When Shall African
Countries be liberated from Bad Leadership?
by Okoro
Monday Akinyemi
Poor leadership in Africa has been the cause for underdevelopment. If
people with good track records are elected into power, the position
and situation of Africa wouldn’t have remained "poverty, hunger and
underdevelopment".
Africa has been a victim of bad leaders. It is time to correct this
past mistakes, if the mistakes repeat itself as mentioned by
“Professor Julius Ihonbvere “, the generation of our children,
grandchildren and great grandchildren will suffer even more than us.
We must not pretend that good leadership is lacking in Africa. The
failure to correct this in this 21st century would lead to
a great jeopardy in our continent. The bad leadership in Africa has
led to a serious debts rising, workers disillusioned, products losing
quality and our infrastructures are decaying. What a leadership
bravado?
It is undisputable that good leadership brings hope and energy to the
people. It attracts the best minds as well as local and external
support, good leadership brings about good quality and general
dynamism.
Africa has been victims of bad leadership over the past 50 years, this
issue has remained unsolved. It is time for our people who goes to
the booth to caste vote to understand the quality of a leadership.
They should not be deceived by a token amount. They should also
understand that those who give out a token in order to convince them
to vote for them have invested. In any investment, profit is expected.
This is the reason why the struggles and sacrifices of our heroes and
heroines in the past have not come out of dependency. This has
retarded our infrastructural development, industrialisation
improvement, technological advancement and institutional development.
We should not deceive ourselves, the problems of Africa today require
focus and serious minded leadership as quoted by “Professor Julius
Ihonbvere” in the Vanguard of 27th June 2006. The election
of a bad leader for a year may set us backward for another thirty
years. We should not give chance to leadership experimentation as it
may cause a serious harvock to our countries. Can we afford to make
mistakes again?
Nigeria of today is currently facing the reality of high unemployment
rate, the people are ploughed by the misery of hunger and food
shortages, lack of social amenities, high crime rate, high poverty
rate. We shoud all be aware that our generation is matured enough to
be confounded with the problems experienced by the nation.
My advice to the people of Nigeria is to identify, support, encourage
and work with people who can provide focus, sense of human, love and
inspiration to the country.
The race for the 2007 presidential election seems to be getting more
interesting with indications that some presidential handlers are
already looking in the direction of the former military leader
“General Ibrahim Babangida” as the likely successor to President Olusegun Obasanjo. Doesn’t Nigeria have other potential people to
govern the country? How long shall Nigeria be governed by certain group
of Ex-Military Dictators? Looking at the history of Nigeria political
status, Nigeria has never been ruled by a neutral person, all leaders
are either retired general and ex-military leader or people within the
same party. It is time for the people of Nigeria to think twice. What
has Retired General Ibrahim B. Babangida got to offer the people of
Nigeria again? He was there for seven years, all he offered was
economic jeopardy, 419, debt accumulation, emigration of citizens ,
lack of employment and the killing of innocent citizens. Is this the
right person for the people of Nigeria?
In conclusion, does
Nigeria
need re-colonisation? If not, I strongly believe Retired General
Ibrahim B. Babangida is not the right person to rule Nigeria in this
21st century. He may be capable in the next 40th
century. Nigeria needs reforms. The achievement of this is based on
good leadership.
