken word

THE spoken word, say the Yoruba of Nigeria’s South-West, is an egg: once broken, it cannot be retrieved. The import of this wisecrack is easily discerned: even on a physical plain, a broken egg subjected to retrieval is trigger for a mess, a contraption which in all material respects is no longer the egg we meant, still keeping issues on a literal plane, to consume. Oftentimes in this clime, mired in arrogance driven by ignorance, our beautifully circumstanced overlords conduct themselves as Pharaohs, firmly entrenched in the world they have crafted for themselves, their heads in the clouds. Strangely, from this strange world disconnected in stark terms from the poetry of want around whom the existence of their fellow compatriots is woven, they attempt to negotiate the pragmatics of existence, the discourse of everyday living. They wallow in privilege writ large, privilege conferred by a nasty system that keeps the majority in servitude, and assume that it is their right to be privilege, an assumption that is at least true in part. They cannot tolerate the admonition to speak only after careful thought.

The honchos because whom I have here interrupted a resolve burnished in experience to leave this space, this space called Nigeria, to its own devices, having learnt the irredeemable deafness of the runners and destroyers of national affairs–a resolve, you must have guessed, to embrace the power of silence—are not particularly talented; they are just fortunate to inhabit the realm of power and privilege. Even a fool, Proverbs 17:28 tells us, when he holdeth his peace is counted wise: and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding. So why is it hard, impossible in fact, for our overlords to stop assailing us with their usually jejune postulations and prognostications? It looks like they cannot stop talking, or they will die, only because they have not been blessed with the gift of wisdom. And this is only natural: who expects criminals, people with a history forged in forgery, to have wisdom? Wisdom is profitable to direct, but criminals are by nature unwise. Imagine people who have stolen even money that is not yet earned being circumspect and introspective: then society would be doomed irretrievably. This is why, by their lifestyle and, in particular, their verbal gymnastics, they cannot but paint a picture of folly. Let’s look at the case, to visit a different plane for the moment, of Ramon Abbass, aka Hushpuppi. Only recently, an FBI affidavit detailed how the Bureau busted the king of cybercrime. One of his accomplices, a non-Nigerian manager of the criminal organization’s money mules, had a UAE number saved as “Hush” tied to the Snapchat username “hushpuppi5.” The FBI similarly found and reviewed Hushpuppi’s Instagram account—where he also mentioned the same Snapchat username and styled himself as a real estate developer—and matched his posts to photos from passports and other identification documents. The account gave the detectives insight into their target’s luxury lifestyle. Snap Inc., Instagram and Apple provided records for the investigation that helped the FBI to make connections between chat histories, phone contacts and email addresses, which in turn allowed investigators to confirm Abbas’s correspondences and his Dubai residence at the Palazzo Versace. Our overlords, because they are of the same profession as Hushpuppi, cannot afford to be silent about their endless atrocities. Garrulity is buried in their blood.

Better to be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt. A certain senior doctor of literature majoring in magical realism brought this wisecrack from the East to my attention. Of course the East has its own contradictions, but such scruples need not detain us here. The issue is that our decisioners, to use a term crafted by Tony Afejuku, Bard of elegant lyrics, cannot but advertise their hollowness. They have stolen too much for their own good; they are full of wine obtained by fraud. Until a honcho told us that as a Victoria Island boy he did not expect a Mushin boy to as much as dare to grace his presence, we might not have known how empty and morally bankrupt he was, and is. And until another quoted the law and government service as his insurance against government apologia propelled by the rustle of currency notes–in a clime, mark you, when many senior advocates have been shown to be nothing more than glorified crooks—we might not have known how dark his mind really is. But he opened his mouth—yes, he refused to make a covenant with his lips—and out drivel, cant, and more hogwash.

• Dr. Awolaja is Editorial Page Editor, Nigerian Tribune

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