Good morning, Nigeria.

Accountability in Nigeria has become an interesting concept. Everyone is angry, everyone is innocent, and somehow, nobody is responsible.

Politicians blame structure.

Meanwhile, elites blame history, while citizens blame tribe.

Young people point at the old, and the old point back at the young.

Everybody has an explanation.

Nobody has a confession.

Somehow, we have built a country where responsibility is always somewhere else.

Accountability in Nigeria: Everyone Has a Reason

Ask why something is broken and you will get an answer.

The economy is difficult because of the previous government.

That previous government blames the one before it.

Institutions are weak because the system was already broken, while the people running the system blame the institutions themselves.

And around we go.

There is always context.

There is always history.

More importantly, there is always someone else who made the first mistake.

Of course, many of these explanations are valid.

Nigeria has serious structural problems.

Leadership matters, institutions matter and history matters too.

However, explanations cannot become permanent substitutes for responsibility.

At some point, somebody has to say:

“I was wrong.”

That sentence appears to be surprisingly difficult.

When Accountability Becomes Someone Else’s Job

We demand accountability from politicians.

Yet we excuse our friend because “he was only trying to survive.”

We complain about corruption, but then make the unofficial payment because “that is how things work.”

Similarly, we demand competent leadership while defending incompetence when it comes from our side.

We want change.

At the same time, we sometimes negotiate the standards required to achieve it.

This is where accountability becomes complicated.

Everyone wants responsibility from somebody else.

Very few people want it attached to themselves.

The System Is Broken

We all agree on this part.

The system is broken.

We say it at dinner and repeat it online.

On television, the conversation continues.

Even in traffic, someone is explaining exactly what is wrong with the country.

Whenever another institution disappoints us, the diagnosis is ready.

Curiously, nobody remembers who broke it.

Or, more accurately, everybody remembers — provided someone else is being blamed.

As a result, we have turned accountability into an extreme sport where everyone participates and nobody keeps score.

Everyone wants the country to change.

Everyone has an opinion about what needs to happen.

Everyone knows who is responsible.

Yet responsibility itself keeps moving.

Who Is Responsible?

Perhaps the first step is not another speech.

Instead, it is honesty.

Not the kind we demand from politicians while excusing ourselves.

The ordinary kind.

The uncomfortable kind.

The kind that allows us to admit when we have contributed to the problem.

After all, a country cannot permanently blame its way into becoming better.

At some point, somebody has to accept responsibility.

Perhaps that somebody is not always them.

Sometimes, it is us.

Good morning to a country where everyone is awake, everyone has an explanation and everyone is innocent.

The question is whether we are honest enough to admit when we are not.