THE DANGERS OF RUNNING NIGERIA LIKE A PERSONAL BUSINESS. PART 1

By P. L. Osakwe

■ INTRODUCTION

Nigeria is dying from a disease that did not come from abroad.
It did not come from colonialism alone.
It did not come from poverty itself.
It came from how those in power understand power — as a personal enterprise, a private company, a family business where the shareholders are the ruling elite and the common citizens are merely expendable labour.
For decades, we have watched the Nigerian state shrink while private individuals expand.
The nation weakens, but private persons grow stronger.
The people cry, but their leaders get richer.
The roads collapse, but private estates flourish.
Hospitals rot, but private clinics rise.
Public schools decay, but private academies multiply like mushrooms.
The government withdraws from responsibility, and private hands step in — not to save the people, but to profit from their suffering.
This is not governance.
This is not democracy.
This is a country outsourced to greed — a republic auctioned to whoever has money, connection, and access to public office.
And the tragedy is this:
Nigeria has been structured — deliberately — to fail the masses and enrich the few.

HOW A COUNTRY BECAME A PRIVATE ENTERPRISE.
Nigeria is being run like a personal business.
That is the root of all our crises.
Those who gain political power do not enter office with a sense of service; they enter it with the mindset of profit. Leadership is not duty — it is harvest. Governance is not stewardship — it is ownership.
A minister behaves like a CEO.
A governor behaves like an emperor.
A president behaves like a monarch.
And legislators behave like shareholders demanding dividends.
Every government office becomes a personal empire, with gatekeepers, insiders, and loyalists whose only qualification is loyalty to the boss, not competence.
The government is the biggest employer of friends.
The ministries are full of relatives.
The parastatals are filled with godsons.
Contracts are awarded to cronies.
Policies are designed to benefit a small circle.
And this is how Nigeria decays:
When the state becomes a family business, the nation becomes a victim.

A CONSTITUTION THAT LEGALIZES NEGLECT.
Chapter II of the Nigerian Constitution tells the government to provide education, health care, good roads, equal opportunities, employment, safety, and welfare.
It sounds beautiful.
It reads like a promise.
It feels like hope.
But then the same Constitution turns around and says in Section 6(6)(c):
“These promises cannot be enforced. The government cannot be sued for failing to do any of them.”
What is the meaning of a law that tells the government what to do, then frees the government from doing it?
What is the purpose of a Constitution that gives responsibility without accountability?
What kind of country creates rights and then tells the people they cannot claim them?
Chapter II is the voice of a country that knows what should be done but refuses to do it.
It is the poetry of a people betrayed by their own legal framework.
The Constitution did not say the government should not provide these things.
It only said the government cannot be forced to provide them.
And because the government cannot be forced, the government does not care.
This is the real silent tragedy.

A UNITARY SYSTEM MASKED AS FEDERALISM.
Nigeria is officially a federal republic, but in reality it is a unitary system wearing a borrowed agbada.
Power is centralised.
Money is centralised.
Decision-making is centralised.
Resources are collected at the centre and sprinkled back to the states like alms.
This structure creates two monsters:
1. A powerful centre that controls everything, and
2. Weak states waiting for monthly allowances.
The centre becomes the throne.
The states become beggars.
Political parties fight not for ideology, but for access to the centre.
This is why party leaders manipulate elections to ensure “majority in the National Assembly.”
Not for policy.
Not for development.
But for control.
Checks and balances disappear.
Dissent is punished.
Opposition becomes enemy.
If federalism was a human being, Nigeria would be accused of impersonation.

WHEN GOVERNMENT JOINS THE CAPITALISTS.
The most frightening part of Nigeria’s collapse is not that leaders fail to stop exploitation.
It is that leaders join the exploitation.
Those who should regulate the market are competing in the market.
Those who should protect citizens from greed are themselves merchants of greed.
Those who should set prices are setting up private businesses.
Those who should build public institutions are building supermarkets, hotels, private estates, private hospitals, and private universities.
How can a governor fix public hospitals when he owns a private hospital?
How can a minister improve public schools when his children are in Canada?
How can a legislator strengthen the minimum wage when he makes in one month what a civil servant cannot make in ten years?
How can a president reform the power sector when people around him own diesel companies?
The government is not interested in solving national problems because those problems are private opportunities.
Power failure means profit for generator sellers.
Bad roads mean profits for tyre and spare part sellers.
Dilapidated schools mean profits for private schools.
Poor health care means profits for private hospitals.
Land scarcity means profits for real estate cabals.
Inflation means profits for hoarders.
When a country is structured this way, failure becomes business.
Decay becomes investment.
Suffering becomes opportunity.
Nigeria is not just mismanaged; Nigeria is monetized.

THE EROSION OF POLITICAL IDEOLOGY.
Political parties in Nigeria do not exist for ideas.
They exist for elections.
Nobody joins a political party because of vision.
They join because of ambition.
There is no ideological left or right.
No conservative or progressive movement.
No intellectual battle about how Nigeria should be shaped.
Parties are not platforms of thought — they are platforms of access.
Where there should be debate, there is silence.
Where there should be policy, there is propaganda.
Where there should be accountability, there is sycophancy.
A democracy without ideology becomes a market.
A parliament without conscience becomes a marketplace of interests.
Leadership becomes a negotiation between greed and power.
This is why Nigeria drifts like a canoe without a paddle.

LEADERSHIP POSITIONS AS EMPOWERMENT TO STEAL.
Positions are not seen as responsibility.
They are seen as reward.
This is why people fight to enter government — not to serve, but to “recover investment.”
Elections are expensive.
Campaigns are expensive.
Buying delegates is expensive.
Maintaining a political godfather is expensive.
And once elected, the office becomes the redemption ground.
The logic is simple and destructive:
“I suffered to get here. Now it is my turn to eat.”
A nation where public office becomes a buffet table cannot prosper.

A COUNTRY WHERE EVERYONE EXPLOITS THE MASSES.
The most heartbreaking truth is that the problem is no longer only about the leaders.
It has entered the society itself.
Everyone sees Nigeria as a place where you can exploit the masses and go free.
The landlord raises rent because everybody else is raising rent.
The trader inflates prices because others inflate prices.
The school owner increases fees because the country is hard.
The mechanic lies because he must survive.
The immigration officer demands bribe because his boss demands bribe.
The police officer extorts because the system rewards extortion.
From the top to the bottom, exploitation has become culture.
Greed has become wisdom.
Corruption has become strategy.
Selfishness has become survival.
And so Nigeria dies — not only from bad leaders, but from a society that has normalized wickedness.

THE SPIRITUAL DIMENSION OF NATIONAL FAILURE.
There is a spiritual energy that hovers over a nation when injustice becomes normal.
It is the energy of collective decay.
The energy of rot.
The energy of lost potential.
The energy of curses carried from generation to generation.
Nigeria is not only politically sick.
Nigeria is morally ill.
Nigeria is spiritually dehydrated.
When truth is a threat, and lies are celebrated, a nation begins to bleed internally.
When the righteous are mocked and thieves are crowned, the land becomes polluted.
When wickedness becomes a qualification for survival, the people lose their humanity.
And when a nation loses its humanity, no constitution can save it.

THE HOPE THAT REFUSES TO DIE.
Yet, even in this darkness, there is something unusual about Nigeria:
Hope refuses to die.
Every morning, people wake up and hustle.
Every evening, they still dream.
Despite suffering, Nigerians still believe something can change.
This is the only reason the nation has not collapsed entirely.
Nigeria survives because Nigerians refuse to give up.
Nigeria breathes because ordinary people push oxygen into it every day.
Nigeria moves because the masses carry it on their backs.
But hope alone cannot rebuild a broken country.
At some point, people must refuse to be ruled by greed.
They must refuse to be governed by personal businessmen disguised as leaders.
They must refuse to be used as statistics in a game of power.

A COUNTRY THAT MUST RE-IMAGINE ITSELF.
Nigeria must decide whether it wants to be:
a nation,
a company,
or a marketplace of exploitation.
Because right now, it is all three — and that confusion is destroying it.
A nation cannot be run like a personal business.
A government cannot function like a private company.
Leadership cannot be reduced to profit-making.
Power cannot be a tool of self-enrichment.
Public office cannot be a source of personal wealth.
If Nigeria does not redefine its relationship with power, money, and responsibility, it will continue to bleed — slowly, painfully, endlessly — until there is nothing left but the echo of what could have been.