Harriman Oyofo: The Nigerian penchant for blaming God
Accidents don’t just happen they are caused – by us! They happen because of what we do and/or fail to do. But in Nigeria where we have a penchant for the absurd, you’re most likely to hear that they happen because God willed it. After all, religion is our thing.
I believe in God but blaming Him, to me, is taking things too far. It is as illogical as it is misplaced. Therefore, I see no point in blaming anyone else but ourselves for the regular loss of life and property around the country. Mind you, some government officials do not help matters whenever they make light of these horrific events by simply laying them on God’s doorstep, whereas the public would in all likelihood feel a lot more reassured if they (agents of government) would step up and be more forthcoming on ways and means to stop the next one due from occurring. God’s ways may be mysterious but how he can so regularly will such massive death and destruction on his people should beat anyone’s religious imagination hollow.
It is safe to say at this point that looking for who is to blame amounts to taking the path of least resistance – an unnecessary official cop out which may be due to ignorance or lack of capacity, or both. Going that route simply points at a system in denial when most of the incidents in question could have been PREVENTED with the right competencies, knowledge, skills, training and other necessary, critical resources.
Citing the will of God for our failure to regularly act correctly to save lives, property and the environment is the height of irresponsible management or lack of understanding of the basic issues in accident causation chain. With the recent spate of particularly horrific accidents all over the country, I think it is clear to those who may care that the responsibility for finding a lasting way around the problem is collectively ours, from the President down to every last one of us in the chain. It’s no use looking elsewhere because it won’t do us any good now or in future. I believe we’ve the resources to tackle it anytime the government decides she is ready to start doing things differently - to make a step change from what is currently the accepted norm – because no progressive economy can sustain significant depreciation of its GDP on a regular basis without paying heavy price.
There has to be a system, a structure, ceilings and boundaries in place as a minimum for accident prevention to be seen as ‘can do’ across board before things can begin to look up for that economy, people and country. If things are not pigeon holed correctly then apostles of ‘it’s beyond us’ shall always hold sway while the nation lurches from one nasty experience to another, bleeding profusely. No serious economy should allow that to happen because it is not sustainable, most especially in these difficult times.
That accidents are caused by us, not God – should not be debatable. Let’s consider the following for a moment to see how God goes about willing death and destruction on our roads, highways, waterways, workplaces, etc, each time:
- A heavy goods truck driver is speeding insanely at over 100km/hr on the Ore-Benin highway on a pitch dark, rainy night at about 8pm, Monday 27th July, 2015 with headlights off. This is at a time when traction and visibility is severely reduced and breaking distances are unusually increased. This truck and its unsafe driver eventually ends up in a catastrophic, preventable collision somewhere a few kilometers further down the highway, spilling its cargo and blocking following traffic from going any further; and it’s God’s will?
- Where does God come into it when an experienced crane operator and his rigger decide it’s time to defy gravity by attempting a lift of 85T cargo using a crane with a Safe Working Load (SWL) rating of 70T just because ‘it’s getting late and that’s the last lift for the night anyway?’
- How is it the will of God when an overpass construction crew lets slip through sheer incompetent handling, a concrete slab of several hundreds of tons in weight to fall through a height of over 50m, eventually landing on a taxi with a driver and six passengers below, crushing them all to death instantly? Why, was it God that should have instructed the crew to close the road below to traffic? Or he should have assigned a tested, competent crew to handle the works? What about the contractor selection and appraisal processes, did the state works ministry go for the best construction company on their books to do the job or maybe they were aware ahead of time of God’s will for the seven unfortunate seven people who were killed?
How about the petroleum tanker that crashes into residential houses spilling thousands of litres of products, leading to fires/explosions, massive deaths and destruction to property and the environment due to “dangerous overtaking in a bending corner”?
Who willed it except the driver?
Harriman Oyofo is CEO, Mann Associates Ltd., Nigeria.
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