In Yoruba cosmology, the Abiku
is the spirit-child who dies and returns, repeatedly, defying parental grief
and communal rituals meant to banish it. Wole Soyinka and John Pepper Clark, in
their celebrated poems, gave voice to this haunting cycle.
Soyinka’s Abiku speaks with defiance:
“In vain your bangles cast
Charmed circles at my feet;
I am Abiku, calling for the
first
And repeated time.”
Clark’s Abiku echoes the inevitability:
“Coming and going these several
seasons,
Do stay out on the baobab tree,
Follow where you please your kindred spirits.”
Nigeria’s corruption is our
national Abiku. It dies in commissions of inquiry, only to be reborn in
new scandals. It is buried in anti-graft campaigns, only to rise again in fresh
looting. Like the spirit-child, corruption mocks our rituals of reform,
returning with the same stubborn laughter.
Soyinka’s Defiant Abiku and Nigeria’s Defiant Corruption
Soyinka’s Abiku is
unapologetic, almost proud of its return. It taunts the living with
inevitability. Nigeria’s corruption behaves the same way. Each time we think we
have subdued it, through EFCC raids, judicial panels, or “war against
indiscipline. It reappears, brazen, unashamed, as if to say: “In vain your
bangles cast charmed circles at my feet.”
The analogy is chilling:
corruption in Nigeria is not embarrassed by exposure. It thrives on it.
Headlines of scandal are not deterrents but invitations to the next cycle.
Clark’s Resigned Abiku and Nigeria’s Resigned Citizenry
Clark’s Abiku is less
defiant, wearier, acknowledging its endless cycle of coming and going.
Nigerians, too, have grown weary. Citizens watch corruption return season after
season, administration after administration, until resignation sets in. The
people, like Clark’s grieving parents, plead for the spirit-child to stay away,
but deep down they know it will return.
This resignation breeds
cynicism: “Nothing will change.” It is the quiet acceptance that corruption is
part of the Nigerian rhythm, as natural as the rainy season.
Inferences: The Abiku as National Metaphor
- Indefatigability: Just as the Abiku cannot be
banished, corruption resists eradication. It adapts, mutates, and
reappears.
- Communal grief: Families mourn the Abiku’s cycle;
Nigerians mourn corruption’s cycle. Both griefs are collective, both are
exhausting.
- Mockery of rituals: Traditional charms fail against the Abiku;
anti-corruption agencies fail against entrenched graft. The rituals are
elaborate, but the spirit-child laughs.
- Generational haunting: The Abiku haunts families across
generations; corruption haunts Nigeria across administrations.
Anecdote: The Commission That Became a Ghost
Consider the countless
commissions of inquiry into oil revenue mismanagement. Each one promises to
exorcise corruption. Reports are written, recommendations made, but nothing
changes. The commission itself becomes a ghost, like the Abiku, haunting
the archives but never altering reality.
Conclusion
Soyinka’s Abiku is
defiant, Clark’s Abiku is resigned. Nigeria’s corruption is both. It
mocks our efforts to banish it, yet it also induces resignation among the citizenries.
To call our corruption indefatigable like the Abiku is to acknowledge
its cyclical nature, its haunting persistence, and its refusal to die.
But unlike the mythical child,
corruption is not a spirit; it is human-made, sustained by greed and impunity.
To break the cycle, Nigeria must stop treating corruption as inevitable fate
and start treating it as deliberate choice. Otherwise, our democracy will
remain forever haunted, forever mourning, forever waiting for the child that
never stays.
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Summary
The article emphasizes that—unlike the mythical Abiku or Ogbanje, who returns through spiritual forces—corruption in Nigeria is not supernatural or predestined. It is human-made, driven by greed, impunity, and the repeated failure of institutions meant to check abuse of power. Using the Abiku metaphor, the article explains how corruption behaves like a spirit-child that continually returns, mocking every attempt to stop it. Commissions of inquiry, anti-graft agencies, and government reforms become ritual performances that look powerful but ultimately cannot bind the destructive cycle.
This cyclical failure creates a dangerous national mindset: a collective grief that turns into cynicism. Many Nigerians begin to see corruption as normal—predictable as the rainy season—leading to resignation instead of resistance. The metaphor warns that if corruption continues to be treated as an inevitable curse, Nigeria will remain trapped in a future that repeats its broken past.
The article concludes that the Abiku story should inspire action, not fatalism. Corruption is not destiny; it can be defeated through accountability and collective refusal to accept the cycle. Only by rejecting the idea that corruption is an unchangeable fate can Nigeria break free from being a nation forever haunted, forever mourning, and forever waiting for promised change that never stays.
— Ogbuke’s Cubicles’s Den, Borderline Ontario