In the 70s, Harvard Professor, Albert O. Hirschman using the Nigeria Railway Corporation advanced the theory that there are three options available for people in civilized societies to address their problems. The options are EXIT, VOICE AND LOYALTY. 

When an organization becomes dysfunctional people tend to get out and find a new one to work with. This is exit and is the equivalent of the Japa syndrome. The voice option is to talk about it with the hope that one's voice will arouse needed concern that will translate to effective change.

Voice can be in terms of complaint or constructive criticism. In any case, it is aimed at showing one's discontent with the prevailing situation and the desire for positive change.

Applying this to NIGERIA, we can say we have never been short of this option. The third option is Loyalty. Here we find people who see no problem at all in the prevailing bad conditions, they could be seen praising the government or the establishment to high heavens and ready to go all out to support the establishment.

Sometimes their actions within the prevailing environment seem absurd, but they do it all the same. One is thus left to conclude that they may be enjoying some largesse of the government and have cause to be faithful to the system that favours them.

For the majority of Nigerians, life is hard, brutish and hellish. Feeding is gradually becoming the preserve of the rich. The hardship of life is so hard that the government is losing all legitimacy as a government of the people.

Nigerians for the most part generate their own water and electricity, they provide their basic security and pay highly for the education of their children. What do they get from the government..nada, zero, zilch, nothing... except tax upon tax and other sundry payments for vehicles, land, and landed properties.

What should the people do? Some who are able have already left the shores of our Country for greener pastures even when they knew it would be difficult, but the certain orderliness of life and certainty about the process provide enough inspiration to embark on such journey to new life and happiness. We still have two options.

The remaining two options are a dip into the black sea. Anyone with an informed good conscience cannot legitimately and morally identify with this government. Those who do so, appear to have lost their conscience and soul.

They have become unthinking and irrational, they are political zombies, available to be used and discarded. This is not a life to be associated with. We still have the option of VOICE.

The kind of voice that is required for the transformation of a diseased nation like ours is still a mirage because dissenting voices are often perceived as inimical to the system and are silenced by any means and every means. 

While I do not advocate a return to violence of the state of nature, of every man to himself, some forms of civil disobedience may be necessary.

While we express our concern to those willing to listen, the rest of us working with and for the Government need to stay home for the government to feel the pinch.

As long as the system runs as usual, the government feels nothing will do nothing for the good of the people and the system will continue to serve an irrelevant government. This option is difficult to execute. 

The only way is through organized labour instructing her members to refrain from servicing the ineffective system. If we are able to paralyze the government for a while, maybe the leadership will wake from its slumber and address the business of governance as the government of the people, for the people and by the people.

In this regard, we need a political class that is people oriented, intent on working for the people they represent. Were this the case, it is our senators and legislators that will fight for the cause of the people, demand for change and call the government to accountability.

But these groups of people have become one with the Government of the day and no longer have the moral voice or ground to call the leadership of the government to order. 

Consequently, every section, every group that has a representative in the Senate or the house of representatives is duty bound to demand at all costs, from their representatives the account of their stewardship.

They should make life so hard for them that they become uncomfortable representing them if they cannot give an account of their stewardship. For this to work, we must jettison petty association and parochial interests.

Tribal sentiments and selfish motives must be discarded. Only the fight for the common good will unite the masses to face their fears and confront the oppressors.

This option is the martyr’s option, it is our willingness to be open to exit and voice at the same time, it is our willingness to give society a martyr’s voice that all will understand and unable to neglect, such as the witnessing of Martin Luther King Jr, Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador, or the heroic witness of Nelson Mandela. 

Let me leave you with the words of Professor Hirschman, our expert in focus: “Exit is unsettling to those who stay behind as there can be no “talking back” to those who have exited. By exiting, one renders his arguments unanswerable.

The remarkable influence wielded by martyrs throughout history can be understood in those terms, for the martyr’s death is exit at its most irreversible and argument at its most irrefutable.”