Wanted: Sanity Inspector of Politics (SIP)

Nigerian politics has gone to the dogs, and something needs to be done urgently to save the dear nation. There are too many madmen and women parading as politicians and democrats in this country. There is the urgent need to appoint a Sanity Inspector of Politics (SIP) to check the mental state of anybody purporting to be a politician in Nigeria.

Time was when Nigeria boasted of Sanitary Inspectors who ensured the general cleanliness of the country; and Nigeria was amply rewarded back then by being ranked all over the world as a healthy nation. Now what needs to be inspected is the sanity of our so-called political godfathers and change-agents; whence the urgency to have an SIP.

            The head of the Sanity Inspectorate must be armed with the knowledge of parapsychologists such as the then celebrated duo of Godspower Oyewole and Godwin Okunzua, both of blessed memory, so as to be able to foretell if the given politician would at a future date run roaring mad on acquisition of power. You see, what generally happens is that these politicians start out as meek normal human beings when asking for the votes of the people initially. They only run mad completely once power gets on their lap. So the needed SIP of Nigeria must be able to tell the future.

            We must learn to make use of what we have to get what we want. It’s so sad that we let the talents of Godspower Oyewole and Okunzua go to waste when we ought to have used them to probe into the diseased brains of our politicians. The duo could have, for instance, foretold the antics of that former Speaker who claimed to have bagged a very fictitious degree in Chicago University. The fake Speaker would have been stopped in his tracks from the very beginning instead of wasting everybody’s time.

            A very sharp Sanity Inspector would have known from the very beginning that our former president planned a Third Term to keep him in power forever. The SIP would have dismissed the Third Term dreamer thusly: “Get thee away from me, sit-tight power monger! You are hereby disqualified from politics for life!” This would have saved Nigeria all of the Ghana-Must-Go bags that were ferried into the National Assembly during the charged Third Term debates. And what is more, Nigeria would not have been saddled with the very deadly virus known as Do-or-Die politics!

               Like the godfather in Mafia movies, the SIP never sleeps. He can function anywhere, from the most local of local governments to the gilded throne of Aso Rock. His powers must not be countermanded by even the President. His task of saving us from the madness of our politicians must not be compromised in any way.

            Any SIP worthy of the name can by just looking at a potential state governor say: “I have seen it in my crystal ball that you are so mad that you would be killing your political opponents on a weekly basis once you have the killer immunity of power. It has been revealed to me that you would be using the blood of your killed opponents to brush your teeth every morning! So off you go!”

            The presence of the SIP would go a long way in putting the fear of God in all aspiring politicians. None of the politicians would thus have the nerve to store any evil inside of him as this would easily be uncovered by the daredevil SIP. The foreknowledge that one must pass through the inspection of the sanity man or woman as the case may be would make the politician to say farewell to evil. This way, any fellow who addresses himself as Evil Genius is marked for failure from the very start!

            With the sanity of all the politicians in place, Nigeria will no longer have any need to fear about people’s votes not being made to count. It was the free field given to madmen who practised “do-or-die” politics that all but ruined our electoral politics. Of course it stands to reason that it is only a fully-fledged madman who can preach the evil philosophy of democracy without real elections.

            There had been the cases of some politicians scoring more votes than the population of whole states let alone the list of registered voters. No SIP worth his crystal ball of foreknowledge would let this madness to happen.  

            Having come up with this very nationalistic idea of appointing a Sanity Inspector of Politics (SIP) I expect to be rewarded with having my name in the next national honours list! Only the few mad politicians would oppose me in this matter! Let the sane ones in our midst rise up to my defence!