Nigeria Immigration Service (The System)

Nigeria is a country that seems to survive purely on the "Who you knows" and "What you haves" and "Who you ares'" rather that on the system. And to be honest, before this, I had been selfishly okay with that, but on this particular day that I had to hustle and queue, watching people who had come after me waltz in, get their documents checked and then foxtrot back to their cars, this system didn’t work for me. I was angry!

Before you go any further, you should know that this is not an aimless venom being spewed on the government, of that I can assure you (See Green, White, Green for that ) and this is not even an article that aims at the Nigerian populace (See Dear Readers for that ). This is simply coming as a result of my 5-hour sojourn at the Nigeria Immigration Service(NIS) center today with my 9-month old brother on a quest to get his first Nigerian Passport.

I am not even angry for myself. I am angered for my 9-month old brother who has not yet developed a resounding voice with which he can speak of the disdain he feels towards the government of this so-called developing nation. What exactly are we developing if we have adamantly resisted any atom of positive growth in the areas that count?

Don't get me wrong, I do not even blame the immigration officers who are understaffed and are expected to work in these poor environments and conditions of no fan, no ventilation, no clean or even attractive uniforms. I see people walking round me in their dirty brown-colored immigration uniforms, proudly carrying around the stale stench of sweat with the marks visible around their armpits, some even have it on their buttocks, and I feel sorry for them.
Therefore I do not fully blame them, for they are as angry as I am.

I do not even fully blame the people who are using their own connects to get ahead and cut corners. It is the way they are used to. This has become the Nigerian system. I blame the system. But more than that, I blame myself for still believing and holding out a candle of hope for a country that has remained rigid, I blame only my optimistic and expectant mind that still sees a change in the future of Nigeria.

We had arrived at their office because the man who was to help us had said to come by 8 o'clock in the morning, but my mother being the person that she is, we got there by 9:30am. Fair enough.
My unknowing mother had packed only one bottle for the baby because according to her, she thought it was going to be a "breeze in, and breeze out" scenario.
Our car was even the first to get there, and we were in high spirits, ready to just collect his passport and go.

Alas! The system had other plans for us.

I must have stood in front of that Acquisition room for hours, since it did not even occur to our able government workers to provide sitting arrangements in the waiting area.
I was waiting for my name to be called as I silently observed the mannerism of the workers of this highly placed government system.
I was trying to explain to that grumpy young man that even in the developed and first world countries that we try so much to emulate, preference is given to the elderly, the pregnant, and to children/babies.
I was frantically trying to explain to him that we didn’t even bring a change of diapers, and my brother had already taken the only bottle we brought to feed him with around 11am, and that he was missing his 10 to 12 am nap and that is why he had been screaming the building down.
I was begging this man to understand that my baby brother who is on the heavy side had to be carried rotationally by my mother and I, but even at that, it was tiring.
I wanted him to get that my 9-month old brother was coughing and hiccupping at the same time, running a temperature even.
My guy didn’t budge.

The system.

Needless to say I was answered around 2pm, and as they were thumb-printing my brother, one of the officers who had been in a private air-conditioned office while we had stood in the bronzing sun opened his foul breathed mouth to ask me, "Is this the boy that you went to put inside AC car? Why I go answer him now?".
Only an alcoholic who has been sober for like a maximum of 2 days, and is facing the strongest smelling liquor can understand the amount of restraint it took me to stop myself from giving that man a smart-ass comeback, because the truth of the matter is that I still needed him to complete all due processes.

I must have stood in front of that Acquisition room for hours, staring blindly at the pieces of white A4 paper pasted on the grey chipping cheapened wooden door. One of the red Servicom posters even stared back at me, mocking me, with the sign saying "You have the right to be served right".

I wanted to laugh at myself for the predicament I was facing, on a day that I could have used to achieve much else, but I was too hungry, tired, irritated, and frustrated to even try. So when my name was finally called, I wasn’t even as much relieved as I was fed-up, I just wanted to carry my agitated baby brother and go home so that I could take a long well-deserving nap myself.

There I was, thinking I was immune to the system, because of the connects I thought we had, the connects that somehow decided to fail; thinking I was above the system because of the breakable rules that surround the system, but all in all, today, the 18th of February, 2011, all I can say is that the system fucked me,simply because of my lack of connects, the system screwed me!