Miscellaneous:Akpabio, Leadership, and Accountability.
I was determined this was the last time I was going to be his accountant. It was an unpaid job. I did it because I thought he loved me and the love was mutual, but the frustration of the last 48 hours is what I never imagined he would put me through. Everyone says I get away with murder with him because we look so much alike facially with the subtraction of height and bald head. I'm not concerned about the resemblance; I only care that he understood me beyond any words I would ever utter to him. We were friends even though he was my father. I was the oldest at home at the time, so I kept his money.
He had put me in this frame of mind because I had done an account of his money, which he kept with me for some reason I don't know where 50 naira was, so I added it to miscellaneous. When Dad saw that word "miscellaneous," he became someone I could not recognize. I tell people I was counting millions before I ever earned it, and physical cash still 'traumatized me." (inside jokes) Imagine counting money back in the days without a counting machine for my dad, who refused to put his money in the bank for reasons I might write about some day. If my memory is correct, the highest denomination back then was either 200 or 500 naira. The rest were 5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 naira. Imagine these denominations in millions.
When I saw how Dad was acting over this 50 naira. I got angry, broke my kolo, what you call today a piggy vest, and added 50 naira, drew another ledger, and told him I couldn't keep his money anymore. He knew I wouldn't steal his money, but he taught me a lesson about leadership and accountability that has been a guiding light for me.
Dad told me leadership was about accountability. It is reverence for people who entrusted time, money, or anything into you. He referenced the story in the Judeo-Christian text of the shepherd who left 99 sheep to go in search of one lost sheep. Dad said he could have registered the one lost sheep as miscellaneous, but because he values not just the sheep but also accountability for his leadership position as the shepherd who should be accountable for everything no matter how flimsy/minute. Dad said other things I will dispense with in the interest of brevity and space.
What has the leadership of this country ever been accountable about? Oil revenue? Security? lives of citizens? Do we understand stewardship as a people? There are people saying Senator Natasha's issue is too frivolous compared to other "urgent" legislative issues. Or those who say, is she the only fine woman? Frankly, I don't respond to these kinds of people and their comments because they reflect our jaundiced way of thinking about pertinent issues. Everyone is suddenly talking about Senate rules. Were these rules not present for all those hurried pieces of legislation that were passed allegedly without due process? Will the Senator Natasha issue become another miscellaneous?
