Welcome!

We sat around the evening fire, warming our cold skin dried by the harmattan breeze. My joy rose as I sat beside him. He cracked his knuckles, spat into the fire and stared ahead with grey brows that carried age and wisdom. I listened as he recalled his boyhood. Days when the Lagos Ibadan expressway was not bloodthirsty. Days when children played outside without fear of kidnappers. Days when you did not need to rob a bank to eat a decent meal. He paused and murmured, the good old days.

The storm in my stomach refused to settle. I asked what happened to those days. I raised my voice. We are being robbed by the failures of your generation. Democracy is stunted. The country stands on the edge of a cliff. Corruption rules with reckless boldness. Hospitals are hostile. Universities resemble abattoirs. Roads are traps. I spoke like someone rewriting the book of Lamentations. He kept watching me.

He spat into the fire again and called a little boy to fetch more firewood. He coughed and spat once more. He asked for the cup of water in my hand. It had gone lukewarm. He thanked me and tried to start another health lecture on the benefits of warm water. I stayed silent. He saw I had no interest.

His voice weakened. I moved closer to this old man, the patriarch of my line. Tears gathered in my eyes. I asked him how we escape this wahala. He fixed his eyes on me and asked what I knew about Switzerland and the Swiss model of government.

My mind raced. I remembered an earlier conversation with my grandmother, Iya Agba. She often said love without marriage is a lesser evil than marriage without love. She described the 1914 amalgamation as the worst kind of marriage without love. My father hated when I discussed national issues with her. He called her an ethnic bigot. She carried her scars from the Biafran war and never hid them. She rejected the mantra of one Nigeria. She believed the 100 year old error of Fredrick Lugard could be corrected without bloodshed. She argued that what separates us is stronger than what binds us. If unity is the goal, she said the Swiss model is the only rope strong enough to hold us.

She often described Switzerland as a place where many cultures live in peace despite different languages and religion. She praised their true federalism, where the national government controls only a small share of spending. The president and vice president hold ceremonial roles and serve short one year terms. The federal council provides continuity. No full renewal since 1848. She loved that kind of stability.

To me, Iya Agba was brilliant. Yet I never knew how to tell her that Naija is a different ground. Our politics is volatile. Our democracy is fragile. The Swiss model feels impossible here.

I rose from the fire, told them I needed a midnight snack and promised to return.