TAIWO AKINLAMI
It is 6.00 AM. My brain is fried from drafting legal documents, checking citations, and cross-referencing protocols. And yet, amidst this fog, a sharp thought breaks through like NEPA light after five days of darkness:
Nigeria is now an upside-down theatre where absurdity is the currency of reward.
Let me share a personal story that still burns in my mind.
While training school leaders under a UNICEF-supported program, a headteacher told us how their school tried to reform a teacher known for being hostile and antagonistic toward children. Their brilliant idea? Appoint him as coordinator of the Child Rights Club.
To my shock, a co-facilitator, an accomplished professor of child psychology from the prestigious University of Lagos(UNILAG), endorsed the idea and called it “the spit-in-the-stew strategy.”
I couldn’t hold my peace. I stood up and said:
“You do not entrust children to someone who lacks a heart for them, not even as a conversion plan.”
In child protection, we work with the principle of knowledge, skill, and attitude. Nothing less. You don’t assign a cat to guard the meat and call it leadership grooming.
Thankfully, the room saw reason.
But it now seems this principle has been scaled up to the federal level and christened national policy.
From Flight Fracas to Federal Honor
Take KWAM 1, our plane-grounding Fuji maestro. I have now crowned him Aríkuyèrì of Nigeria (the one who sees death and ducks), for by the way he ducked the wings of a moving plane, whose front he once stood in, he carved himself a new national title.
He allegedly disrupted a commercial flight. Videos showed a man in simple attire delaying an aircraft like a local monarch postponing market day, after allegedly pouring alcohol (sorry, water) on airline officials, including our dear pilot, whom some affectionately call our “Agbani Darego of the Skies”
His punishment?
Appointed Airport Security Protocol Ambassador.
Not a reprimand. Not a fine. An ambassadorial title.
Because, apparently, the best way to promote airport discipline is to decorate the undisciplined.
Meanwhile, Comfort Emmanson, the lady whose airborne altercation on Ibom Air went viral, is being courted by Nollywood. Reports suggest she’s also receiving destination-dating offers to exotic cities like Texas and Doha, though the true motives behind such generosity remain unclear.
Some are calling for her to be crowned Ambassador of Passenger Decorum.
How we leapt from flight drama to film contract, I cannot say. But it’s giving serious Catch Me If You Can energy.
Remember Frank Abagnale Jr., the infamous con artist turned FBI consultant? At least he had genius-level forgery skills.
Here, it seems if you disrupt public order with enough flair and hashtags, you might just land a public service gig.
A Modest Proposal from a Tired Mind
At this point, I’m beginning to think that if I truly aspire to be crowned Ambassador of Airport Decency, I should just streak shirtless through John F. Kennedy Airport or Heathrow Airport, ideally during peak boarding hours. Perhaps toss in a theatrical slap on a customs officer for dramatic effect. Surely that qualifies me for a UN Peacekeeping role on the global stage?
Honestly, it’s starting to look like a powerful brand strategy for anyone who has been labouring in mountainous prayer for an international breakthrough. If decorum no longer counts, perhaps drama is the new divine strategy.
All jokes aside, what message are we sending?
Is that public misconduct now a public audition?
That violating civil order is the new résumé?
That the road to reform is paved with clout, not consequence?
Let me end this with a modest proposal:
Next time you’re tempted to act with dignity, pause.
Ask yourself: Would foolishness fetch me further?
In this our blessed land, it just might.
And you see, these things make fatherhood tough.
They make discipline a joke.
How do I raise a child to do what’s right in a society that has no culture for it?
Look, my eyes are aching. I must go to sleep, and keep praying for the wisdom to swim against the tide of these strange and sacrilegious fires burning in the holy temple of decency, where I still serve as a minister… and where I am slowly initiating my little son.
It is well, as they say… even in the well of national absurdity.