The ability to forget is one of the most important, if least acknowledged gifts of man. It is because we are able to forget things that we can go one with life, putting aside memories of lost ones as well as painful recollections of events that would otherwise make the very act of staying alive a struggle, and life, a running agony.
But while the ability to forget has its benefits, not many people learn lessons from life’s experiences. Some, either because they are essentially dense or deliberately obtuse, choose to dare fate. How else can one explain the actions of the president’s wife, Mrs. Patience Jonathan who thought it fit to close Nigeria’s capital down for an entire day, in what basically amounts to a brazen continuation of the campaign for her husband’s re-election?
For someone, who by her account, only just managed to come back from the dead after multiple surgeries and relapses, it seems that Mrs. Jonathan has not learned any lesson from that experience. Or it may be that the gift of forgetfulness has obfuscated her reasoning faculties. For anyone who had anything meaningful to do (like reporting to work to earn legitimate livelihoods) in Abuja, last Thursday was a commuter’s hell. The impunity with which major roads were closed off is a pointer to what Mrs. Jonathan would do if she were to remain in the villa beyond 2015.