‘Years of disappointment have eroded Nigerians’ confidence in leadership’

You will recall that they prophesied that there would be war in Nigeria last year, even before the general election; so all the forces came together to bring it into effect, but thank God for the divine intervention. These challenges wouldn’t have been in the first place if the nation’s leaders had been listening to counsels and if the people had been listening to caution on corruption. I think God is using the challenges to caution us and to tell us that if not His grace, Nigeria would have been swept off like some other countries. Nigerian leaders have not learnt a lesson still- the kind of appointments they are making, the kind of policies they are formulating; look at our constitution, most things that are obnoxious there are the decrees by the military and we have just left everything to remain like that. Above all, we do not have standards that can be used to measure anything. It is anything goes. Nigeria has become a dumping ground because we are not ready to do what is right.

It is still the same spirit I told you that doesn’t want anything to work out well in the country; the same spirit that wants war for Nigeria. Nigerians must speak with the same voice; they must demand for a new constitution through a referendum, so that we can say, ‘we the people of Nigeria’ give ourselves a constitution, not a military decree in the name of constitution. By the time we have a people’s constitution, we would not bother again which part of the country a true leader comes from; we would no longer say he is from Abia, he is from Kaduna State, he is from Lagos State, but he is a Nigerian no matter where he comes from. Also, we would be speaking with the same voice just as we did when the pressure came that we should accept gay marriage. But because of the benefits our leaders are deriving from such faulty constitution and bad policies, they have refused to do the right thing. You know with such faulty constitution you can run public entity as if it were private business. And that is what they have been doing.

I will tell them to sanctify a fast and seek the face of the Almighty God, just like the people of Nineveh did. It is not about Moslem of Christian; it is a national fast that will involve everybody, irrespective of religion. We say, for instance, ‘Nigeria is on a three-day fasting, God, please, have mercy on us’. I don’t mean a fast where political leaders will go and pick a pastor or Imam of their kind to come and pray, no, but a prayer and fasting that every family will do consciously, and with the purpose of achieving a national rebirth. It is a commitment. That’s number one. Number two is the word- dishing out words through mass orientation. Before, we had MAMSER (Mobilisation for Self Reliance, Social Justice, and Economic Recovery. It was an exercise in political orientation in Nigeria that featured in the Ibrahim Babangida regime) and others dishing out direction; encouraging words, character-moulding, and encouraging words to Nigerians.

The problem is now multi-faceted because the people who are responsible for the problem in government relied on those in the spiritual side, and those in the spiritual side thought that they were hearing from God, but they were not; confusion everywhere. Some said that some of the preachers told President Jonathan that God told them that he would win the re-election. But we can now see whether they told the truth or otherwise. My own thinking is that they should re-examine those they are trusting as leaders and make a clean break for once and do what other nations do when they enter into trouble. You can’t mix old wine in a new bottle and expect it to stay. It will burst the bottle. As they say change, change, if the change does not affect leadership, it won’t work. Once the head is sick, the body will respond to the sickness.

The reason is that they do not trust the leadership. The way to earn the trust is by consultation. The people must be involved in government programmes; they should be made to be part of it from the planning stage. If they are part of it and buy into it, they’ll see the need for such programmes; but if they have any reason to suspect that government is not being sincere, that is where the problem lies. If the Nigerian people see the need for government programmes they will be the ones to encourage it. For instance, if a government sets up a panel to look into an issue, if the people have any reason to suspect that such panel was not set up in good faith, they will just be looking without cooperating with government. But if such a panel gives its report and government makes it public and commits itself to effecting the recommendations of the panel, then government would be taken seriously. We have cases where past recommendations are not implemented; it no longer holds any water. Government is not as transparent as it claims. Everybody is skeptical and suspicious of every one of government moves. This does not augur well for its programmes. If things are done very transparently, the people would not oppose such things because they know such programmes will benefit them. But it appears people have no confidence in leadership anymore. Once bitten twice shy. That’s the cause of all these things.

In the days of Azikiwe, Awolowo, Tafawa Balewa, Sarduana, etc, these things were not there. Politics was there, religion was there but these types we are seeing these days were not there because they were credible leaders. Today, they have put away the ancient landmarks; they have destroyed the foundations. I am sad that we are going back to the faulty steps that led to the civil war. I have said that I would not want to see war the second time in my lifetime; but the drums of war are being beaten by those lopsided appointments, and hunting of opponents among others. We must go back to the ancient landmarks.

Let the war against corruption be fought collectively and not to see it as APC or Buhari business alone. Let it be seen as the concern of all Nigerians. The agencies empowered to do the fighting must be independent. Corruption is like a cankerworm and it cannot be allowed to fester. That is the best thing to do for us to receive the blessings of God and rise again, just like Ghana is doing now. At a point Ghana was down; corruption was the order of the day, but today Ghana is rising, they are now enforcing righteousness, at least, at secular level. You cannot totally wipe out corruption, but it can be reduced to the barest minimum. What we see here is that those who say they are fighting corruption are corrupting themselves in the process, thereby making more mincemeat of whatever they are preaching by the method they are using. No one party or president can solve the problem of Nigeria now which is hydra-headed. It is said that whoever comes to equity must come with clean hands; we are not having equity because we don’t have clean hands.

We have got it wrong from inception. The President is not supposed to be a party person once he is sworn in. Just like you go to the Senate, it is an assembly of Nigerian lawmakers. It is not for a particular party or region. They are there in the interest of Nigeria and Nigerians. The problem we have is that everybody wants to be a president, governor or local government chairman, without proper training or requisite experience and qualification.

Again, if all the arms of government do what is expected of them, with the National Assembly, for instance, playing the watchdog role, things would be better. We must demand that the judiciary must be independent to be able to effectively checkmate the activities of the Executive and the legislature.