I Have a Plan for My Brain

 

Long before 50 Cents insured his penis and Jennifer Lopez her bottom, I’d considered going into insurance business or taking a policy. Either way, the issue wasn’t about insurance; it’s about my tummy. You see, I really got scared the first time I felt hungry and developed headache. I thought the demons were eating up my inside. But doctors blamed it on my feeding habit. 

 

Well, they said a similar thing about an American woman, recently. Terri Schiavo, for weeks now, has been a subject of political, judicial and medical experiments - simply because she “messed up” her feeding habit. I heard she suffered brain damage in 1990 when she had a chemical imbalance from an eating disorder. Now, things are getting worse. A judge says she must not eat forever, because she’s no longer from the United States. Now, she’s been “ceded” to a place called “vegetative state”. Like Gowon and Obasanjo decided the fate of Bakassi indigenes. The judge declared Schiavo legally dead. And doctors say she’s “brain dead.”  

What the hell’s that? An “irreversible loss of all functions of the brain”, experts say. The first sign:  no electrical activity - in the brain. Like NEPA? So, if a brain lives without “NEPA” - in a place without electricity, we get various ‘deads’?  Brain-dead. Security-dead.  Infrastructure-dead. Welfare-dead.  Polity-dead. In fact, land of the living dead.

Well, “brain-dead” sounds like a comical film directed by Peter Jackson. But it’s no laughing matter. In fact, it’s as serious as denying Nigeria’s lawmakers bribe or refusing a National Conference delegate sweet.

Delegate: Mr. Chairman, Sir, since you banned kolanut and sweet, we have all been sleeping like water lilies.

Chairman: I love you all. But my gavel shows that most of you are brain-dead because of indigestion. Instead of thinking of contributions and how to make money, you’re thinking of sweet.  Anyway, Professor Wole Soyinka, make your comments, please. And if you’re not here, show by lifting your comb, sorry, your hand.

 Lawmaker:  Mr Senate President, Sir, I suggest we forget Obasanjo and his naïve former Education Minister, who couldn’t even catch a fish. Anyway, Sir, how much did the other ministers bring?

 Presido: You must be brain-dead to ask that question. Look, I’m a man of integrity; I don’t need to borrow it from Ehindero’s motto. I only “facilitate” the “passage” of the “bills” – from the ministers to the committee members – in my house. And I go to sleep whenever they discuss money.  Nobody says anything about bribe, when I chose to be awake. In fact, we only discuss issues of national (assembly) interest, like “Ghana-must-come”. 

Brain is the engine room of activities in man and animal. It could also put a man in trouble if it’s overactive. But it’s worse trouble if it’s dead. Well, perhaps, the beauty of being brain-dead is that you don’t have to think. Somebody does it for you, including the next meal. Only problem is that in Nigeria, you could be cheated out of your skin, if you try being brain-dead.  And brain dead implies insensitivity - mostly to the cries of the people around. Check out the politicians.

 

Anyway, many problems around the world have, somehow been linked to not only the brain, but the tummy. War, betrayal, corruption and even hunger. If lawmakers develop huge appetite for money, where else do we locate the reason but in the tummy? That explains why we say politicians “chop” our money. And if they don’t “chop” enough, backstabbing enters. Then, war – of words, wits and intrigues. Check out Wabara’s Senate. 

To prove that being brain-dead has a lot to do with the tummy; concerned doctors now want to withdraw food from “redundant” lawmakers. Perhaps, that would push them into brain activities like quick thinking. About 300 doctors in Washington D.C. want a federal court to permit the withdrawal of food, water and other life support from members of the House and Senate Republican caucuses – their patients. They insist the lawmakers have lapsed into a “persistent vegetative state,” and have shown “absolutely no signs of cognitive brain function” since September, 2001. 

Now, I, Usoro, my father’s son and an indigene of my village, hereby swear that I am my grandmother’s grandpikin. And that the old woman is from a place in an uncertain country - we’re not sure whether it’s in Cameroon or in Nigeria. In that area, the only president they know is that of the village council. Anyway, granny likes a lot of vegetable and even plants some. Yet, I swear, she’s not from any state named “vegetative”.  

 

American docs say Schiavo, who’s not my grandma’s age-mate, is in a “vegetative state”. And some lawmakers are said to be in a “persistent vegetative state”. I don’t know which is worse but I think Nigerian politicians belong in the second group. Many of them have made only one contribution to lawmaking since 1999 – corruption. Since they’re paid “sitting allowances,” most of them “sit” in their quarters for fear of losing the “allowee” – if they stand in the chamber to make contributions. They sit perpetually – in a “persistent vegetative state”.

 

You see, as in American, the problem with our lawmakers is that of “feeding habit”. Oh, that’s actually the problem with the common man, too. Some politicians feed so “inappropriately” that their tummies grow out of proportion - with bribery and corruption. While we feed so “inappropriately” that we die of hunger. One, I’m told, is called overfeeding; the other, starvation. While the overfed becomes redundant and goes brain-dead because he’s too heavy to think; the underfed is brain-dead because he’s malnourished. He can’t afford even the vegetables, so he ends up in a “vegetative state”. It’s even worse, since he has no place to hide his head – not even a helmet. Oh, don’t you dare mention building a house, with a bag of cement rising overnight from N600 to N1, 800? Hell! 

 

I’m told the brain dies because nutrients, including – believe it or not - air, do not supply well. Okay, some people say air is free. Yet, democratic air has been very expensive. Every petrol station, for instance, advertise “free air”. Yet, the price of cooking gas is now as high as the airport control tower. Even vulcanizers charge high heaven for a little air. Gas welders lecture you, like Obasanjo, on why air is dear; then expect you to pay for the job and the lesson. Oxygen in the hospitals cost human lives. Result? We can’t even get enough air for a balloon. Hence, many Nigerians are brain-dead, clinical confirmation or not. 

 

Here’s a tip: If you want to know if your brain’s okay, try listening to Obasanjo’s speech. If you don’t fall asleep, then you have insomnia. If you join politics and your brain is still intact, you must be wearing a helmet. If you’re not schooled in the art of bribery and corruption, then go back to the classroom. You’re not yet a politician. Ask Osuji on the hospital bed. If there’s a difference between EFCC and ICPC, then Ribadu is not an ex-cop and Akanbi isn’t spotting a goatee. If the two bodies convict any suspect, then Dr Makanjuala isn’t Obasanjo’s cousin. The former Defence DG was once accused of  “misplacing” about N450 million. He went home free because Baba ordered it. Case-dead. In fact, that was when I started a plan in my head for my brain. But it doesn’t include going into a “vegetative state.” Please, tell no one, it’s a secret.

 

 

• First published in Saturday Sun of  April 19, 2004