THE PSYCHOLOGY OF OUR CORRUPTION

One of the most recurrent themes in the public domain  is the issue of corruption especially among the political leaders .We are discovering how certain individuals  abuse  the privilege of  office for personal enrichment at the expense of the majority of other citizens . In certain circumstances, money that is essentially earmarked for  projects  meant for the good of the society is diverted into private pockets just as we do not have much to show for the enormous wealth  that God has bestowed on  us  on  due to the greed of the ruling  elite class  whether  military or political . This monster called corruption has defied many antidotes as it has found expression   in all of our societal institutions .The scary part is that the Nigerian factor is almost synonymous to the narrative of greed and corruption.
  Accountability and altruistic management of government resources seem to elude us as we resign fate to the hereafter. Several political parties come with varied shades of promises that they fail to fulfill which makes us believe that governance in Nigeria may require the help of some extraterrestrial beings.
Even the religious Institutions are not spared as our religious leaders parade volumes of wealth that they cannot legitimately defend just as their followers wallow in abject poverty. Our society reserves so much respect for money irrespective of how it is acquired which has made a good number of our traditional rulers  throw caution as they confer high profile chieftaincy titles on their children who have brought home some of the stolen money.  Our social welfare institutions are comatose just as private primary and secondary schools usually unaffordable by the floundering masses have replaced the public schools. The private universities have sprung up with beaming hope that in the closest future they may overtake the existing public ones. Government Hospitals are lagging behind in certain equipments and manpower while the private ones are better equipped but largely unaffordable by the masses. Our roads are death traps while the electricity supply is epileptic and cannot sustain the industrialization of our nation leaving a good number of our graduates unemployed. This definitely provides a breeding ground for varied kinds of mental illness. Some folks have called for the psychiatric evaluation of our leaders but at a closer look this monster called corruption is evident even in the most basic unit of our society.
A good number of our Scholars   defensively assert that this abysmal leadership failure claiming is traceable to the negative impact of colonialism without interrogating the psychodynamics of the behavioral pattern   of the ruling elite class. We have a very wonderful culture that guarantees warmth and brotherhood but there are certain aspects that Insulate reckless leadership from accountability as there are no culturally supported sanctions for disciplining leaders who mismanage our commonwealth.
There are some sporadic elitist measures but certainly not emanating from the masses which explain the mindless looting by our leaders. 
I have always been fascinated about the linkage between culture and behavioral patterns.  We have a culture of materialism that could get guarantee the success of the slave trade through material inducement of our leaders. We have also read how certain families are selected to be buried alive  with a dead king so they can help him carry his material belongings  in the context of a lip -service brotherhood without any repercussions  .
Our culture places much premium on the material at the expense of contribution hence the mediocrity of our leadership. The Psychology of our corruption is rooted in poverty that transcends the material definition. We suffer from another form of poverty that cannot be cured by material abundance hence the continuous looting of state resources by our leaders. Our culture breeds Scarcity mentality which is a deep-seated sense of lack that no amount of material supply can satisfy. Some of our leaders have stolen enough for generations unborn yet they still keep looting. This scarcity mentality that I call poverty seems to be the primal motivating factor for our leaders to exploit loopholes provided by our culture for looting. It is a deep psychological issue with enormous reinforcement in our culture. It is not a mental illness but a cultural indulgence. Religion and education should have provided templates for interrogating and possibly reconstructing this psychological defect with a cultural root but these institutions are inextricably enmeshed in the same problem.
This Psychology of corruption definitely needs treatment but certainly not pills. We are in a season where the reality of our dwindling  oil reserves stare us in the face  and the masses are  becoming more  aware of their rights to choose their leaders without material inducement .This may certainly but gradually reinvent  leadership and heal this malady as we build a society that guarantees mental wellbeing.



Dr Adeoye Oyewole
adeoyewole2000@yahoo.com
+2348034905808(Whatsapp only)


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