FRIDAY MUSING.. THE UNSPOKEN PRICE OF “JAPA” AND THE SOLITARY AUTUMN OF LIFE

By Lanre Ogundipe

In our public conversation about the mass departure of young Nigerians, the phenomenon we have come to call “Japa,” we speak mostly in the language of economics. We count the professionals leaving our hospitals, measure diaspora remittances and watch the queues outside foreign embassies. We discuss the opportunities awaiting those who leave and the skills Nigeria loses when they do.

But beneath those figures is another story, quieter and more intimate. It is the story of parents growing old while their children build new lives thousands of miles away.

For generations, the Nigerian family operated as an informal social security system. It was never written into law, but it worked. Children, grandchildren and extended relatives lived within reach of one another. An elderly parent might have a son nearby, a daughter in the next street, grandchildren running through the house and relatives who could be summoned when something went wrong.

That arrangement is changing.

A generation has travelled. Some have gone to Britain, Canada, the United States, Australia and elsewhere. Others have moved from rural communities to Lagos, Abuja and other cities in search of work. They have every reason to pursue a better life. Many left because the country could no longer offer them the security, opportunity or professional fulfilment they needed.

There is no moral case for condemning them for leaving.

But their departure has consequences that cannot be captured by the exchange rate or the volume of money sent home.

A son can transfer money for his father's medication within seconds. A daughter can pay a hospital bill from another continent. A grandchild can appear on a phone screen and wish grandmother a happy birthday.

Yet money cannot sit beside an elderly parent in a hospital waiting room.

A WhatsApp message cannot notice that someone who normally speaks with clarity has begun repeating himself.

A video call cannot respond to a knock on the door at two in the morning.

This is the uncomfortable dimension of Japa that our economic calculations rarely capture.

The Nigerian family has traditionally carried responsibilities that the state never fully assumed. Care for ageing parents was understood as part of family life. There was always somebody around. Somebody could accompany an elderly parent to the clinic, buy food, repair a leaking roof, help with medication or simply sit down in the evening and talk.

Now, in many homes, the house is still there but the people who once filled it are gone.

This is where the meaning of ageing begins to change.

An elderly parent may be financially comfortable and still be lonely. There may be money in the bank, regular calls from abroad and children who genuinely care, yet something essential can still be missing.

Presence.

And presence becomes increasingly important as age advances.

The practical demands of ageing are not always dramatic. Sometimes they are painfully ordinary. Someone needs to accompany an elderly person to an appointment. Someone needs to notice that the medication has not been taken. Someone needs to help when mobility becomes difficult. Someone needs to recognise that a familiar routine has changed.

These are responsibilities that cannot always be outsourced.

The danger is that loneliness itself can become invisible. An elderly person may not complain because the children are doing their best. The children may not realise the extent of the loneliness because they call regularly. Everyone may be acting with love, yet the distance remains.

This is the paradox confronting many Nigerian families today. We have become better at maintaining financial connections across continents while becoming less capable of maintaining physical presence within the family.

It would be wrong, however, to romanticise the past. The old family system was not perfect. Some elderly Nigerians suffered neglect even when their children lived nearby. Poverty, family disputes, migration within Nigeria and strained relationships have always existed.

What has changed is the scale and speed of separation.

The traditional family safety net is being stretched at precisely the moment when Nigeria's formal systems for elderly care are still developing.

That should concern us.

We need to begin thinking seriously about what ageing will mean in a society where children increasingly live abroad or in distant cities. Community based support, accessible healthcare, social care networks and reliable systems for protecting vulnerable older people will become increasingly important.

But government cannot carry the entire burden.

Families must also begin to rethink what responsibility means in an age of migration. Presence may have to be organised differently. Regular visits, trusted caregivers, neighbours, relatives and community networks may become part of the new family arrangement. Technology can help, but it cannot replace everything.

There is also something more personal we need to confront.

Many of those leaving today will themselves grow old one day.

The child who leaves at 25 may be 65 when his own children are living somewhere else. The daughter who crosses the Atlantic in search of opportunity may eventually discover that the same distance she once celebrated as freedom has become a distance she wishes she could cross more easily.

Life has a way of returning questions to us.

Perhaps this is why the conversation about Japa should not be reduced to whether people should leave or stay. People will continue to move. They should have the freedom to seek opportunity and security wherever they can find it.

The deeper question is what kind of society we are building around that movement.

Can we remain financially connected without becoming emotionally disconnected?

Can we ensure that ageing parents are not left to navigate their final years largely alone?

Can we build communities where an elderly person is still known, noticed and cared for even when the children are far away?

The answer will determine something about us that no remittance figure can measure.

A society is not judged only by how successfully its young people leave poverty behind. It is also judged by what happens to those who remain behind after the young have gone.

There comes a season in every life when achievement becomes less important than companionship. The large house, the foreign currency, the successful children and the photographs from distant countries may all tell a story of accomplishment.

But when evening comes, someone still has to be there.

That may be the unspoken price of Japa.

And perhaps the greatest responsibility of a generation that has learned how to cross borders is to make sure that those who gave it roots do not grow old feeling abandoned on the other side of the distance.

 Lanre Ogundipe, Public Affairs Analyst, Former President Nigeria and Africa Union of Journalists writes from Abuja.