On his second nomination Burna Boy the Afro Fusion artist won a Grammy for the world music best artist category. The Grammy has reinforced the Burna Boy brand as a universal item, that every part of the world would want to tap in. The Grammy awards may have been made in the USA, but over time it has been adopted as the world’s event. What the Grammy does is, it further enhances the artistic profile of the musician or artist and expands the economic horizons associated with the artist or brand, closely or remotely.
Now knowing that failure is an orphan, success is bound to attract chief opportunists in any society, the political class being one of them. Burna Boy’s wining of the Grammy award for Nigeria after many years apart, suddenly gingered the politicians to recognising whom Burna boy is and was granted accolades for a job well done.
A few months back, October 2020 to be precise, Burna Boy was at the vanguard of clamouring for change in Nigeria. Burna Boy is not just an artist, he is a young Nigerian under the millennial age bracket who was part of thousands of young Nigerians asking for an end to the old ways of doing things, which was typified by police brutality. During the #Endsars protest, police brutality only headlined numerous contentious issues which has long held Nigeria back and had to be fixed. Apart from police excesses, the unworkability of the exiting constitution was emphasised as a very sticky item. The rights of women in society, under the weight of patriarchy and a deeply misogynistic culture was also brought to the fore.
The campaigners made the distinctive statement that the older generation may have lived with so many levels of dysfunctionality within the Nigeria state, they were not going to take on the baton and pretend that everything was honky dory. They have had enough. Burna Boy’s rise to prominence globally, though a relatively well-known musician, was when he made the protest pronunciation at the Coachella music festival in the United States, that he would not be treated as a minor with his name hidden in small print at the popular music festival, but that he was unarguably ‘‘the African Giant’’. But back home, Nigeria has experienced so much battering over the years to maintaining its position as the giant, on the African continent.
Shortly after independence, crude oil took a prominent place as the main source of revenue for Nigeria. There are academic estimates that Nigeria may have sold $200trillion worth of crude oil over the past five decades. Sadly, the country frittered its petroleum wealth with little invested in the people or in infrastructure. The youth population lay the blame squarely at the feet of the older generation, whom they believe have failed to adjust over time into the realities of an innovation-based economy, apart from the challenges of governance. On their part the antidote to restoring the pride of the country is embracing technology, innovation, and creativity.
The social media has been a driving force for the youth around the world and the Nigerian youth is no exception. The social media is a cost-effective platform which fosters the creative energy of the individual by the fact that, talents and creativity are easily shot to prominence within a short time, while it also acts as a viable economic community. Where people can project their talents, without any hindrance and obtain a much higher percentage on investment, the social media space is the place to be.
While innovation and creativity has created outlets for engaging the youth energy, it has at the same time exposed the vulnerability of the youth due to their non-exposure to the rudiments of politics. The suspicion of politicians and politics, and almost total disengagement from it, simply means that the youth may find themselves at the mercy of the older generations of indirectly dictating their daily lives through policy formation and legalisations, which bears little or no significance to their aspirations.
It was and still is the youth’s lack of experience and knowledge of Nigeria’s political terrain and dynamics, that led to the collapse of the #Endsars campaign with the ultimate vilification of its promoters as wanting to overthrow the government of the day. Politicians and their hangers on trivialised the protest as a jamboree of debauchery. The main purpose of the protest was intentionally lost in translation.
To many politicians in Nigeria, politics is their main means of survival, thus they would play dirty and ugly if there is any perception that their source of livelihood is threatened. With #Endsars protest taking a reprieve and some cosmetic responses from authorities, old habits of police extorsions, brutality e.tc. have resurfaced. The major issues on the front burner then, remain intact unresolved. Some of them are massive youth unemployment and lack of investment in quality education and accessibility to it.
What is the solution? The youth population must come to terms, with the fact that they are faced with the hard reality that politics plays an important part in their daily lives, as it does for every individual and thus it should not be left to the vagaries of the older generations. Thus, the need to taking part in party politics, getting more involved in advocacy, and influencing policy formation is non-negotiable.
© Copyright, Olugbenga Adebanjo
Ojuriblog 