Patrick Sawyer And the Burden Of Collective National Guilt

By Osuolale Alalade

It was a refreshing quiet Christmas day in 2009. I remember it so vividly because of the rude intervention that terminated my mental escape to this temporary bliss. A long colony of geese playfully floated on the still waters of the canal in the distance without creating the slightest ripple. It was as if they were almost fearful of the waves breaking the pervading eeriness of the morning. This was a morning after a rambunctious carefree eve. Beyond the fleeting thoughts of gratitude for the fast approaching end of another year, this morning of 25 December promised nothing out of the ordinary to cap what could go for a generous year. I was home from another long posting.

My preoccupation that morning wasgoing about procuring the right ingredients for the ceremonial thanksgiving libations to Shango. There were many things to be thankful for. My new home in Cypress was accommodating and our community, thoroughly melange, was a little expression of all of God’s humanity. You felt safe from the often deceptive correctness of mainstream America until the opportunistic break of the season of truth.

I sat on the wooden quays in my garden abutting the water edge watching intently as the trailing family of the white flock silently paddled by me. And again, they created no microwaves on the still waters. I tried to count their numbers but  gave up as the line wobbled and scattered only to self consciously straighten itself as if to the dictates of an invisible conductor. I gave up counting.

The man-made canals that criss-crossed Sydney Harbor, Cypress in the suburb of Houston, Texas, was exhilarating in its awesome handsomeness. The flock took advantage. I was thankful for this morning and allowed myself to soak in this beauty and imbibe life’s rare quality moments. That was the case until Nigeria intruded through the breaking news, brought to me via an unusual strenuous agitation of my ex. An uncharacteristic Christmas was afoot.

The name Umar Mutallab did not mean much to my American ex, but Nigeria naturally did. “He is said to be Nigerian, he is Nigerian,” she exclaimed again and again, strenuously proclaiming as she let loose a commotion all around. Literally commandeered by this insistence to witness to a supposedly Nigerian infamy, I stood up and sauntered to the front of the television to catch up on the crazy world. I had invited myself to an unfolding scene comprising all manner of market place analysts, unapologetic racists and closet jingoists as they sold their stinking wares about Nigeria.

 All the channels were agreed that a Nigerian, a product of this new hotbed of global terrorism, had tried to explode a bomb on a NorthWest Airlines flight arriving Detroit Airport from Schipol in Amsterdam. Nigerians are like that! I could decipher the intonations of the news commentary. My aggravated honey would not take my misguided assurances that this was a mistaken identity, as I argued that we Nigerians, for all our legion of warts, loved our skins too much to commit suicide. It is unNigerian! It is the reason why we steal in billions, because we never believe that we’ll die. And we would not instigate violent death of ourselves. Besides, since when did a name like Umar Mutallab to be quintessentially Nigerian?

I was convinced that the very resourceful American media would soon discover this and the serenity of our home would be restored. I even had the temerity of spirit to imagine that perhaps, I might still have the luxury of compensating for the broken introspection by returning to the quay that evening to watch the sunset.

It was the last time I sat on the quay during the holiday at home. The news of Umar Mutallab hounded every Nigerian. The comments in cyberspace were particularly caustic as every neophyte scum poured his/her odious phlegm at us. It did not matter that Texas, and indeed the United States, is home to an incredible galaxy of accomplished Nigerians across the spectrum of the most honorable of human engagements.

I was consumed by the restive inquisitiveness of my mind and what seemed to be an unspoken inquisition against the Nigerian collectivity. My vacation was ruined. Mid January as I queued up at the airport to go through the mandatory security protocols, my green passport certainly drew attention. But the US border agents and TSAs were, to my surprise, very professional. I heaved a sigh of relief as I attracted only a cursory glance. That glance could have been a reflection of my mind rather than what had transpired in actuality.

In between the experience of the Nigerian underwear bomber and now, one has learnt, living abroad, to come to terms with the reality of irrepressible and hardened Nigerian criminals, very unrepresentative of Nigerians, incessantly hugging the headlines for the very wrong reasons. None has surpassed the telephone that rang on May 23, 2013 encouraging me to go to watch a recording of the shameful exploits of the horrible duo of Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale in the process of hacking a British off duty soldier, Lee Rigby, to death. Wielding an axe these monsters butchered the defenceless soldier like a piece of meat in broad daylight at Woolwich, some place in London.

I can be squeamish and so took a bit of courage to watch the gory Golgotha of these two precursors of Boko Haram’s Ibrahim Shekau. How could these renegades call themselves Muslims and how could they have or claim Yoruba antecedents? How could they be Nigerian? In my mind I began to fight the Umar Mutallab nightmare all over again. But, wait a minute, No.  Yes, they are associated with Nigeria and Mutallab is Nigerian. So how does the madness of one Nigerian now become my cup of tea? So, I decreed.

Now, my decree is that each shall bear his father’s name and carry his cross. I am Nigerian but recognize that on this terra firma, every Nigerian is an individual and would be accountable for his actions. The Nigerian child rapist and incessant armed bank robber in Monrovia, Liberia, the sweet talking Nigerian credit card fraudster in Los Angeles or Chicago, the Nigerian drug dealer in South Africa, the Nigerian prostitute knocking the macadam in Spain or even raising the evening dust in arid Burkina Faso shall bear his father’s name. There shall be no collective guilt.

On a recent trip to Johannesburg, my new South African friend took me to an attic watering hole of the black middle class overlooking a vast oasis of manicured multi-million dollar residences tucked under the sprawling umbrellas of canopies of a city, world famous for its greenery. From our lofty height, he pointed to the little paradise below and observed that not a few of the palatial homes belonged to my compatriots. He added that the problem was that no one knew what they were doing to get their money. I did not even shrug. I have learnt not to carry the cross of every Nigerian. The garbage induced by some of the choices I have made in my life is more than enough load for me to carry. I would not be guilty by association anymore.

No one deserves to be guilty by just mere association with a compatriot or even through kinship ties. Otherwise, no Nigerian would be able to live outside our borders. Equally, no nation should collectively be guilty on account of an infraction, no matter how grave, of one citizen. So goes with all the misplaced shots at Liberians over the tragedy of Patrick Sawyer and Ebola in Nigeria.

I know Liberia well. I know Liberians very well. The reality is that Liberians are majorly a proud and respectable people. Importantly, Liberians have a lot of respect for Nigeria and expect much from us. In a naïve way, I have asked myself serious questions regarding why a normally responsible Patrick Sawyer, and we happen to have many common friends, although strangely I never met him, would come to Nigeria in his state. My take is that it is a case of a troublesome love that follows us as a nation. For with most Liberians, next to the United States, Nigeria, despite all our frailties, is the next abode of God. Did Sawyer hope to contain the symptoms of his state, just so to reach Nigeria believing that our health infrastructure may save him? This is the contention of his wife that I do not dismiss lightly. Secondly, it is difficult to conjecture the state of mind of a man confronted with almost the certainty of imminent death. How does the mind of a dying man work? Can any living person with no experience of death realistically grapple with this? This is the conundrum that friends of the late Sawyer would never with any certainty be able to resolve. So, we can only resort to rationalizations, sometimes almost as illogical as the whole phenomenon that we seek to understand. In the circumstance, we can only express regret at this terrible Sawyer mistake and pray for the Orishas to give the bereaved families the fortitude to bear their terrible losses. The devastating consequences notwithstanding, the idea of collective Liberian guilt burden for the tragic mistake of Patrick Sawyer as some seem to suggest is unjust. Nigeria should be too big for this pettiness.  What Liberia needs in its hour of greatest tribulation is the solidarity of its Nigerian kinsmen.

This article was first published on TheNEWS magazine.