Nigeria, a light bulb, and Jack Bauer

“Make another sound and I’ll rip your tongue out!”

The words echoed against the walls of my room and I didn’t move a muscle.

I stared, spellbound, at the wall in front of me. I could feel my heart pounding.

I could hardly breathe — mostly because of the humid air that permeates Victoria Island and Ikoyi, but partially because of the tension of this moment…

I was rewatching all 9 seasons of 24, and in this particular episode Jack Bauer was in the middle of being vintage Jack Bauer; half-hero, half-heartless assassin, and something like a slam poet with the way he passionately delivered threats to stubborn terrorists. Even the beads of sweat on my forehead decided to wait till after this episode to drip; my face was now a greasy-glazed mess.

Before the terrorist could plead for his life again, I heard the whir and scream of the transformer outside the complex. Yes, yes, yes, YES!

Up NEPA! They’re bringing back light!

So let me pause and explain a few things. “Bringing light” literally just means bringing back electricity. In Nigeria, you’re lucky if you have power 50–60% of the day. We all own diesel generators that we usually turn on once the electricity provided by the government goes out. On this particular day, we didn’t have any diesel left to run the generator due to fuel scarcity affecting the city. Not a drop of diesel anywhere, aside from dodgy characters that lined the crowded street-sides selling diesel-like liquids in black canisters before vanishing in small crowds — I’ll pass. We were just going to have to deal with it feeling like a sauna. Luckily for me, I had charged my laptop, and now distracted myself from the intensity of the heat by falling into the story of Jack Bauer saving the world in 24 hours…AGAIN.

Through the far window in the back corner of my room, I saw the soft glow of lights rolling on in the distance, as our area, once plunged in darkness, began to revive as though blood was being pumped and circulating from heart to veins to organs. Funny how quickly Lagos could look alive.

I reached for the light switch in my room and quickly flicked it on.

Still dark. Hmmm.

I flipped it on and off. The click of the switch could be heard, but nothing happened.

I rushed out of the room, and trekked over to Femi’s room, before knocking loudly.

“Femo…do you have light?” I asked. He shuffled to do the door groggily, looking at me with disgust that I was bothering him at 1am. He flicked the switch on, and the yellow light leaped across the sheets, and brightened the beige walls.

“Yes, there’s light — why are you up? Mschew!”

He closed the door grumpily behind him and I went back to flicking the switch in my room in search of light, to no avail.

The next morning, I set out to The Palms mall to grab a couple of light bulbs. I came home and thankfully there was electricity, so I promptly climbed atop my mattress and reached up to change out the old bulbs with the new bulbs that I had just purchased. I casually flipped the switch.

No light.

Femi walked past as I stared, puzzled, at the bulbs I had just changed. “Ol boy, you still don’t have light?” he asked while reaching in the fridge.

“Nope,” I whined, “It’s still not working.”

“You probably bought bad bulbs” he said nonchalantly.

Bad bulbs? I was confused.

“Sometimes these guys get cheap or fake bulbs from China, or they repackage used bulbs and distribute”, he answered.
I sighed. Knowingly, he passed me the number to an electrician who I called to come by. The electrician asked me to pay for his commute as he was traveling a long distance from the mainland to the island — due to the traffic, that trip could take hours. I agreed to pay his fare, and he arrived a few hours later. He hopped on my mattress and unscrewed the bulbs. He reached in his knapsack and pulled out 2 bulbs then screwed them in tightly. He then flipped the switch.

The light came on.

I embraced him as though he had risked his life and saved a litter of puppies from a burning building. He smiled and said that I can’t just be going and buying bulbs from anywhere. I thanked him, gave him money for his transport fare, and tipped him because I was happy. He trekked to the bus stop nearby and I watched him disappear into a mist of sand, exhaust smoke, and fog at the next roundabout.

3 hours later, as Jack Bauer emptied bullets and raced through an abandoned building on my laptop screen, my lights went out…again. As I explained angrily to Femi, his own face remained cool while pondering.

“Well — it could be that the electrician tricked you and gave you another batch of bad bulbs..or…it could be that the electrician meant well, but himself bought some bad bulbs from the market…or…it could also be that the wiring for your room is bad. Let’s call a different electrician.”

Electrician #2 came by the house the next morning, waltzing in with an heir of confidence that I couldn’t help but admire…and almost zero tools. He pulled the wires from the wall and examined the connection.
“Oga — your wire is bad. I need money to go to buy the correct wiring, I’ll replace it and the light will work.”
I was hesitant, but had no other options so I gave him the money and 2 hours later he arrived back at the house, cutting and rewiring behind a patch of wall. When he was finished, he reached for the switch and flipped it upward.

The light came on.

I shook his hand and provided him with the rest of his balance. That night I slept with the light on, not wanting to mess with my good luck. Unfortunately, 2 days later — more darkness — the light went out AGAIN.

This time I took over from Femi’s line of reasoning while muttering,
“It could be that the electrician tricked me and told me the wiring was bad when it actually wasn’t. He could have just messed up the wiring just to have the opportunity to ‘fix’ it. Or, what if it was the bad wiring before, but now it’s a bad bulb?” The scenarios piled up in my head.

At the end of the week, we were able to get diesel to run our generator and even with the generator on, the light in my room would not go on. It had been 1 whole week without light in my room. I called Electrician #3 and he blamed the generator for not providing enough current which was causing the wiring to go bad. I now pondered the following:

Was it bad bulbs from China?
Was it repackaged used bulbs?
Was it bad wiring in the house?
Was it Electrician #1 hustling with bad bulbs?
Was it Electrician #2 messing up the wiring on purpose to get paid more?
Was it Electrician #2 misdiagnosing the issue?
Is Electrician #3 telling the truth, and there’s been a problem with the generator?
Is the generator guy, rigging the generator to fail knowing we might call him to get a new generator, or for repairs?
Is it any combination of the above?

This is Nigeria.

After 59 years, our country has one problem. Trust.

And unfortunately, that issue like my issue with lighting up my room, is one where a seemingly simple problem turns into compound problems.

It is a country where we are still searching for why there isn’t consistent power: is it generator corporations making huge money and lobbying against steady power? Government corruption? Simply power distribution issues? An inability to produce adequate amounts of power? Eroded infrastructure?

It is a country where we are still feeling the effects of not having power: a steady decline in education, an inability to innovate, a lackluster environment for foreign business investment, and rising opportunity costs.

It is a country where no one can afford to trust another. We do not trust our President to lead the nation. We do not trust our government officials because they steal public funds endlessly, and greedily. We do not trust our youth to lead because they too have been born in the midst corruption, and we do not trust the teachers that taught them. We can not trust that salary will come in on time, nor can we trust that pension will be waiting after decades of service. We do not trust that Nigerians abroad care enough to change the country, as opposed to moving back just to capitalize on the chaos. We can’t even trust ourselves to action. What can we trust?

I remembered after I got my light working (it was the wiring), watching a scene in 24 where Jack Bauer talks to his CTU director, George Mason, disgustedly because he needs to sever a bad guy’s head to establish credibility in going undercover with a terrorist organization. He’s tired and disgusted.

Jack says, “That’s the problem with people like you, George — you want results, but you never want to get your hands dirty. I’d start rolling up your sleeves. [insert dramatic pause] I’m gonna need a hacksaw.”

I think we need a hacksaw too.

(Happy 59th birthday Nigeria)

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