Cogent Social Sciences (Jan 2020)
Narrative of governance crisis in Nigeria: Allegory of resource curse and “Emergence” in Tunde Kelani’s Saworoide and Agogo-Èèwò
Abstract
From the resource curse perspective, this article investigated how Tunde Kelani’s twin-movies, Saworoide and Agogo-Èèwò, explored the vulnerability of leaders in natural-resource dependent state to corrupt practices, leading ultimately to governance crisis. Textual and mythical representations in the movies are critically analysed to explain the significance of tackling governance crises during the leadership-making process. Significantly, the article investigated the historical revisionism contained in the films as a predictive imagination of how the future (political-economy) will remain bleak in the face of the continued maladministration of the resources in Nigeria. Focusing on the socio-economic and political malaise that has continued to play out since the discovery of crude oil at Oloibiri community in Nigeria by mid-1950s, the article sought to unravel what Tunde Kelani’s allegorical postulations in Saworoide and Agogo-Èèwò reveal about leadership experiences of states depending solely on natural resources income. It explained how the absence of shared goal and dearth of mass mobilization strategies, which were successfully deployed in the films for denouncing despotism and yokes of elitism, are lacking in the present-day Nigeria. The insulations against irresponsible public administration, which the leadership-making process in Saworoide and Agogo-Èèwò rigidly built into the leadership-making process in Saworoide and Agogo-Èèwo, arguably, showcase the consequences of unscrupulous choices emanating from gamed electoral system inherent in the modern liberal democracies. In doing so, the study showed how the conjoined films are a unique art that figuratively lends itself to explanations of leadership challenges arising from natural resource endowments.
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