NICHOLAS MUTU’S TIME TO SAY GOODBYE

By Dr Eyiseifa Jonathan Ebiowei

Vanity is an impossible disease to cure. Those who suffer from it are usually annoyingly vacuous, empty headed and difficult to control and so would not eat the humble pies necessary for their cure. They are show-offs, always wanting to impress, not by achievement but by belonging to a supposed upper class.

Nicholas Mutu Ebomo has been suffering from a variant of the vanity disease that has its cause and background in a lack of good education, creating a low self-esteem which demands him to be in high society for self validation and relevance. So Mutu finds expression in overarching ambition and the desperation to become a permanent fixture in the Federal House of Representatives.

Nicholas Mutu is the oldest elected person in the entire Nigerian National Assembly. He has served from 1999 to the present day and when this tenure ends in 2027, he would have served in the House of Representatives for 28 years or seven tenures, a full generation.

Nicholas Mutu is a flamboyant but vapid man who hides his low self-esteem in grand language and in exaggerated fashion turnouts.

Since nearly twenty eight years or seven tenures, Nicholas Mutu has been without accomplishments of any kind, representing the people of Patani/Bomadi federal constituency in the House of Representatives.

He has never introduced or sponsored any bill, hardly ever makes contributions of any kind at plenary or even committee sessions and generally just occupies space to the annoyance of colleagues. His official record in the Hansard of the House of Representatives remains at zero for bills and other recorded contributions in twenty-seven years, going to the twenty-eight.

How do you have a man in parliament for a full generation of nearly thirty years without ever introducing a bill, sponsored a motion or made intelligent contributions to national discourse? The people of Bomadi/Patani needs to ask Nicholas Mutu Indolence alone cannot fully explain such catastrophic failure. A near absolute lack of capacity is what we are witnessing in the failures of Nicholas Mutu on the House. The lack of good education tells is that Nicholas Mutu is out of his depths and out of place in the House of Representatives.

He was for ten years 2009 - 2019, by reasons of ranking or long stay, the House Chairman of the Committee of the NDDC (Niger Delta Development Commission). Those years are still regarded as seasons lost to the locusts, unremarkable and underachieving and remains ten years of sloth and upheaval in the Commission.

Nicholas Mutu has therefore become a dead weight in the House and should leave to open up space for a more worthy representative for the Bomadi/Patani Federal Constituency.

 The man has offered no useful contributions to his people or to the federation. The lethargic performance in parliament is so bad that there is no record of even a single bill or motion sponsored by Nicholas Mutu for seven tenures in the House of Representatives.

He has been of no use to realizing the objectives and development agenda of the Ijaw nation in parliament and will be a waste of the peoples time and resources to keep him there.

Without presenting bills and representing no ideas or goals, he was just sitting possum and being of no use to the House or to his constituency, so Nicholas Mutu is a perfect example of the old, unproductive order that has to be swept away for Nigeria to embrace a new order that should be active and productive. Indolence cannot be a virtue in these time of urgency for development.

Mutu’s lack of accomplishment of any kind has proven his worthless ess to his constituents and the larger Nigerian population that he is supposed to be serving.

Nicholas Mutu is without a verified or credible school certificate and does not lay claim to any higher education. That would not have mattered if he had spent time to develop himself even while in the House as parliamentarian. Many had done it and are still doing it.

But Mutu spent twenty-eight years idling in the House of Reps., playing the ‘noveau riche’ game, building the biggest private house in Abuja, but neglecting to develop himself and improve his job performance, the job that was bringing him wealth and recognition.

So year on year, Mutu’s job performance has been declining, even while he was getting more voluble. He does not represent the Ijaw culture of frugality and good sense and does not follow in the footsteps of our accomplished professionals and technocrats thriving in many fields of human endeavour all over the world.

Nicholas Mutu is supposed to have come from the same cultural environment that produced the likes of the accomplished John Pepper Clark Bekederemo, Professor Alfred Opubor, Chief E.K Clark and many other men and women of letters and fame who have made remarkable contributions to the development of Nigeria.

It was to find relevance in a new political dispensation and cover up the sense of worthlessness without higher education that Nicholas Mutu threw himself into the election to the Federal House of Representatives in1999 and to date, unable to develop himself or to create relevance for himself even as member of the House of Representatives, he has been overwhelmed by his lack of self motivation and incompetence.

He has been unable to find usefulness for himself and unable as well to be of use and relevance for his people. He has proven himself to be an impediment to Bomadi/Patani peoples progress.

Right before our eyes, the job of House representatives has left Nicholas Mutu behind.

He has watched askance while the job grew in scope, power and sophistication without him being able to grow with the job. Other men and women in the House with better education and knowledge came and expanded the breath and stature of the parliament while he remained idle in the house, not growing in understanding and not developing himself to grow in perception, acumen or erudition.

He refused to develop the skills needed for self growth and sophistry in parliament.

It is no gainsaying but Nicholas Mutu, after decades of idleness, no longer fits the job in a modern parliament, not because he’s old but because his understanding and preparation for modern parliamentary work is old.

Time has passed him by because of unwillingness to develop himself to fit the evolving job description. Without a higher education combined with a lethargic laziness at self development, the world wheezed passed him and no one can bet anymore that Nicholas Mutu understands the scope of the job before him in a modern parliament.

And there is the more troubling fact that Mutu has ensconced himself in Abuja for so long that he has lost touch with the issues troubling his constituency and their need for justice and development in the evolving world. He has become too self absorbed to bother about the people who sent him to parliament.

Environmental degradation and the accompanying underdevelopment resulting from oil drilling continues to impact the lives and environment of his constituency but Mutu is far removed from his base and not confronted with these facts in Abuja makes him a parliamentarian living in the diaspora with no true knowledge of the situation in his constituency.

So let Nicholas Mutu go find rest in his massive mansion in Asokoro, Abuja and leave the people of Bomadi/Patani to their struggles. He has lost any claims to his constituency to idleness and sloth.

 Bomadi/Patani Federal Constituency has also lost him to the wanton consumption culture of Abuja which pampered him so much that he forgot his duty to his home.