A number of recent events, at home and abroad, raise issues about the nation’s unending quest for a transformational leader, more so, as the politicians have started traversing the country, even if covertly, in preparation for an election that is still, at least, two years away. Abroad, the most conspicuous of these events is the absence of the customary peaceful transfer or power that occurs in the United States, considering the high level of military mobilisation and show of force that accompanied the exit of President Donald Trump and the swearing in, on Wednesday, of President Joe Biden. Needless to say that the extraordinary manner in which Trump vacated power most reluctantly, is a cautionary tale for the whole world, and in particular, developing democracies where abuse of presidential power and sit-tight syndrome are already rampant. The loud warning from the American transition saga is that all it takes to rupture established conventions and political niceties is for the wrong person to end up as the helmsman. If this is true for developed democracies, it is even more so for underdeveloped ones such as ours.
At home, there are fresh anxieties about insecurity which is recently extending its tentacles to the South-West, as illustrated by the insistence of the Ondo State Governor, Rotimi Akeredolu SAN, that Fulani herdsmen residing in the forest reserves, who commit and abet crime, should either register with the government or leave the state. Interestingly, Akeredolu’s statement has attracted the notice of the Presidency which has taken a position that can only be described as pro-herdsmen. The danger signal in this controversy is that, should the recent, apparent invasion of the South-West by the herdsmen – Oyo State is another hotspot – result in another high profile assassination on the scale of the murder of Mrs Funke Olakunrin, a daughter of Afenifere leader, Pa Reuben Fasoranti, we may be witnessing, God forbid, another round of turmoil and protests. The other issue to which one should draw attention is the recent publication by a national newspaper to the effect that the cost of the proposed rail line, projected to pass through Jigawa and Katsina states to connect Maradi in the Niger Republic, has had its contract awarded at a sum which exceeds, by 100%, the estimate of the African Union for such projects (The Guardian, Tuesday, January 19, 2021). The point here is that if the contract sum is so outrageously inflated, what then is the status of the much talked about anti-corruption fight, the flagship programme of the current regime? All of these bring us to our relentless and elusive search, not just for the deepening of our democracy, which remains shallow and electoral, but also for a national leader who will raise Nigeria from its current mediocrity and morass to that of a fully functioning, orderly and developmental state, manifesting the kind of soft power which will make it the envy of other nations. Before the citizenry is ambushed by yet another round of electoral chicanery, it is important for the media and civil society activists to enunciate what the requirements should be, of a visionary leadership, if we are not to spend more time in what Bishop Matthew Kukah, recently described as a ‘journey to darkness’.
In taking on such an enterprise, and if truth be said, the political class has more or less annulled its mandate to be the nation’s counsellor partly because of the paucity in its ranks, of those who are willing to speak truth to power. Unlike in the United States, for example, where several Republicans opposed Trump’s excesses, we do not have a political class with the nobility to differ by conviction. In the same manner, the opposition does not take its task seriously enough, confining itself to predictable and clap-trap criticism of the ruling party, rather than germane and genuine discourse on fundamental national problems. That apart, national discourse itself has been watered down by reference to party affiliation, rather than the merits of the ideas canvassed. If the nation must remain as one, and there are those who contend such a perspective, but this need not detain us here, it must search for a leader with a national mission as opposed to a limited ethnic, religious, and sectional world view. Indeed, it can be argued that Nigeria would remain a limping state for as long as it fails to throw up leaders, in particular, presidents, who, by word and deed, have a pan-Nigerian outlook. Such a purview is not exhausted or implemented by simply sloganeering ‘One Nigeria’, but requires leadership by precept and by example. True, the diversity of the nation-state, its plenitude of divergent ethnic nations, living in uneasy coalition, challenge such a vision. Nonetheless, and at a minimum, no ethnic or religious irredentist, blissfully indifferent to the inclusive moorings of the Nigerian state, should be allowed to rule Nigeria. That is not all. A transformational Nigerian leader would be one that has genuine empathy for the worsening plight and suffering of the Nigerian populace, possessing the zeal and the understanding to relieve their distress and to communicate awareness of their woes. Nigeria can no longer afford leaders who hide behind the pomp and pageantry of power, talking down to the people, as well as riddling and making light of their condition.
Embedded in our traditional culture is some degree of the arrogance of power, though, even at that, such power was often mediated by democratic structures which limited and hold in check, the power of rulers. In contemporary times, we have carried over the imperium of the power of traditional rulers without filtering them through the countervailing structures that regulated such power. I labour to make the point that Nigeria cannot afford an imperial president who prefers to dictate to the people rather than hear them out; the transformational Nigerian leader proposed here will maintain a collegial camaraderie undergirded by a capacity to listen, rather than talk or maintain ominous silences. Such a leader, it should be emphasised, will have a knowledge of what it means to transform a slumbering giant like ours into a leader on the world stage, inserted into innovative developments. That kind of leadership majors in the ability to think clearly, plan, organise, with an eye for details, combining vision with administrative capacity. The model here, in this columnist’s opinion, should be the political leaders of those developmental states in Asia, which led their countries from backward status to robust positions in the global arena. We can no longer afford, as a nation, those who want to rule us, for the fun of updating their curriculum vitae or to simply savour the extensive perquisites of power in a deformed democracy. This presupposes that they must have a record of service to the people, rather than one which simply itemises or glories in the position they have previously held.
Our projected leader should, like most of the world’s great men and women, be a workaholic, not afraid to put in, not just a day’s labour, but if need be, to exert themselves beyond the call of duty. Sloven habits and indolent work routines have no place in this order of business. Guided by these ideals, let the search for a transformational Nigerian leader truly commence.
