By: Dr. Charles Obiajulu Ugwu
There’s a certain tragedy in watching someone walk confidently in the wrong direction. More painful still is watching them check a broken compass, nod reassuringly, and quicken their pace. Such is the fate of nations caught in the delusion of progress. And in this theatre of confident missteps, Nigeria plays its role with masterful conviction.
We are a country in motion, no doubt. Roads are being built, ministries are making announcements, international conferences are being attended. But motion, as any seasoned traveler knows, is not the same as movement. And certainly not the same as progress. It is here that the metaphor of the broken compass becomes more than imagery; it becomes diagnosis.
Wandering in Familiar Circles
Nigeria’s development journey feels, at times, like a man spinning in a room full of mirrors. Each turn brings a new reflection, a new illusion of change. New leaders, new agencies, new strategies—all carefully arranged to appear different from their predecessors, yet fundamentally tethered to the same dysfunctions.
It is tempting to confuse activity with achievement. But a treadmill does not take you forward, no matter how long you run. And much like the treadmill, Nigeria’s development cycle offers an exhausting illusion of movement. Policies are recycled. Institutions are renamed. Pilot programs are announced with fanfare, only to disappear into the silence of neglect. We rarely pause to ask: what is actually improving? Who is truly being lifted?
The False Gods of Metrics
The modern world worships data, and we in Nigeria have not been left behind. We cite GDP growth, literacy rates, smartphone penetration, foreign investment figures. We celebrate them as signs of arrival. But these numbers, like digital ghosts, can be manipulated, misread, or simply misplaced in a narrative hungry for good news.
Take for instance the notion of GDP growth. It is entirely possible for an economy to grow on paper while millions sink deeper into poverty. It is possible to have more children enrolled in school while fewer are learning anything meaningful. It is possible to have more hospitals with less healing, more roads with less connectivity, more elections with less democracy.
Our metrics soothe us. They make us believe that we are better off than we feel. They paint pictures that we hang in global galleries, proud of our brushwork, oblivious to the growing cracks beneath the canvas.
Of Shuffles and the Comfort of Change
Every election season, we shuffle our deck of leaders, often pulling the same faces with different titles. We change the guards at the gate but rarely question the design of the house. And we clap for each new appointee as if charisma can replace capacity.
But dysfunction, when dressed in new garments, remains dysfunction. A system cannot self-correct if it does not first self-reflect. And yet, Nigeria seems addicted to the performance of change without the discomfort of transformation.
It’s like rearranging the chairs in a burning house and declaring the interior redesigned. Or like repainting a leaking roof and announcing weatherproof progress. These are the comfortable delusions of a nation unwilling to confront its structural demons.
From Lagos to Kano: Illustrations of the Loop
Visit Lagos, and you’ll see gleaming towers casting shadows over flooded streets. Take a walk through Kano and you may find bustling markets beside schools without teachers. The contradiction is jarring: islands of wealth in oceans of neglect.
Our development is patchy—a quilt of disconnected efforts stitched without a pattern. One local government boasts of solar lights while the surrounding villages lack drinkable water. A city launches smart traffic systems even as its hospitals rely on candlelight.
These contradictions aren’t just economic; they are psychological. They train citizens to accept incoherence as normal. They teach our children that excellence is the exception, not the expectation.
The World Watches, and Wonders
Globally, the story is not unique to Nigeria. Many developing nations wear the garb of modernity while clutching the logic of yesterday. But Nigeria’s size and potential make its paradox more visible, and more painful.
Foreign partners often marvel at our energy, our brilliance, our resilience. But they also puzzle at our insistence on old formulas. They ask, gently or otherwise: how long will Nigeria continue this circle? How long will it celebrate symbolic wins while substantive losses go unattended?
What Does Real Progress Look Like?
Real progress, as any honest observer knows, is quiet. It does not always come with ribbon cuttings or social media trends. It is the child who learns to read because her teacher was trained and paid on time. It is the farmer who harvests more because the road to market finally became passable. It is the young man who stays, not because he has no passport, but because his nation gave him a reason to believe.
Real progress is slow, often invisible at first. It is the turning of the soil, not just the planting of flags. It demands humility—a willingness to admit past errors and present gaps. It requires coherence, where health, education, infrastructure, and governance are not pursued in silos but seen as parts of a single, living organism.
Toward a Shared Reckoning
The broken compass will not fix itself. It must be set down. We must ask ourselves, honestly: what are we measuring? And why? Who does our progress narrative serve? Are we building for headlines or for history?
And perhaps most crucially: can we afford another decade of motion without direction?
These are not easy questions. But nations, like people, grow not by avoiding discomfort, but by leaning into it. Nigeria stands today at a moral and developmental crossroads. The temptation to continue spinning is great. The applause for superficial gains is loud. But beneath the noise, a deeper yearning persists: to become a country where progress is felt, not just proclaimed.
A Final Reflection
In the end, this is not just about Nigeria. It is about every community, every nation, every institution that has confused movement for meaning. It is about a world that must relearn the difference between being busy and being better.
Progress is not a performance. It is a quiet, often thankless, pursuit of human dignity. It is rooted in honesty, in coherence, in care. And until our compass is repaired—until we choose truth over optics, substance over style—we will continue to wander, exhausted but unchanged.
The question that remains is haunting in its simplicity: Will we dare to stop and ask if we are truly moving forward—or merely walking faster in the wrong direction?
Follow us on all social media platforms @dailyquery for news and analyses around the globe.
