Reading Ibelema Jumbo’s WriteAngle: ‘We Need PHIA No More’ (The Tide, Monday 23/11/2020), was quite instructive. It is a reminder of an ancient culture that has refused to fade away: Hero Worship. A common example: Roman Emperor Nero who ordered the killing of whoever would not bow and tremble at the mention of his name. That was A.D. 54-68, but in 2020, UK Parliamentarians raised an issue of a Nigerian hero who had half of Nigeria’s Central Bank (CBN) in his pocket. Humans would quickly change their perception of true heroes if they have a glimpse of the records of custodians of global security dozzier.
Jumbo would tell us that “the naming of airports after the towns and cities in which they are located is fast going out of fashion”. Rather, he would ask: “who said that naming Omagwa airport for Alfred Diete-Spiff, Melford Okilo or even former President Goodluck Jonathan … would be indigenously incorrect?”. It is truly said that “Lives of great men remind us, we can make our own lives sublime”. But heroism is a different issue.
Historically, at the founding stage of Christianity many zealots engaged in acts of fanatical martyrdom solely to be immortalized or called “saints”. At the Council of Constantinople, 553 A D there was almost a fight as church leaders presumed to decide what would be allowed to be true. That was how the issue of reincarnation was expunged from Christian creeds by the belligerent posturing of a small but powerful group of clerics. Not only that power wins arguments but political heroism is a commercial commodity.
As an experienced journalist, Ibelema Jumbo should know how arm-twisting tactics can turn truth into falsehood by power holders. He would also know how ‘WriteAngle’ audacity in journalism can be dangerous. With late Dele Giwa as an example, it is easy to know how jittery power-holders can be with inquisitive cats who have damaging records. Let him also learn from Shakespeare that “the merit of service is rarely attributed to the true and exact performer “. The intelligent class in a society should be able to see beyond hypocritical and mundane posturing and grand-standing common in Africa.
When Great Britain ruled the waves, great pirates were given national honours for acts of brigandage and plunder which brought cash into the nation’s coffers. Similarly, the founding of America, Australia and New Zealand, involved acts of unspeakable inhumanity against aborigines. Matabele Land in South Africa was called Rhodesia after the hero who plundered the gold of the land. Human history is full of such plight where might is right.
The world of politics and economics are full of intrigues, whereby fair can be foul and foul fair, Ibelema Jumbo must have heard the old cliché that “behind every great wealth, there is usually a crime”. Neither is he unaware of what sociologists call elitism and its driving ideology. There are numerous crooked ways, including the rigging of elections, by which great ones become great. A school pupil once asked a history teacher why someone was called Alexander the Great, and the teacher said that it was because he killed many people.
Obviously some people are born great and do great deeds, for the benefit of humanity. Neither is it indigenously incorrect to honour folk heroes. Rather, it is the politicization and commercialization of national honours which breed the culture of hero-worship and other abuses. Dr Goodluck Jonathan’s immortal statement of his ambition not worth the blood of anyone, marked his greatness and nobility of soul. Neither would naming any national monument after him do him more credit than the nobility of his character had already depicted. Sponsors of immortalization projects are usually praise singers.
Late Professor Tam David-West sought to be given a cremation burial as a symbol of what he stood for. He would say that greatness lies in unassumingness and that peoples’ works and the values contained therein should speak for them. Similarly, Francis Bacon of Britain, disgraced in office for bribe-taking through conspiracy, gave humanity the true meaning of greatness. David-West had a similar experience with a cup of tea and a gold wristwatch as the bribe that he took from foreign oil buccaneers.
Great and knowing ones like Bacon, using Shakespeare as a medium, would tell us that “men’s evil manners live in brass; their virtues we write in water”. Same sublime truth is repeated: “I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones”. It is more human to bloat the wrongs of others rather than give them credit for their virtues. The other political extreme is immortalization as window-dressing.
Nigerian currency notes bearing faces of Nigerian heroes by the present devalued status of the naira, is a symbolic testimony of the error of immortalization. Similarly, Nigeria’s National Honours lists bear names of heroes and patriots. The likelihood is that unsung and unknown heroes live and die with happier memories, rather than have wrong human assessment.
During the Vietnam War, Mandarin system featured as a form of corruption. It had to do with influence-peddling whereby a high public official uses his position and power for personal good. Thus greatness and heroism become idle impositions. The history of elitism has to do with the Mandarin culture whereby power and wealth determine who the great and beautiful ones are. Those excluded from the club are nobody’s heroes. Wheeler-dealer game!
There was an ancient mockery whereby name and place of origin determined the worth and value of an individual. That was how the question arose: “can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” while acts of heroic patriotism should be appreciated and valued, hero worship must be discouraged as well as image laundering.
.Dr. Amirize is a retired lecturer, Rivers State University, Port Harcourt.