Anyone who wants to learn how to make good decisions, needs to read the treatise, ‘How we think’ a small pamphlet written in 1910 by John Dewey, a foremost American philosopher of his time. In the book, Dewey admonishes humanity to ask 3 questions before making a decision on how to solve any problem.
What is the problem is the first critical question because without an idea of what a problem is, no one can solve it. What are the likely solutions to the problem is the second question which establishes that it is only by assembling all the likely solutions to a problem that all the sides to the problem can be covered. Which of the solutions is the best is the third question which puts a person in a position to appropriately solve a problem. Each time I have had to review the work of Dewey, I have always imagined that he had Nigerians in mind when he propounded his 3-stage theory.
In truth, given the propensity of Nigerians to subject a topic to an unending debate, one would have thought that our people would spend minimum time at problem solving. But that has not been the case. It is true that many Nigerians spend much time debating issues but the goal is not so as to quickly solve a problem. Instead, the numerous debates in the country are influenced by the people’s love for an incessant talk-shop which produces no result. In many other climes, the institution where debates really matter is the legislature. Based on several contending factors such as constituency needs, political party position and public interest, almost every issue is subjected to intense debates by lawmakers. But in Nigeria on the other hand, the legislature has become the most notable place where decisions are made without a debate.
Even when the constitution empowers our senate to ensure that the best hands are cleared to occupy sensitive positions, every nominee is asked to ‘take a bow and go.’ The recent argument that all those so treated had been legislators before and thus needed no new clearance is interesting. But was the new clearance intended for them to serve once more as lawmakers? Put differently, does the fact that a nominee was once a legislator give him sufficient cognate experience and knowledge to become a Minister? More often than not, our legislators claim success for promptly passing a bill or a motion in record time without any form of debate whatsoever.
On June 3, 2015, our 7th senate shockingly passed 46 bills in 10minutes! Persons who occupy no public offices are no less active in talk-shops in Nigeria. Here, our citizens are always among the first to reject any policy before the details of the policy are made known – a good example being the controversial tax reform bills. Some of the fears expressed by highly placed leaders like governors about aspects of the tax bills were found to be superfluous because the imaginations leading to the fears didn’t even exist. In other words, such top leaders had not read what they were rejecting. Now that there are rumours that the bills gazetted are not exactly the same as the ones reportedly passed by the National Assembly, many are calling for the suspension of the new laws.
But then, neither the gazetted copies nor the supposed genuine version is available to the public. If so, what information was debated by the public before the call for the suspension of the laws? In other countries, it is only after people have read copies and have found the annoying allegation of short-changing democracy to be true that calls would be made not just for the suspension of the law but also for the government to resign. For us, puerile debates are just in vogue. In the case of US President Donald Trump’s threat to attack Nigeria on account of alleged Christian genocide, we left substance for shadows as the debates were on whether it was only Christians that were being killed in the country.
Was it not Nigerian Christians that had been calling for foreign intervention and thereby suggesting that their own government was incompetent if not colluding? Nigerian opposition politicians have always called on outside powers to penalize members of the Nigerian ruling class for allegedly assaulting democracy.
Incidentally, there is hardly any evidence that a thorough debate on the performance of a government is used to vote any government out of office. The debate as to whether or not President Trump has powers to attack Nigeria – another sovereign nation was no doubt quite intense, but there were no prior or subsequent debates where the point was made that by taking over many of our local government areas, foreign insurgent groups had usurped Nigeria’s sovereignty. In any case, what is sovereign about a nation whose people are treated as objects instead of as subject of governance? Is it not in Nigeria that the people elect the flagbearer of a political party as governor and that flagbearer after assuming office decides to alter the mandate of the people by defecting to another political party that the people rejected at the polls?
At which new election did the people indicate that they wanted their mandate altered? On December 25, 2025, certain enclaves of terrorist groups in Sokoto state were reportedly bombed. Nigeria’s public debates have since shifted to the development with some people drawing attention to many aspects that ought to be debated. Who actually carried out the exercise, was is it the US or Nigeria or a combination of forces? President Trump had tried to claim all the credit by suggesting that it was done by the US with him in command as that nation’s commander in chief. Yet, his War officials and Nigerian authorities are agreed that credit ought to go to the combined troops.
This has given ample room to Nigerian professional debaters to organize multiple on-line debates capable of leaving many people confused as to what actually happened.
Nigeria’s official claim was made by otherwise credible sources particularly the Minister of Information, Mohammed Idris, himself a front-line media professional. The statement by Idris was also detailed enough to establish its authenticity. According to the statement, the operation was carefully planned and executed to neutralise threats without civilian casualties. On its part, the Sokoto state government categorically confirmed that ‘the joint airstrike hit terrorist hotspots’ in the Tangaza local government area of the state. This notwithstanding, some analysts are not persuaded that Nigeria played any role in the Christmas bombing.
They insist that she was only claiming to be part of it as a mere face-saving strategy. Others are wondering why the attack took place in far-away Sokoto instead of Borno state where insurgency has been thriving. One group has even attempted to derogate substantially from the incident by alleging that the target was missed. Bashar Isa Jabo, a member of the state house of assembly was quoted to have said that ‘the missiles fell on an open field about 300 metres away from a local hospital’ adding that fragments of the missiles were found near a large crater with no damage to homes or loss of lives.
The debate may remain alive for some time to come especially as none of the members of the group has been held to show the exact target they claimed was missed which suggests that they know the target. Another factor that may keep the debate alive has to do with certain emerging terminologies. One of them that has re-echoed consistently is the word ‘non-kinetic.’ What precisely is the meaning? Perhaps, the military have a clear picture but for the rest of us the term has attained daily usage hence some Nigerians are beginning to imagine that it probably refers to what is used to magically conjure the release of vulnerable citizens earlier abducted by kidnappers.
No one cares much about any other meaning just as Nigerians don’t seem to care about Census. Any time the issue of our population is raised, everyone has a preferred figure. In 2023, the popular figure was 200 million; it has moved to 220 and 230 million of recent depending on any person’s disposition. Our source is usually an estimated figure by an outside body. Although we are as far away as 20 years from our last botched census, a continuing debate will probably help us to determine the next figure to adopt. Goodbye to 2025.
