Consequences. Unforgiving consequences.

Bromah was from a small rural settlement in Benue state. A young man, he spent the better part of the last 5 years working odd jobs and saving up to start a business.

Finally, he starts a wholesale business in his hometown. His inventories had short shelf life, and he needed to get them out to the consumers as quickly as possible.

He struck a deal with a friend, Temunu, who had direct access to his consumers. Considering that Temunu had no money to pay for the inventory upfront, Bromah trusted his friend to sell them and remit the costs.

I’m sure you can imagine how this worked out.

Four months passed, Temunu was no where to be found. Bromah had lost his life savings because he trusted his friend with whom he had aligned incentives. He was livid at first. Then he accepted his reality and went back to working odd jobs to rebuild his savings.

On a good Friday afternoon, about a month later, Bromah ran into Temunu at a random gathering. He expressed his displeasure and disappointment towards how the deal played out. And that was it.

Few weeks after that encounter, Temunu pulled something familiar with yet another guy in the town.

You might ask, why didn’t Bromah report Temunu to the police and get him arrested?

Well, it’s not so simple. Reporting Temunu would be self-incriminating because the merchandise in question was a few kilograms of marijuana.

However, the legality of Bromah’s enterprise is not the crux of this discuss. So what is?

In functional societies, consequences apply at the structural levels. In families. In street. In settlements.

In most African American communities, they say “snitches get stitches”.

In closed business communities like among YC companies, “a handshake deal is as good as a signed contract” and the consequences for default is getting shunned by other founders.

Actions must have consequences regardless of the nature and legalities of the underlying relationships.

Often, the consequences of unfavorable actions must be grave and should outweigh the action itself.

Due to the fact that karmic justice is a myth, the consequences of unfavorable actions should be administered by the wronged person (directly or otherwise), and advisably through legal channels.

In the absence of [grave] consequences, accountability becomes a myth, and society collapses.

Children grow into adults oblivious of the “cause and effect” of their own actions. They grow to become policy makers, entrepreneurs, employees, diplomats and so on; all of whom holds society by its hems, ripping it apart.

We all want better leaders, accountable leaders. However, great leaders aren’t heaven sent, they don’t fall from the skies. We make them.

We must imbue onto children in our immediate communities values required of great leaders. There is one way to achieve this: Consequences, unforgiving consequences.