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The dress code of the
West has caused a drain on Nigeria’s economy. Most Nigerians
believe that you cannot perform the duties of a chief
executive if you’re not on English suits, a white shirt and
perhaps a red tie to match. This is not a myth because the
dress code has no relationship whatsoever with the process
of management at its hierarchy. Agreed the English people
introduced their dress code to Nigerians during the era of
colonialism, but the question that must be asked is whether
Nigeria is still in that era? If the answer is no, why would
Nigerians not fashion out their dress code that would be
suitable to their economy and environment? Picture in your
mind how all the chief executives from both private and
public sectors go to Aso Rock and they bow down their head
to respect the office of the president and the man in charge
who wears his native attire. The consequences of Nigerians
continued patronage of Western suits and its accessories are
that, Nigerians create huge market/employment for the
Western world while unemployment rates continue to rise in
Nigeria and the people are impoverished on a daily basis. To
this end, the people of Nigeria/government should have a
re-think at this time of global economic melt-down. Let’s
get it clear; your dress code does not make you
efficient/inefficient at work neither does it makes you
strategize better. We can categorically say that the English
suit is as good as the buba/sokoto in all ramifications or
the shape of attire of the current president. For all
intended purpose, the “agbada or popularly called babariga”
is out of this discussion because the over-flow of the
agbada would interrupt with office equipment and other
working tools. The fabric to make buba/sokoto is “Ankara or
Adire” or materials that can be made in Nigeria. While the
men can go on buba/sokoto, the women can go on skirt over
blouse or the female version called buba/iro made out of
locally manufactured textiles. In the Nigeria’s economy,
clothing takes a good chunk of total expenditure; as such,
one of the ways to fix the economy is through reduced
imports and increased usage of home made goods.
Every nation on this planet is clamoring for improved
economy right now and all hands are on deck to ensure
success, so why should Nigeria be an exception. If countries
of the Western world are going back to their drawing boards
to fashion out for example alternatives to energy so as to
improve their economy, why would Nigerians not utilize what
Almighty God has placed in their hands? The guts to discuss
this issue at the Federal Executive Council meeting in order
to implement an official dress code policy from the federal
to local levels would make Nigerians dress in their home
made attires from Mondays-Fridays. This would bring about
huge employment ranging from farming (cotton production) to
manufacturing of the textiles, then to sewing of the
materials. Yes, the machines to sew these clothes would be
massively imported at the onset, but chances are that with
time, same machines could be manufactured in Nigeria. That
is a discussion for another day. For God’s sake, Nigerians
need to take a second look at the matters within their
control, such as this. A nation must as a necessity strive
to make ends meet without the influence of outsiders.
Agreed, no nation is an island, but there are some issues
that can be handled without much interference from outside.
In this era when the rest of the world are brainstorming on
ways to improve their standard of living, Nigerians must sit
down, think and be able to stand firm on issues that are
within their reach as well as better their economy and
lifestyle. Apparently, the lands are fertile and there are
sufficient lands to commence serious farming for cotton.
Some Nigerians are gifted with creativity, so the tailoring
aspects of these attires are not a problem, so why can’t we
reasonably compare costs and benefits at some point in time?
Huge foreign exchange will be saved and used for other areas
of human development such as hospital equipment, education
materials, etc fashioned to the 21st century. We
know that fashion and human looks are synonymous with
man/woman relationship.
That a lady is dressed in buba/iro does not make her
unattractive to men, neither does a man dressed in buba/sokoto
look awkward to ladies. Let’s take our minds back to the
days when ladies were using tread to plait their hair and
some used stretching comb to stretch their hair, these
ladies had boyfriends/husbands and the so call “sugar
daddies.” In effect, the issue of man/woman courtship is not
dependent on what the ladies/men wear. Rather, it’s
dependent on nature. Nature has it that the urge for both
sexes to interact is inevitable regardless of what kind of
dress code that is available. In my days when I had choice
of ladies, I never admired a lady because of her London
imported clothes and paintings. I preferred natural looks to
artificial beauty that would provoke my sight very early in
the morning when she wakes up from sleep without make-ups
and those dresses skillfully tailored in Great Britain or
France. These days, some people have started using “Ankara”
to sew uniform (ashoebi) for parties and the reality is that
they look gorgeous in them. It’s therefore left for the
three tiers of government to officially make it possible for
everyone to dress in these attires to work in order to
create employment for Nigerians. If Nigerians in Nigeria
cannot get involved with modern day science and technology,
then to make use of what is before them shouldn’t be a
problem. I still remember vividly that when I went to Abuja
early in 1987 to serve a court subpoena, the young man who
attended to me wore buba/sokoto. Though his spoken English
was not clear, but I got the attention I needed. Nigeria is
a place where implementation of polices are difficult due to
the corrupt nature of the citizens. However, if the Federal
Executive approves this dress code its implementation would
be easy.
Infant industries in Nigeria have always suffered a setback
because men of the Customs are made rich when an item is
banned from the ports/markets as they are adept in laying
out strategies to collect huge bribes from importers so as
to allow the banned commodity gets into the country.
Likewise, the Policemen in Nigeria had the opportunity to
have free sex when they were ordered to arrest prostitutes.
In this dress code matter, once the policy comes into
effect, a supervisor or manager that allows an employee to
violate the policy will be queried. With this, it’s very
easy for the supervisor to tell his/her subordinate to go
back home and dress properly. This way, the Custom officers
would have no back-door businesses. On the other hand, it’s
also easy to align the private sectors such as the banks
with government policy like this though the government has
no direct control on the banks. Because government offices
are the biggest sources of bank deposits, bank executives go
to these offices frequently. So when the bank executive
comes through the door and he is told by the government
official that he as a bank executive has a role to play in
shaping the nation’s economy, and that his eighty thousand
naira suit is a drain to the nation’s economy, it’s obvious
that the man would go back to his office and have a
re-think.
Nigeria is a country with good weather all year round.
Perhaps, most people don’t even understand that the wearing
of suits in the Western world is partially due to the cold
weather during the winter season. There is something wrong
being a copy-cat in a direction of waste and senselessness.
One of the ways to rejuvenate the Nigeria’s economy is to
implement a simple policy like this. When you travel to
other parts of the world, one common thing you see on the
streets is that country’s home made products. At this point
in the global economy, Nigeria’s government doesn’t have a
sensible choice other than to develop its own strategy of
survival of which this dress code in all government offices
is one of it. Why can this dress code not be possible when
the man that occupies the highest office in the land wears
his native attire that does not interrupt any form of office
equipment, and the shape looks more or less like the English
suits? Indeed, Nigeria’s economy and the ways to fix it
should be uppermost in the minds of Nigerians if the huge
population and the use of the nation’s resources are
concerns to the leaders.
Tosan Okotie
Lives in Texas, USA
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Published
October 5, 2010
