An inheritance is supposed to be an asset or a commodity of value which one receives from parents. In other words, inheritance is supposed to be an addition, something of worth, a valuable item, commodity, or set of assets which should ideally aid and facilitate the progress of the beneficiary.
However, when an inheritance turns out to be the exact opposite of what has been described above, then there is an giant cause for alarm. The question arising from this scenario, however, would seem more like this: should one inherit a bunch of bad debts, bad public image, illegal businesses and other liabilities that the parents may have left behind upon their death? Most people would respond with a resounding 'No'. But we should not forget the fact that some things do not just go away with a snap of the fingers. They just have to be dealt with if there would be any hope in the horizons.
Unfortunately, one of such things is your state of mind, your parental upbringing, the years of training and grooming which your parents have invested in you, the religious dogma, social and cultural opinions as well as the political ideologies you have imbibed. The latest of which is the essence of this essay.
It is no secret that the majority of the citizens of this country are very poor, with the population of these indigents growing with each passing day, while the minority referred to as the privileged class occupies positions which guarantee them immense wealth and a wide range of far-reaching political and social influence. These few go about with a claim that they achieved these feats through their hard work. However, the great Nationalist and former Tanzanian president, Julius Nyerere, seemed to have a dissenting view to this. In 1968, Nyerere, in his essay "Ujamaa, the basis of African socialism", said, "Defenders of capitalism claim that the millionaires’ wealth is a just reward for his ability or enterprise. But this claim is not borne out by the facts. The wealth of the millionaire depends as little on the enterprise or abilities of the millionaire himself as the power of a feudal monarch depended on his own efforts, enterprise or brain. Both are users, exploiters of the abilities and enterprise of other people. Even when you have an exceptionally intelligent and hard-working millionaire, the difference between his intelligence, his enterprise, his hard work and those of other members of the society, cannot possibly be proportionate to the difference between their 'rewards' as a thousand of his fellows can acquire between them". If this assertion by Nyerere is anything to go by, and I strongly believe it is, then these rich, flamboyant and extravagant cliques of political, corporate and religious elites have attained their status not merely as a result of hard work, but by the continued exploitation of the masses. Their immense wealth was achieved at the direct expense of the larger society.
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the word parent could be defined even far beyond the popular biological implication to also mean 'the material or source from which something is derived' or better still 'a group from which another arises and to which it usually remains subsidiary'. These definitions, especially the later has afforded us the opportunity to evaluate how important a parent is. It is the origin, the source, the fountain from which something emanates and to which it usually remains 'subsidiary'. This, probably, is the closest explanation we can get to the cancerous situation of the present Nigerian state.
Our parents had remained sober, quiet, calm, peaceful and indifferent to their political environment for too long, they have voted more out of coercion and routine than of interest and practical optimism, they have believed in the possibility of the evolution of bad into good on its own accord. Our parents have watched arms akimbo and folded hands over their chest, helplessly waiting with naked pessimism in their eyes for things to change and for bad to evolve into good of its own free will. In the words of Edmund Burke, “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing”.
A pessimist or optimist you may be, but history has no use of your opinions or wishes. History is an indifferent, inconsiderate, blunt persona but plays out the script already written, just as it was written. Therefore if history itself, the most impartial of all, could tell us that there has never been a situation or occasion where the oppressor of his own accord releases the oppressed from his bonds, but that the oppressed must rise up and vehemently fight for their freedom, then I wonder why our forbears have decided to voluntarily become victims of history.
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