The Nation Newspaper

Tag: leadership

  • Leadership challenge in Nigeria

    The National Intelligence Council (NIC) report, ‘Mapping Sub Saharan Africa’s Future’, which painted a depressing picture of the African continent, had engendered several discussions. Using indices such as globalization, patterns of conflict, terrorism, democratization, AIDS, evolving foreign influences and religion, the report specifically estimated that Nigeria could fragment in the next 15 years. This categorisation of Nigeria as a prospective failed state had raised concern and even apprehension at the nation’s top policy making levels. Before now, the failed states phenomenon in Africa had often been associated with countries like Somalia, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Angola, Burundi and Congo at different stages of their evolving histories.

    Leadership plays a pivotal role in the descent into failure and collapse. Africa’s political history is replete with leadership crises. In Mobutu Sese Seko’s Zaire, Samuel Doe’s Liberia or Somalia, the ruler-led-oppression provoked a countervailing reaction on the part of resentful groups that led to the eventual collapse of the state. Governments are unable to set in place transparent and accountable institutions capable of securing economic progress, governing effectively, and protecting their citizens.  This lack of capacity is amplified by recourse to authoritarianism and repression, dramatic economic decline precipitated by indiscriminate corruption, and the adoption of exclusive (ethnic) policies to assure self-succession tendencies.

    In the absence of patriotic and charismatic leadership, corrupted elites model the state to serve their narrow interests, instead of the interests of the citizens.  As a consequence, the state itself is unable to fulfill its purpose or perform those functions of protection, delivery of basic social services and provisions of institutions to respond to legitimate demands and needs. The failure to perform these functions creates three major gaps in most African societies, notably ‘security gap’, ‘capacity gap’ and ‘legitimacy gap’.

    Security gaps have been most evident in Africa, because of the inability of African states to preserve effective sovereignty and order within their territories, situations that other states, non-state actors, and simple criminals seek to fill with violent, hostile, or illicit acts.  Capacity gap exists when a state fails to play a central role in meeting the needs of its citizens. In the same manner, legitimacy gap provides an opening for political upheavals and crisis. This gap exists when the state fails to maintain institutions that protect basic rights and freedoms, hold individuals accountable for their actions, enforce laws and ensures broad- based citizen participation in the political process.

    Nigeria provides a perfect case study on problems of leadership because only few countries in Africa have experienced greater trauma in the attempts to fill the gaps examined above. Years of military rule and the attendant problems of corruption and accountability had widened these gaps.  In his book Power And Leadership In Nigeria, Chuba Okadigbo (1987: 134) examined the role of leadership in Nigeria and concluded that: “The lack of national cohesion, indeed of any bold attempt by raising institutions or leaders to really unite Nigeria, is indicative of leadership failure in Nigeria, i.e. of failure of personal leadership as well as institutional or structural failure”.

    Professor Chinua Achebe came to the same conclusion in his book The Trouble with Nigeria, when he simply identified the problem of Nigeria as failure of leadership.  The Nigerian problem, he concluded, “is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal example, which is the hallmark of true leadership”. Still on the problems of leadership in Nigeria, Mahmud Tukur (1999: 393) argued that generally most governments in Nigeria have failed to take “an activist conception of the purposes and functions of the state…the basic inclination (is) to regard the sphere of social morality as lying outside the purview of public concern”.

    To underscore the importance of the leadership element, reference is made to the South East Asian nations, where the quality of leadership had brought dynamism and greater prosperity even in the face of globalisation. These countries have also made a tremendous progress in building sturdier and more capable democratic institutions. By contrast, African countries have either stagnated or failed, due to an interplay of demographics, poverty, disease, and most importantly, poor governance.

    The NIC report’s projection that Nigeria would fail as a state in the next 15 years had drawn attention to the country’s enduring problem of leadership.  Interestingly, Robert I. Rotberg in his analysis even categorised Nigeria as a state that collapsed in the 1990s, but gradually recovered and is now weak.  If Rotberg’s categorisation is accepted with all its flaws, the question to ponder is, can Nigeria relapse into failed state as predicted by the NIC report and what is the critical role of leadership in averting this situation?

    Two responses are likely to quickly emerge reflecting the positions of the two dominant paradigms for analysing Nigerian politics. The realist paradigm would argue that Nigeria cannot fail, because it has all the physical characteristics of a continental or middle power: large population, a vast land area, huge mineral resources including petroleum, growing industrial work force, vast arable land and a large military force.  Underlying these characteristics is the widely held assumption that Nigeria being the ‘giant of Africa’ would not be allowed to fail by the West because of the consequent effect this would have on the West African sub-region. By contrast, the radical paradigm sees Nigeria as essentially a dependent state whose future, growth and influence are rather unstable and unsustainable. Such a state it could be argued is likely to fail or collapse. In deference to these two paradigms, the position this paper takes is that although Nigeria has potentials, its growth and influence cannot be assured unless it has a Strategic National Leadership that can harmonise and utilize its current capabilities to realize its national interest.

    The history of failed or collapsed states has clearly shown that failure or collapse is not equivalent to the absence of physical national attributes or capabilities. Many of the failed countries in Africa like Zaire and Liberia are rich in natural resources such as diamonds, oil, gold etc.  In the same manner, ethnic, religious and cultural homogeneity is not a guarantee that a state will not collapse as Somalia had shown. In all these cases the vital missing link was leadership, where political leaders were unable to deliver political goods or close the gap on the essential issues of security, capacity and legitimacy.

    Like most African countries, Nigeria is experiencing difficulties in the delivery of political goods for its citizens, despite the abundance of natural resources. At the level of security, while Nigeria is not confronted by an immediate external threat to its sovereignty, internally the government is battling with the problem of providing security for the lives and prosperity of its citizens. The problems of armed robbery and banditry are effectively challenging the nation’s internal security mechanisms.  In addition, there are other forms of ethnic and religious strives that threaten the state.  However, the most fundamental security problem is the proliferation of ethnic militia and separatist movements in the country.

    According to Nnamdi K. Obasi (2002: 1), “the proliferation of ethnic militia, vigilante and separatist groups has been one of the most significant failures of Nigerian society and politics in recent years.”  These groups subvert the rule of law, create violence in Nigeria, and thus constitute threat to national security. Crucially also, is the fact that Nigeria faces the problem of meeting the needs of its citizens due to years of mismanagement, profligacy and endemic corruption.  Thus inadequate capacity to meet social welfare need of citizens or sustain the intermittent reinforcement of social goods and services had resulted in the erosion of public confidence and popular support.

    While Nigeria does not fit perfectly into any of the categories considered, it would be no exaggeration to say that the country exhibits some of the characteristics of a weak state as identified by Rotberg, notwithstanding the imperfections in his thesis. It should be noted, however, that categorising a state as failing, does not necessarily doom it irretrievably to full failure. Failure is a fluid halting place, with movement forward to weakness and backward into collapse always possible.

    The problem of failed states remains a core security problem of the 21st century, not only to the countries that suffer the fate, but also to the international community. Failure and collapse are undesirable results for states, but fortunately they are preventable. Human factors rather than structural flaws or situational insufficiencies are almost invariably responsible for the slides from weakness (or strength) towards failure and collapse.

    The most fundamental measure required in confronting the challenge, and averting the Nigerian state from failure and collapse is strategic and progressive leadership. The importance of strategic leadership is that it identifies and harmonizes national capabilities to achieve the national interest. The following recommendations classified as long-term are proffered to meet this challenge.

    1. Create effective national institutions that can meet citizens’ needs and take full part in the workings of the international community.
    2. Undertake concerted development, broadly understood as progress toward stable, accountable society.

    iii. Restructure the polity to ensure equity, justice and fairness.

     

    • Ambassador Wando, MFR, mni is a diplomat.

  • Saraki: The leadership imperative

    The number of political appointees working for the average Nigerian politician has always depended on and couched in utmost secrecy. Typically, there is no information as there are no pointers as to how much taxpayers sacrifice to their daily, weekly allowances or monthly wage bills. Worse still, where town-hall meetings, which are often a scarce occurrence, happen, those subject matters never always earned a mention. No one but the politician knows. And, inquests into such matters considered an exclusive preserve of the public officer holder, who more often than not, seems accountable to no one and law unto self, have always hit the brick wall. That has been the Nigerian public office experience over the years.

    However, recently, following the steadily falling naira exchange rate to world currencies, public office holders were once more reminded of the need to trim down the number of their office hands. The call earned prominence as it became public knowledge that some states were still unable to pay salaries as a result of continuous dwindling monthly federal allocations. Unfortunately, skewed delineation of state boundaries constrained a few states from generating sufficient internal revenues to augment their allocations. Interestingly, too, it was not just the states that were caught in the financial drought wire. The federal government apparently, bleeding financially, was buckling down as most premium projects across the country suffered. No thanks to the steadily falling national revenue as per barrel oil sale bottomed at $50 in the international market.

    Obviously, the nation needed much more than mere talk. It was in desperate need of leaders, particularly public office holders, who can practically demonstrate patriotism by heeding to calls to trim down their office hands in remedial response to the prevailing economic mesh. As often is the case, such calls had always been pooh-poohed without hair-raising protests. But last week, the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, proved what could probably qualify as a classic case of exemplary leadership by trimming down the number of his office hands.

    Indeed, like other senate presidents before him, including senior top political office holders, Saraki had a choice to ignore the calls and act as though nothing was amiss. But seemingly nudged on by public and national interest, he set himself apart by identifying with posterity. This explains why he deserves commendation for pointing the way to how responsive a public officer should behave, and more so, as the nation clearly was under financial knife and needed practical and far-reaching redemptive measures to whittle down its huge financial burden. Interestingly, it was not the first time the Senate President was sign-posting responsible leadership. The former governor, like many of his colleagues still receiving pensions in their respective states, had equally outed out of the statutory pension as stipulated by the third schedule paragraph D (i) of Governor and Deputy Governor (payment of Pension) Law, number 12 of 2010 of Kwara State. The State Pension Law empowers the state government to pay pension to former governors and deputy governors of the state. But, in an act of selfless service, Saraki wrote the Kwara State government and requested immediate stoppage of such payment to his account and refunded all previous credits to his account back to Kwara State government. He explained that though they were lawful entitlements, his decision was based purely on morality as he was still serving the nation.

    Again, to further demonstrate responsible leadership, Saraki approved the layoff, last week, of no fewer than 98 out of the estimated 300 aides attached to his office. No doubt, the development would largely and positively impact on his office monthly wage bill, especially as most National Assembly Service Commission’s staff seconded to his office would revert back to bureaucracy where they were from the beginning and thereby freeing up funds for other crucial needs. Not only that, the best hands would be left to run the office and ultimately shut down human financial waste pipes that needlessly have the weevil effect on the nation, willy-nilly.

    But more than anything else, it signposts a wake-up call to all public office holders to act responsibly in the interest of the nation. With oil, the only revenue source for Nigeria selling at abysmally beggarly price of $50 per barrel, the move is even more important considering that in a dying economy as Nigeria’s, funds so saved could help inject life into the economy and ease up the vicious poverty and hardship in the land.

    In the last two years of Saraki’s Senate Presidency, the nation has witnessed what could safely be described as anxious responsibility towards public good and interest. NASS among others bills, has successfully passed into law more than 20 premium bills, including the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill, which aims at introducing new operational and fiscal terms for management of revenue from the sector. It had also passed the Customs Service Management Act, which aims at enforcing unconditional compliance to global best practices, as well, as the Ports and Harbours Reforms Bill; which focuses on protecting the rights and interests of service providers at the port, including but not limited to commercial port users.

    Again, the 8th Senate, it would be remembered, also passed the Secured Transactions in Moveable Assets Bill, to create a new species of capital that can be used in our financial system, as well as, moved to reduce the risks involved in doing business with companies that have the history of not paying back through the Credit Bureau Services Bill; the Witness Protection Bill, Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Bill, and, the Whistle Blowers’ Protection Bill, among others.

    Apart from the constitution amendment Bill in which the senate adopted 29 Bills, the amendment of the Universal Basic Education Act which extended the right to free education across the country from nine years to 12 years for all children, and which the youngest Nobel laureate,  Malala Yousafzai commended Saraki and the 8th Senate, is most fundamental.

    While more endearing and responsible leadership roles are expected from the National Assembly, especially towards restoring trust, unity, patriotic zeal, and national pride, it is hoped that other public office holders would learn from the Senate President’s exemplary humility in trimming down his aides in national interest, voluntarily refunding his constitutionally guaranteed pension and the landmark achievements of the 8th Senate under his leadership. This is even more as the nation has never been so divided along ethnic and religious divides in its 56 years of chequered political history as today, and requires much more than legislative eloquence to earn the support and trust of the people.

     

    • Oba is Chief Press Secretary to Kwara State governor.
  • UN: how to position youths for leadership

    UN: how to position youths for leadership

    Youths are leaders of tomorrow. To prepare them for the future, the United Nations (UN) is pushing for economic empowerment for them. This, the UN believes, will enable them devote their strength to building peace and progress in their communities. The UN threw this challenge at an event held at the University of Lagos (UNILAG) to mark the International Youth Day. WALE AJETUNMOBI reports.

    At a growth rate of 3.2 per cent, Nigeria’s population is projected to exceed 289 million people by 2050, with more than 60 per cent of this population expected to be youths. Without genuine effort to pursue integrated economic policies that will empower young people and initiate a sustained jobs creation plan in preparation for this demographic overshoot, Nigeria faces a dire future.

    This is  the crux of the address by the United Nations (UN) Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Nigeria, Mr Edward Kallon, to scores of youths that converged on the University of Lagos (UNILAG), last Saturday, to commemorate the International Youth Day.

    The event with the theme: Youth building peace, was organised by the UN Information Centre (UNIC) in Lagos in collaboration with Strategy for Mentoring and Leadership Empowerment (SMILE), a non-governmental organisation.

    The population bulge, the UN envoy said, provides a unique opportunity for Nigeria to leverage the burgeoning youth demography in achieving accelerated growth and development. But he warned that the country may be in a quagmire if there is no effort targeted at engaging and empowering its youths.

    Kallon said: “Nigeria stands at a crossroads with a growth rate of 3.2 per cent. The country’s population is expected to exceed 289 million by 2050. An estimate of 31.7 per cent of Nigeria’s population is between 10 and 24 years of age, while approximately 60 per cent is under the age of 40. This projected population growth can either pose a major challenge for Nigeria or a major opportunity.

    “To unlock this demographic dividend, Nigeria must empower its youth to play constructive, unifying and innovative roles and fully include them in the country’s development process. The youths must have equal access to economic opportunities and decent livelihood.”

    The envoy added that the 2015 UN Security Council’s Resolution 2250 was passed with the aim to engage the youth in fostering global peace and security. He noted that the resolution also sought to change the normative stereotype on the youth as victims and perpetrators of violence and conflict, to focus on positive contributions which youth should play in preventing conflict and building peace.

    He said: “As we take steps in Nigeria towards realising Agenda 2030, which recognises that the challenges to peace and security are rooted in developmental deficits, we must identify and tackle the obstacles that inhibit the youth from playing active and empowered roles in development and building peace.

    “One is the lack of economic opportunity, which is rendering too many Nigerian youths hopeless and denying them access to decent livelihoods. According to government’s statistics, there is an estimate of 17.6 million youths unemployed in Nigeria. This means there are existing hurdles for those who want to enter into the workforce. Political, ethnic and religious rhetoric is dividing communities and has led to entrenched narratives that fuel violence, particularly among youth groups.

    “These youths need psychological support and rehabilitative services to help regain their productive capacities and become constructive forces in their communities. In asking the youth to engage and champion development, and help to build peace, these young people must be empowered and their energies harnessed for positive projects.”

    Despite its developmental challenges, Kallon observed that Nigeria had put forward “sincere commitment” to engage its youths productively. He said the establishment of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) and creation of independent ministry for youth development purposes were steps in right direction. He also praised the National Assembly for the recently passed Not-Too-Young-To-Run Bill, which he described as the “most progressive legislation” since the inception of the current dispensation.

    The UN envoy said: “Nigeria has continued to demonstrate its sincere commitment to empowering the youth. The recently passed  Not-Too-Young-To-Run Bill, which lowers the age for standing in elections, is a good step. That bill is one of the most progressive legislations enacted by senators and all politicians in Nigeria. It would create opportunity for the youth to be participants in governance and politics of this country.

    “It is very progressive and timely, because youths are agents of progress and peace. We expect the legislation to give more opportunity to young people to take up leadership positions and effect the changes they want. The future of Nigeria belongs to the youth.

    “They should not be seen from the traditional rhetoric as perpetrators of violence.

    “Nigerian youths need social inclusion and economic empowerment, which the government must put in place through regulations that are necessary to bringing out young people’s potential. Government must make efforts to ensure the youth are provided decent jobs and means of livelihood.”

    To the president of SMILE, Mrs Bimpe Bamgbose-Martins, the occasion presented the government an opportunity to address the causes of conflict and agitation, which, she said, have led to intolerance, poverty and economic inequality.

    She said: “Being productively and profitably engaged will not only ensure a fulfilled and impactful life for the youth, it is also key to building sustainable peace in the country. Beyond the well-crafted speeches being read today, SMILE will follow up the anniversary with a plan to run Business Enterprise Development programmes to equip willing participants with entrepreneurial skills and knowledge to start, grow and run viable businesses.”

    Co-chairman of Private Sector Advisory Group on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Dr Ndidi Nnoli-Edozien, said it was out of place for the youth to beg for leadership roles, saying their exploits in technology, entrepreneurship and education naturally make them leaders.

    Nnoli-Edozien, who is the Group Head of Sustainability and Governance of Dangote Industry Limited, charged the participants to see themselves as leaders in their fields, stressing the need to imbibe good attitude and engage the social media productively.

    Bovi, a popular comedian, said youths’ inborn freedom to think for themselves is being daily suppressed by the society through cultural, religious and social norms, noting that the youth are being programmed to think in the way the society wants them to.

    He said: “One of our problems is that, we have been programmed. Right from our homes, we have been programmed. We are programmed by the system, culture and religion. To a large extent, this helps to keep the law and order in the society. While this serves the society better in promoting orderliness, it is morally wrong in most cases because it suppresses the freedom of the youth to think independently.

    “There is nothing wrong in breaking the norm, especially if the action does not go against the law. In this part of the world, the youth have been programmed to fight for survival and freedom. Since the advent of the Internet, things have changed, because the youth now have a platform to express their ideas and abilities. Until young people break away from the programme, we would continue to agitate for our inborn freedom.”

    The event featured interactive panels of discussion, during which contemporary challenges facing the youth were examined.

    A panelist, Taiwo Akinlami, said the first step the youth could take to build sustainable peace is to shatter the barrier of ignorance. He said the battle against youth oppression in any country would not be won by agitation and violence, but through the weaponry of the mind.

    He said: “The major threat to peace is oppression. As young people, we must recognise that oppression is by permission. That first thing that supports oppression is ignorance. When the youth lack knowledge, they will be silent when they are being oppressed. So, the first step to take to fight oppression is to shatter the barrier of ignorance and get education. A properly educated mind will not accept any act of tyranny. Things will not change if we decide to be carrying placards and promote violence.”

    Other panelists included the national coordinator of Nigerian Youth for Peace Initiative, Rafiu Lawal, and Victoria Ibiwoye. Participants at the event included students and members of various youth groups.

    On December 17, 1999, the UN General Assembly passed Resolution 54/120 to endorse the recommendation made by World Conference of Ministers Responsible for Youth that August 12 be declared International Youth Day.

     

  • Igbo community resolves leadership tussle

    Igbo leaders in the North have resolved the leadership dispute between two factions of the Igbo Community Association in Zamfara State.

    News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports the resolution of the dispute, which lingered for 20 years, was achieved after intervention by leaders of Igbo community in the 19 northern states and Abuja, at Gusau.

    The two factions agreed to work together at a meeting convened by Chief Chikizie Nwogu, president-general, Igbo Delegates Assembly of 19 northern states and Abuja.

    Nwogu told reporters in Gusau the leadership of the Igbo community in the 19 states intervened in the crisis and resolved it.

    He said: “Today, we are happy to announce that after a reconciliation meeting between the two factions, we have achieved a great success, because both factions signed a peace agreement and promised to work together.”

    Nwogu hailed the factions for the maturity, understanding and respect, describing it as a “welcome development.”

    Commenting, Eze Pampas Ngozi-Ahaiwe, chairman of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Eze of the 19 states and Abuja, urged the Igbo community to be law-abiding.

    “You should maintain peace. You should cooperate with the government and security agencies for peace to reign in the state and Nigeria.

    “The Igbo are peace-loving people. You should desist from anything that will tarnish our image,” he said.

  • Re-establishing Nigeria’s leadership position in the world

    Re-establishing Nigeria’s leadership position in the world

    Text of a lecture delivered by former Commonwealth Secretary-General Chief Emeka Anyaoku at the Annual Akintola Williams distinguished lecture series in commemoration of the doyen of accountancy’s 98th birthday in Lagos.

    I was the Chairman of the first annual lecture in 2015 which was very ably delivered by the former Governor of Ekiti State and now Minister of Solid Minerals, Dr. Kayode Fayemi. I am glad to be speaking under the chairmanship of my friend and one of our country’s most outstanding and cerebral diplomats, Prof Ibrahim Gambari.

    It is a testimony to how seriously Mr. Akintola Williams has dedicated his life to public policy issues in the economy and politics that the organisers of the Akintola Williams Distinguished lectures have never failed to be eclectic in their choice of topics.

    I would like to begin by commending the Akintola Williams Foundation for instituting this lecture series in honour of a true Nigerian iconic son, Williams, a man of many parts. One of the briefest summations of him is aptly captured in his description as the doyen of Nigerian, nay, African Accountancy; a respected elder statesman and philanthropist one of whose most cherished legacies is this venue, the Musical Society of Nigeria (MUSON) center.

    The fact that he was the first African to qualify as a chartered accountant cannot be a surprise, given that he is a scion of an eminent and industrious family. His grandfather was a successful merchant, while his father had a thriving legal firm way back in colonial Nigeria. So, it is no surprise that Mr. Akintola Williams has continued in his family tradition of professionalism and industry by being the first indigenous chartered accountant in Africa, carrying on with such a professional integrity that enabled him to have a commanding influence in accountancy on Nigeria’s private and public companies hitherto dominated by foreign firms.

    He had also built a conglomerate of accounting firms which as I recalled at the 2015 edition of this lecture series had fanned out to many other African countries, including Cameroun, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Swaziland, Kenya and Egypt confirming the man as a colossal accountant that straddled the entire African landscape, mentoring and encouraging the development and growth of other indigenous chartered accountancy firms. There is no doubt that Mr. Williams has served humanity in many profound ways, both in the private and public sector.

    Apart from being one of the leading figures in the establishment of accounting organisations like the Association of Accountants in Nigeria (AAN) and the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN), Mr Williams also played a leading role in the establishment of the Nigeria Stock Exchange (NSE). His mark was also made in the public sphere when he was chairman of the Federal Income Tax Appeal Commissioners and member of the Coker Commission of Inquiry.

    He has also served as a member of the Board of Trustees (BoT) of the Commonwealth Foundation; as Chairman of the Public Service Review Panel on the Udoji Salary Review Commission; as  President of the Metropolitan Club and of course, as  Founder and Chairman of the Board of Trustee of the MUSON Center. It was for these and many other accomplishments that our honouree here has garnered many local and international awards, including the Commander of the Order of the Federal Republic (CFR) and Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE). But, even in retirement, and at the glorious age of 98 which he attained only yesterday, Mr. Williams is still availing himself for consultation in the great task of the Nigerian nation-building project. Let me now come to the subject of today’s lecture.

    It is common knowledge that is evident in our daily media which are read by, among others, all foreign diplomatic representatives in Abuja, that currently all is not well with Nigeria both at home and in its standing in the comity of nations, hence the theme of this lecture: how to re-establish Nigeria’s leadership position in the world.

     

    The golden age of Nigeria’s foreign policy

    Those of us who were of discerning age in the early years of Nigeria’s independence would, I am sure, readily agree that our country experienced what can truly be described as the golden age of Nigeria’s leadership role in Africa and in the wider world. I would like, briefly, to reminisce on the string of foreign policy successes that underscored the country’s leadership position in the international community during that period.

    As John Campbell, a former American Ambassador to Nigeria reminded us in his book: “Nigeria: Dancing on the Brink”, the vision of Nigeria at independence by both the departing colonial authorities and Nigeria’s emergent political elites, was a great one. It was the vision “of a huge nation of numerous ethnic groups and religions united by democracy, pursuit of economic development, governance according to the rule of law, and the occupation of an important place on the world stage; … a friendly Nigeria to provide Africans with a seat at the table with other great powers”.

    Flowing from this great vision, Nigeria was at its independence in 1960, rapturously welcomed in the comity of nations in a manner that was consistent with the confidence and hope of its founding fathers. On October 7, 1960 when the country was admitted into the United Nations (UN), the event elicited widespread jubilation in Africa, in Africa’s Diaspora, and generally among the black race in the wider international community. This enthusiasm was clearly animated by the fact that Nigeria’s demographics, its human and abundant natural resources were adequate indices of national power that would enable it to be an asset, not just for Africa, but also for the international community represented at the UN.

    On that occasion of its admission to the UN, Nigeria’s Prime Minister, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, in his speech to the General Assembly, pledged the country’s commitment to multilateralism and as such, to making its due contribution to the promotion of peace and development of the international community through the auspices of the UN.

    Inspired by awareness of the fact that Nigeria is the only country with the largest population of black people in the world, its governments, following independence, actively sought to champion Africa’s and black peoples’ causes. This was why for example, just weeks after independence, the Nigerian government notwithstanding the predictable potential economic and other costs, pitted itself in opposition to the French government’s atomic tests in the Sahara Desert which had occurred in February 1960 and seemed likely to be repeated.

    Nigeria’s Africa activism was the kernel of the evolution of the doctrines of its foreign policy for many years after independence, namely: Afro-centrism and Concentricism. Under these doctrines, Nigeria prioritised the pursuit of its national interest in a concentric circle, beginning with her immediate neighbours in the first inner circle, through the rest of Africa in the second circle, to the rest of the world in the outer circle. It was these doctrines that critically fostered the country’s leadership position in the world for years and enabled it to ride the crest of very favourable international opinion and reckoning.

    Some of the highlights of this golden age in Nigeria’s foreign policy, included the fact that the country soon after its admission into the UN became  the backbone of the organisation’s Africanisation of solutions to African problems as evidenced by Dag Hammarskjold, the then UN Secretary-General, requesting Nigeria to send a peace-keeping military contingent to the Congo. And it was because of Nigeria’s pre-eminent position at the time that one of its own military officers, Brig.-Gen. J. T. U Aguiyi Ironsi, was appointed by the UN Secretary-General as the first African to command the UN peacekeeping force in the Congo.

    For over two decades, Nigeria chaired the UN Special Committee Against Apartheid. The country was also active in the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) where it played veritable roles in asserting the sovereignty of the developing countries as well as giving them voice while using the neutrality of the NAM to steer the world away from the possibility of an armed confrontation between the Western countries led by United States (U.S.) and the Eastern countries led by the defunct Soviet Union.

    It was as a NAM leader that Nigeria’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Chief Simeon Adebo, played a leading role in resolving the crisis that paralysed the UN General Assembly in 1964, when the Western countries, invoking Article 19 of the UN Charter, sought to deny the Soviet Union voting rights in the controversy that arose from the Soviet Union’s refusal to contribute to the budget for the cost of UN operations in the Congo.

    Nigeria also played a leading role in the founding of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) which has now metamorphosed into the African Union (AU). Nigeria had led the Monrovian Group of 22 African countries to merge with the Casablanca Group of five to successfully form the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in May 1963.

    And in the Commonwealth, Nigeria was a prominent member and became the first member country to host the meeting of Commonwealth Heads of State and Governments outside of London in Lagos in January 1966. Also in 1986, Nigeria’s Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo co-chaired the Commonwealth Eminent Persons Group that went to South Africa in an unsuccessful attempt to promote negotiations for the ending of apartheid. And three years later in 1989, a Nigerian, my humble self, was appointed by Commonwealth Heads of Government at their meeting in Kualalumpur the first (and so far only) African Secretary-General of the Commonwealth.

    Nigeria was also a critical mass in the struggle against apartheid in South Africa and in the liberation of the Southern African nations of Angola, Mozambique, Namibia and Zimbabwe from the clutches of colonialism and white racist minority regimes. It was in recognition of Nigeria’s role and commitment to the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa and the de-colonisation of Southern Africa that it was designated a “frontline state” in the struggle, even though it was geographically far apart from the region.

    Other indications of Nigeria’s leadership role in international affairs during this period include the leading role it played in the establishment of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). Beyond the founding of ECOWAS, Nigeria was to remain critical in the financial sustenance of the organisation and for ECOWAS’s ability to function as one of the most viable African regional blocs.

    There were also the successful negotiation of relief from the Paris Club of Nigeria’s debilitating foreign debt burden by President Obasanjo and his Finance Minister, Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, and the creation of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) by President Obasanjo and his South African colleague, President Thabo Mbeki.

     

    Signs of decline in Nigeria’s leadership position

    Unfortunately, Nigeria’s leadership role in the world began to decline initially in the wake of the successive military intervention in the country’s governance beginning in January 1966. I would like to mention some of the signs of the decline.

    Nigeria does not have a seat in the leadership organ of the AU, the 10-member Commission. It was a matter of national embarrassment that the Nigerian candidate lost out in the election of the AU Commissioners during the AU summit meeting in February 2017.

    Secondly, a growing number of Nigerian citizens are now commonly badly treated and deported from many countries of the world including even African countries such as Libya and South Africa. And only last week, Nigerian athletes who were due to participate in a Commonwealth Youth Games in Bahamas could not attend because they were denied transit visas by the governments of the United Kingdom (UK) and the U.S.

    The decline in Nigeria’s standing in the world prompted another former American Ambassador to Nigeria, who, many believe to be a good friend of Nigeria, at a colloquium in Brown University, USA, to lament the de-industrialisation of the country and to warn that “Nigeria was fast becoming irrelevant in continental and global affairs, owing to its unfocussed leadership and wrong choice of assessment parameters” (Vanguard, January 18, 2017). Ambassador Lyman went on to say that Nigeria’s habit of predicating its geopolitical relevance on its oil wealth and population is fast fading away, not just because oil is losing its strategic relevance, but also because many countries in the West African sub-region have struck oil in commercial quantity.

    The plight of Nigerians in the waves of Afrophobia in South Africa is particularly regrettable because, as observed earlier, Nigeria had played a very active and prominent role in the struggle that led to the dismantling of apartheid in that country.

    Another regrettable sign is Nigeria’s declining grip on its immediate West African sub-region, particularly in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), a regional organisation it helped to found and which it has nourished for the past 42 years, diplomatically, economically, financially and militarily, when it led at huge financial and human cost to itself the ECOMOG military forces that were involved in peace making in the Mano River Basin countries of Liberia and Sierra Leone during their internecine civil wars.

    Although the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is hugely bankrolled by Nigeria, the organisation’s bureaucracy seems to have been virtually taken over by the Francophone countries who have gone ahead to establish a parallel French version of the ECOWAS – the Communate Economique d’Afrique de L’Ouest  – that now confronts and constrains the ECOWAS.

    Nigeria’s loss of grip in ECOWAS was dramatised by its inability to veto the ECOWAS’s decision in principle to admit into its fold Morocco, a North African nation and member of the Arab Maghreb Union (AMU).

    With the prospect of Morocco joining the ECOWAS, Nigeria would be risking a diminished influence in the sub-region; it would also be opening itself up to Morocco’s inevitable determination to get its pound of flesh following Nigeria’s role in the admission of Western Sahara into the OAU/Africa Union (AU). And this is not to talk about the adverse economic consequences for Nigeria from Morocco’s membership of ECOWAS.

    I believe that for its effectiveness and the benefits of the future integration of its members, ECOWAS must remain a strictly geopolitical regional organization whose membership should be limited to only countries in the West Africa geographic space. Besides, extending ECOWAS membership to the Mediterranean Sea will inevitably dilute the organization’s integration movement.

    Measures for re-establishing Nigeria’s leadership position

    I now turn to my recommendations of what should be done if Nigeria is to return to a leadership position in international affairs especially now that we live in an increasingly globalising world.

    For every country, there is a nexus between foreign policy and domestic politics. Thus, no country can maintain a credible leadership position regionally, continentally or globally without a politically stable and sound socio-economic domestic background. And so, for any country to be able to exert a credible influence and maintain a leadership position to be reckoned with in world affairs, it must achieve a reasonable balance between its domestic and foreign policies.

    In his book: “Foreign Policy Begins at Home: The Case for Putting America’s House in Order”, Richard N. Haass, President of the U.S’. Council on Foreign Relations, reiterated this symbiotic relationship between domestic politics and foreign policy when he wrote that the U.S. needed a new approach to both domestic and foreign policy because “the two are intimately intertwined: Americans will not enjoy the standard of living or quality of life they aspire to at home amid chaos abroad; and the U.S will not be in a position to limit chaos abroad unless it rebuilds the foundations of its strength at home”.

    Accordingly, every country’s standing in the world is to a large extent determined by its domestic situation. If Nigeria is to return to the golden age of the country’s foreign policy achievements and high global standing, its domestic situation must be fixed. Fixing Nigeria’s domestic situation requires that the challenge of political stability as well as its economy and the socio-economic welfare of its citizens must be tackled.

    Ensuring the welfare of Nigerian citizens will, I believe, fundamentally lessen their temptation to migrate abroad and subject themselves to death in the Mediterranean Sea as well as to unacceptable treatment in the countries of their destination.

    I have consistently expressed the view that to achieve greater political stability and deserving socio-economic development in the country, thereby tackling the worsening challenges it currently faces in many sectors, Nigeria must restructure its present “unitarist” governance architecture by returning to the true federalism which our founding fathers negotiated and wisely agreed in the 1960/63 Constitution to be the most suitable structure for the stability and development of our multi-ethnic and multi-religious country.

    With the number and nature of the ongoing agitations in several parts of the country, our present leadership, including, especially the Senate which two weeks ago rejected a motion for devolution of powers, seem to be indifferent to the fact that Nigeria is currently sleep-walking to a national disaster.

    Restructuring will enable us create fewer and more viable federating units for planning and pursuit of economic development and, with more powers devolved to them, deal with the issue of “do-or-die” political competition for the control of the all-powerful center which by exacerbating the inherent divisive tendencies in our citizenry is largely responsible for the country’s political instability and many of its socio-economic ills including the evil of massive corruption.

    And we can only fix our economy by diversifying it and making it less dependent on revenue from the export of crude oil. This is especially so, now that more and more crude oil importing countries are announcing plans for facing out their reliance on fossil fuel. We must industrialise the country by embarking more vigorously on policies that support the local manufacturing of our needs. The diversification of the Nigerian economy must also entail focusing much more actively on the development of the agricultural and solid mineral sectors.

    Besides, fixing the home front must include the leaders in our government, in our corporate sector, and in all our governmental and non-governmental institutions becoming more concerned with tackling the factors that have earned for Nigeria abroad such adverse national reputation as being on the list of the most corrupt countries and the list of fragile states i.e. potential failed states.

    Against the continuing changes in African and global circumstances, Nigeria must from time to time review the strategic objectives and operation of its foreign policy.

    The strategic objectives should, in my view, be: first, to raise Nigeria’s international position and influence by becoming in the global reckoning an acknowledged Middle Power and member of the groups of G20 and BRICS; secondly, to pursue its external economic relations especially, with the view of promoting its exports and importation of foreign direct investments; thirdly, to render whenever necessary appropriate care to Nigerian citizens abroad; and, of course, fourthly, to maintain cordial relations with all our diplomatic partner countries.

    To achieve these objectives, it is important that the government should pay greater attention to the adequate maintenance of the two principal machineries for the formulation and execution of the country’s foreign policy namely, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Nigerian diplomatic missions abroad.

    It is regrettable that our diplomatic missions abroad have continued to be inadequately funded with results that undermine the image of the country and the efficiency of the missions themselves. The conduct of foreign policy is never cheap in any country and so, I urge the government to ensure adequate budgeting for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and all the diplomatic missions that it decides to sustain abroad after a careful review.

    There is also the need for Nigeria to always articulate an effective campaign strategy whenever its candidates are vying for positions in international organisations. This is what is done by every country that is successful in winning desired international positions for its citizens.

    Nigeria should also endeavour to reclaim its place and influence in the West Africa sub-region. ECOWAS is critical to Nigeria for economic and security reasons, and also because it is the country’s primary sphere of influence. And Nigeria must work to ensure that ECOWAS dwells more actively on inter-state infrastructural development, especially in the areas of transport and power in order to promote greater cohesion and integration of the sub-region.

    So also should Nigeria similarly, for security and economic reasons, pay greater attention to promoting cooperation in its other sub-regional associations namely, the Gulf of Guinea Commission and the River Niger and Lake Chad Basin Commissions.

    Finally, to this list of recommendations, I should add that our three past presidents (Obasanjo, the late Umaru Yar’Adua and Dr. Goodluck Jonathan) respectively acknowledged that the existence of the Presidential Advisory Council (PAC) on International Affairs which I chaired for 14 years was helpful to their administrations. There is therefore an inherent benefit in having a council of a small team (there were only six of us) of suitable retired senior ambassadors and academics in the field of international relations, being available to meet periodically and advise the president on the strategic objectives and execution of Nigeria’s foreign policy.

    I would say from my experience, that it is important that such a council should offer its advice directly and in non-public ways to the president since it must not be seen to be interfering in the work of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which is rightly the public agent for expressing and conducting Nigeria’s foreign policy. This was why in all my 14 years as chairman of the PAC, I, very seldom spoke to the press about the issues covered in the Council’s advice to the President.

    Conclusion

    In conclusion, I want to say that if truth be told, there is now a growing number of sceptics of the description of Nigeria as the giant of Africa, a description that was universally considered credible for a long time since the country’s independence. The scepticism is largely because of the existence of unresolved serious challenges in Nigeria’s domestic affairs.

    However, I am confident that endowed as it is with such rich human and material resources, provided its leaders acknowledge the seriousness of the internal challenges currently confronting the country and proceed to successfully tackle them, Nigeria  will surely not only achieve political stability and development at home, but also will return to playing a leadership role in the sub-region, in Africa, and in the wider international community.

     

     

     

  • Ambodeism: Lesson in leadership

    I seek the indulgence of readers in my coinage of the word Ambodeism, but one cannot completely explain the phenomenon called Akinwunmi Ambode, the Governor of Lagos State, until one examines him as a central theme or perspective, projected as strong feeling, combining a mix of economic, political, social, moral and spiritual principles. The concept brings inspiration to the public who, having received adequate communication of its values and empowered to participate effectively in governance, readily subscribed to the possibility of SMART City destiny of Lagos, through expression of determination, dedication, discipline and duty.

    The Governor Ambode, that I know, is a man of big dreams, with immense ambition, great characters and matching astuteness to achieve unprecedented milestones in all things he sets out to do. Lagosians have witnessed many of such seemingly impossible targets that were set and were met over the two-year period of Ambode’s administration. Internally-Generated Revenue (IGR) is over N30 billion a month; he has proposed N50 billion! Governor Ambode I know will realize this target soon!!

    From a big vision, Ambode pursues big plans, reduces and interprets in big pictures; but pursues the objectives in bits and pieces to produce fantastic and delightful impressions that create lasting images in the mind of the people. Little actions he takes bring appropriate results in multiplicity of beneficial impacts, culminating in fantastic rewards.  He does the right things for the right reasons. He follows carefully-prepared template for all his programmes and projects and monitors them to completion. Though sometimes he takes risk in practical ways, he does not believe in chances, but that you can create chances. He religiously mentors his followers.

    Here is a man who is not comfortable with failure; he puts his heart, health and soul into projects; he eats, sleeps and breaths work; he goes the extra mile to get results. He pushes you to persevere in assigned tasks. “One on the driver seat does not sleep”, he says, “Sacrifice and successes are Siamese twins.”  At the State House, every hour of the day, year round, is working hour. Ambode pursues details with fervour and with enviable transparency; and believes that if there is a will, a right passion, a right plan and right persons to drive your policies, there will always be a path to unprecedented accomplishments. To the governor, “attitude is king of character.” Probability of failure or probability of successes should not be the key to achieving programme objective, but having correct keys or plans always, will unlock the doors to successes. And when passion results in big triumph, he does not rush to the airwaves.

    Often he says: “succeeding or failing is what you choose. Create your own chances; if you wait for chances, you may have to wait for eternity. Leadership is about adding something, every minute, every hour, every day, every month and every year. If you cannot add to what you met, be better person than who you are and change the people for good at the end of each programme or project or tenure, you have betrayed the electorates who freely gave you their mandate. Confront challenges headlong; do not falter, do not fail, do not fall, and if you do, do not be frustrated by your failure; do not stay down, but stand firm in faith and continue to pursue your dream. “

    Ambode actually believes that a follower is capable of surmounting mountains (and should surmount) obstacles, if he can exert himself to bring out hidden strength and ability hitherto unexplored. He constantly searches for something good and strong in his followers and subjects. According to him, “a chain is as good as its weakest link”; he is a fantastic team player.

    While he agrees that it is more difficult to build on success than failure, he believes success becomes sustainable as you become stronger after surmounting blocks of gigantic proportion. He smiles, praises and pats you in the back, and says affectionately: “brother, you could have the ability do much more; next time let me know how you can accomplish more.” His Excellency is a man who builds on your strong points, making your weak points irrelevant.

    Goals, Results, Impacts and Outcomes achieved with Excellence and transparency, are central in Ambodeism.  Excellence, whatever it costs, must be pursued in the realization of strategic targets, for here is a man of habitual integrity. Ambode is motivated by outcomes that will bring the greatest joy to the greatest number of Lagosians; he fervently pursued lay down strategies with passionate love, expressed in such infectious ways that followers begin to believe that they can move mountain.

    Bringing me to the ban on sponsorship of pilgrims to the holy lands; occasionally some would express concern that many Lagosians would not be able to visit the holy lands henceforth. To this my answer, which was always well received, is that enough pilgrims from Lagos would always go to the holy lands at more affordable cost that only Lagos could offer, but many that had no reason to be there would not be there; moreover, money saved by the administration is adding better values in critical sectors, bringing benefits to many Lagosians.”

    Yes, the governor can be very firm.  When he is focusing on result, he puts his foot firmly on the ground. Yet, he is warm, loving, kind and considerate. He looks down on no one. He says: “If our practices do not favour the masses, we must find courage to voice them and abandon such practices.” He is humble enough to say, despite his numerous achievements, people owe him nothing, as he only serves them by the privilege they have conferred through the ballots, and will never take them for granted.

    Indeed Ambode is among the few leaders past or present, who command loyalty, obedience, love and respect of his cabinet and other arms of government. He is a fantastic role model, providing direction and inspiration, always pushing you to realize a potential you did not think you have and celebrating your fantastic success in the end. To Ambode, every man has a hidden gift to annex and exploit to benefit individual and society. He challenges you for more, and you are surprised that you can transmit all of his noble values to others in your workplace, and achieve so much more than you think possible to the benefit of the society at large.

    Over time, since the beginning of the Ambode’s administration, landmark results have been recorded, this is clear evidence that there is something right with the Ambodeism. Of recent, my ministry won seven out of eight awards for the state, in respect of 2016 Hajj pilgrimage, this unprecedented record in Nigeria, occurred during Ambode’s administration, a Christian.  I pray to Allah to achieve much more in this year pilgrimage, hoping on greater inspiration from Ambodeism.

    Strive constantly for the good purposes, and Allah will join in your effort. Your success is not measured by the amount of wealth you have, but by what you have bequeathed in advancement of humanity. That is your legacy. Ambodeism is a legacy that will endure.

     

    • Dr. AbdulLateef is Lagos State Commissioner for Home Affairs.

  • Lagos Speaker lauds Ikeja GRA leadership, launches buses

    Speaker of Lagos State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon Mudashiru Obasa, has extolled the virtues of the leadership of Ikeja Government Reserved Area (GRA), describing them as visionary people whose activities are in line with that of the state governor, Mr Akinwumi Ambode.

    Obasa made the remark during the launch of a fleet of shuttle buses to ease movement in the GRA.

    The Speaker who was represented by Hon Emeka Jude, said: “I want to commend you for this laudable gesture.  What you have done will create jobs for the people and it shows you keyed into the vision of the Governor Akinwumi Ambode led administration. I like the colour because it shows that it is for the people. I want to use this opportunity to call on other Community Development Associations (CDA) in the state to emulate you.”

    The chairman of the security committee of the GRA, Hon Debo Collins, said: “The importance  of an organised transport system in ensuring the security of the people can never be overemphasized. We came up with the template to give people a good transportation system that would check the menace of commercial transporters, especially the okada riders.  We started working on the idea two years ago. Today, we thank God that we have a fleet of vehicles to start with. We would move higher from here.”

    Also speaking, Hon Funmilayo Tejuoso, said: You have done a fascinating job. Public transportation is becoming fearful but with this kind of registered transportation system, the security of the people is guaranteed. This is the vision of the governor who is committed to ensuring the security of the citizens and creating enabling environment for economic activities to thrive.”

    Representative of the 9th  military command, Lt Col, Sheriff Fagbemi assured the residents of the command’s support, advising that commercial drivers should be used for intelligence gathering by educating them to report suspected passengers.

  • Future Project Leadership Boot Camp empowers youths

    The Future Project Leadership Boot Camp recently held the first phase of its youth leadership and civic engagement project in Oyo, Lagos and Ogun states to empower the youths on leadership and accountability.

    The five-day intensive development programme, supported by the Ford Foundation, was designed to promote active participation of young people in leadership at local and national levels.

    The objective was also to enable young leaders play a leading role in agitating for greater accountability within their respective local government areas.

    A total of 120 applicants with exceptional leadership profiles as well as ability to impact their communities were shortlisted to attend the training after a comprehensive review process.

    The training featured top-notch facilitators from varying backgrounds to share insights. The facilitators included former Executive Governor of Ogun State, Gbenga Daniel; Member, House of Assembly, Abeokuta South Constituency, Victor Fasanya; and Vice Chancellor, Tai Solarin University of Education, Prof. Segun Awonusi.

    Others were Lead Partner, Queens Attorney, Barrister Kayode Akinsola; Data Analyst, BudgIT, Ayomide Faleye; and Special Adviser to the Governor of Ogun State on Youths, Clement Olusegun, among others.

    Speaking on the impact of the boot camp, Akinkunade Dare, an attendee of the Ogun Boot Camp described it as an interactive and motivating seminar.

  • Politics, leadership and destiny

    GIVEN the spate of speculation on the state of the health of the Nigerian president nowadays I think it is time to look at the issue of destiny and how it affects political leadership in the conduct of the affairs of state. Quite convenient and relevant in this regard is the fact that the ailing Nigerian president is on record as having lamented publicly before, why God has made him president at this time which was an indirect reference to the poor health that has dogged his presidency. That really is the import of destiny in the discussion of today’s topic. Destiny or fate is like the blind lady that depicts justice and deals it out blindly not seeing or knowing who is brought to justice as she wields her legendary sword. Today then we look at the impact of destiny on world affairs both locally in Nigeria and Africa and historically in the world at large.

    In Britain this week, we see, rather amazingly, a modern example of a drunk electorate waking up with a hangover of the Brexit referendum and trying to retrace its steps and avoid the result of implementing what it had voted for with its eyes wide open, and examine the role of its neighbor France in the matter.

    We then look at the collaboration between France and the US on the war against terrorism and the import of that for Africa. First we go back to Nigeria to look at how destiny has affected the conduct of a government that came in on a note of optimism and hope based on the victory of our sick president who had lost presidential elections thrice before being lucky to be elected massively by Nigerians in the 2015 presidential elections.

    In a way destiny has caught up with the leadership of the Nigerian government in several ways. Aside from the president whose health has prevented him from enjoying or fulfilling his mandate to clean the Augean stable of Nigerian politics, the Acting President too is a product of enduring destiny. It is an open secret that the former Governor of Lagos state Asiwaju Bola Tinubu was to be Vice President on the APC ticket but for the objection to the Muslim – Muslim ticket and it was Tinubu himself who recommended the Acting President-AP- as his replacement on the ticket as acknowledged by the AP himself. Undoubtedly the AP has acquitted himself successfully in office to the admiration of all Nigerians and in spite of the flurry of abuses hauled on him by those who accuse him of not saying the truth on the state of the health of his boss after declaring that the president will soon resume after visiting him in the UK.

    But there is no denying that as destiny has incapacitated the president in terms of health when the nation most needed him and his reputation to clean the polity, the same fate has been kinder to the AP than the two most famous Nigerian leaders from his catchment area, the South West, namely the immortal sage Obafemi Awolowo and the AP’s mentor Asiwaju Tinubu. Both leaders of the illustrious Yoruba race never made it to the presidency in which Osinbajo is the AP with such admirable unobtrusiveness and high quality level headedness. That again is the handiwork of destiny which is still unfolding as the saga of the absentee president unfolds daily in our now restive political system. In the case of France the US, the UK and the global war against terrorism and Africa, we look to history to explain the import of destiny on contemporary events in these nations this week.

    On Brexit it was speculated authoritatively this week that the French are out to make Brexit a hard realty for the UK especially as it seems the British are about to make a U- turn on the Brexit result which is a cause being championed this week by former PM Tony Blair. But the French have always had an axe to grind with the English long before Brexit and very much during the time of former French President Charles de Gaulle who did not allow Britain to join the European Community at the outset. De Gaulle’s grouse could be rooted in the innocent killing of over 1000 French sailors and the destruction of the French fleet by the British Navy in 1940 on the instruction of British War PM Winston Churchill who felt that the Vichy regime would allow Hitler the use of the French fleet against Britain in theMediterranean sector of World War 2.

    The attack happened on July 3 at Mers EL Kebr on the coast of French Algeria and resulted in the death of 1297 French servicemen, the sinking of a battle ship and the damaging of five other ships. Obviously the death of those innocent Frenchmen led to a rupture in relations between Vichy France and the UK but the tragedy convinced the US to give military and financial aid to Britain as US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt felt it showed clearly that Churchill was ready to fight Hitler to death by all means.

    This week’s French animosity on Brexit and its implementation in a hard way is therefore a reminder of an ancient feud between the two closest European nations of modern times. Lastly the relations between France and the US seems to be heading for a positive result in terms of the wiping out of ISIS and of course our Boko Haram. Collaboration with Russia on this in the Middle East especially in Syria seem destined to wipe out global terrorism or at least minimize it. Trump’s bull in the China shop diplomacy amongst the Arab states which has isolated Qatar seem to be yielding some dividend as negotiations continue to put pressure on that nation to stop supporting ISIS, Hizbollah and Hamas and to stop its hobnobbing with Iran, the nation most feared by the west for the sponsorship of global terrorism. Although two presidents of US and France are differ in the manner of the age of their spouses they have a meaningful and positive attitude in their diplomacy on fighting global terrorism.

    Trump is married to a wife old enough to be his daughter, while the French president’s wife is old enough to be his mother. Yet both leaders have jelled in the way they have taken the fight to the lion’s den of global terrorism . Trump has set the Arabs against each other from his recent visit to Saudi Arabia. Macron made a visit to Mali his first state visit and has secured funds from his government and the EU to fund a multinational armed group to fight in the Sahel and on the fringes of the Sahara from where terrorists roam and flee into the north of west Africa to wreak havoc like Boko Haram has done defiantly in our vast but poorly populated north east for a long time. One can only pray for a fruitful collaboration between these two unusual world leaders to make the world safe for all of us as they pursue their unexpected mandates based on their equally unexpected emergence on the world stage in consonance with their unusual pedigree and leadership destinies. Once again long live the federal republic of Nigeria.

  • Africa’s future: The leadership imperative

    Africa’s future: The leadership imperative

    To Prof. Kingsley Moghalu, a one-time Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Deputy Governor, the consequences of leadership failure are more profound in developing countries. In his keynote speech at the African Leadership Conference entitled: “Rethinking Africa: Leadership for possibilities”, organised by the Washington DC United States (U.S.)-based Guardian of the Nation International (GOTNI), the professor of Practice in International Business & Policy at the Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy, Tufts University (U.S) suggests how to tackle leadership challenges.

    Around the world today, the very idea of leadership confronts big challenges, big opportunities and big possibilities. From corporate leaders in advanced industrial countries who have to worry about the implications of disruptive innovation, the demands of corporate citizenship on business models, and the rising political risk to bottom lines from the surge in populism in western democracies, to entrepreneurs in Africa faced with unstable macroeconomic environments, absent infrastructure, policy inconsistency, and weak institutions, leadership is stressed and challenged.

    From the political ferment in the United States (U.S.) in the era of Donald Trump to the stunning victory of Emmanuel Macron in response to the yearnings of French citizens for bold, new leadership. From the electoral shifts in the recent elections in the United Kingdom (UK) in the era of Brexit to the political crisis in Brazil over allegations of corruption against its elected leaders, leadership is the big issue. For good or ill, we live in its shadow.

    We can understand why: in all its manifestations – political, corporate and entrepreneurial, science and innovation, academia, healthcare and public policy, leadership is the main determinant of social and economic progress.

    Although our focus here is on leadership in Africa, we must understand that the leadership challenge in the world today is universal. That should help us keep things in perspective. As Mark Beeson, Prof of International Politics at the University of Western Australia has observed: “If we scan the international political horizon, it is difficult to spot anyone that might be described as an unambiguously great leader. Perhaps, the last person to fit this bill was Nelson Mandela.”

    Now, it should be clear that the consequences of leadership failure, while not good for any society – developed or developing – are far more profound for developing countries such as those in Africa. Developed countries have strong institutions that can mitigate the effects of bad or weak political leadership. But many African countries, saddled as they are with fledgling or undeveloped institutions, cannot achieve transformational progress without effective domestic political leadership.

    What real leadership in Africa should mean

     

    For our continent, then, leadership is the critical challenge we must confront and overcome. We must, if democracy is to yield good governance, if the entrepreneurial talent expressed in the narrative of an emerging Africa is to yield true economic transformation, and if Africa’s rich historical scientific heritage is to translate into an explosion of innovation that can make us competitive in a globalised world.

    How do we get leadership to make Africa prosper and matter? (Forgive the pun on my book Emerging Africa: How the Global Economy’s ‘Last Frontier’ Can Prosper and Matter.) In the area of business and entrepreneurship, we have seen impressive leadership by African entrepreneurs. These businessmen and women are altering Africa’s narrative from one of poverty and foreign aid to one of creativity and wealth creation. From Nigeria’s Nollywood movie industry to Aliko Dangote and his Africa-wide industrial empire, Tony Elumelu and his Heirs Holdings investment group, and the blogger and entrepreneur Linda Ikeji; from Tanzania’s Ali Mufuruki and his Infotech Investment Group and Kenya’s Michael Macharia and his Seven Seas Technologies to Ethiopia’s Bethlehem Tilahum Alemu whose firm, Sole Rebels, manufactures and exports environmental-friendly footwear that’s “hot” in the western world; and from Ghana’s Patrick Awuah, founder of the 21st century non-profit Ashesi University, Ken Offori-Attah and his Databank Corporation, and the young Harvard-educated investor Sangu Delle to Cameroon’s Yaya Moussa, the former International Monetary Fund economist that founded Africa Today TV in the U.S., Africa’s entrepreneurs are making progress against all odds.

    Our continent’s leadership problem is located mainly in our internal political spaces. But it is precisely these spaces that determine what kind of societies, economies, education and health systems that we have.

    The first order of business, as I have argued consistently, is that of our minds. We must reinvent the African mind. Our minds determine whether or how we understand what leadership means or doesn’t. Our minds determine what kind of mindset or worldview we bring to the task and responsibility of leadership. And our minds determine whether we have, or can acquire, the character and competence of leadership.

    My personal understanding of leadership, especially in the context of countries like those in Africa, is that great leadership must be transformational. And I always approach the subject with the end in mind: what, for example, would be said about my service after I have completed a specific leadership task or responsibility? Indeed, to envision more radically, what will be said at my funeral? (One should hope that that event will hold somewhere north of my 100th birthday!)

    I have sought to apply this understanding to every leadership role in which I have had the privilege to serve – from national reconciliation and nation-building work by the United Nations (UN) in New York, Cambodia, Croatia and Rwanda to institutional and management reform in the UN, from building global partnerships and raising billions of dollars for social investments in developing countries by The Global Fund in Geneva to structuring and facilitating investments in emerging markets, from leadership roles in monetary policymaking and banking sector reform in Nigeria in the wake of the global financial crisis to serving as a professor in one of America’s premier universities, my vision has always been to leave the situation, institution or assignment I was tasked to handle much transformed from where I met it.

    Leadership is about utilising appointive, elective or situational authority to envision. To inspire. To take calculated risk. All in order to take societies, family units, organisations or institutions from A to Z, or whatever point in the 26 alphabets is relevant, necessary, and possible. It is not, as we often misunderstand it in Africa, about merely holding positions of power or deploying authority mainly for self-serving purposes. This is why many career politicians in Africa that consider themselves “leaders” are in fact – and despite the veneer of democratic processes — more accurately “rulers”, or minions and accomplices of despotic power.

    Leadership requires a certain kind of character that emphasizes and upholds core values, a sense of abnegation to consciously forgo opportunities to advance self or other narrow interests, and the competence to bring these values to bear in a manner that creates change and sustains social progress.

    In an illuminating article by Sunnie Giles that was published in the Harvard Business Review (“The Most Important Leadership Competencies, According to Leaders around the World, HBR, March 15, 2016”), the author’s research found that the top 10 leadership competences, based on the percentage of respondents from 200 global leaders asked to rate 74 qualities, were:

    • High ethical and moral standards (67 per cent);
    • Provides goals and objectives with loose guidelines/direction (59 per cent);
    • Clearly communicates expectations (56 per cent);
    • Has the flexibility to change opinions (52 per cent);
    • Is committed to my ongoing training (43 per cent);
    • Communicates often and openly (42 per cent);
    • Is open to new ideas and approaches (39 per cent);
    • Creates a feeling of succeeding or failing together (38 per cent);
    • Helps me grow into a next-generation leader (38 per cent);
    • Provides safety for trial and error (37 per cent).

    As Giles explained, neuroscience confirms that a leader having high standards based on core values and acting consistent with it, when combined with the ability to communicate expectations clearly, creates a safe and trusting environment and heightens brain activity related to creativity, social engagement, and a drive to excellence.

    Leadership in African countries requires a worldview that can build real nation-states from the hodge-podge of ethnic nationalities lumped together by the Berlin Conference of 1884-85 that carved up the continent between imperial global powers at the time. That worldview must understand the dynamics and mechanics of globalisation. It must grasp the truth that being a market for globalisation is not what is beneficial. Finding a niche in the production value-chain of economic globalisation is what really matters.

    That worldview should be able to create a common goal and destiny around which citizens in our countries can unite and strive together for progress. This is different from the narrow views that fuel the ethnic and religious-identity irredentism that has dominated the domestic political space in many African countries. We are trapped in these ethnic tensions and strife because our rulers have exploited these divisions instead of liberating and educating their citizens. But in order to liberate and educate your citizens, you, the leader, must have the substance with which to educate and liberate. As the legal maxim puts it, nemo dat quad non habeat (you cannot give what you don’t have). Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, the late Nigerian musical maestro, had little time for elegant Latin maxims. He puts it bluntly in one of his songs: “Teacher, don’t teach me nonsense”!!

     

    The role of Nigeria

    and South Africa

     

    In the quest for good leadership and governance in Africa, few, if any countries are more important than Nigeria, Africa’s largest economy and most populous country with 180 million people, and South Africa, the continent’s most advanced and industrialised economy. Both countries can and should set worthy examples of internal domestic leadership that are worthy of emulation. But, over the past several years, this expectation of both countries has been observed more in the breach. South Africa has been caught in the throes of a debilitating leadership crisis involving its current President Jacob Zuma since he assumed office in 2009. One of the very few countries in Africa with independent institutions, efforts by Zuma and his allies to whittle down or block the effectiveness of the country’s public protector, which indicted President Zuma with charges of corruption and state capture by Zuma’s cronies and business allies, have created existential threats to Zuma’s government, the political dominance of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) party, and the political stability of South Africa.

    Nigeria, like many African countries, has made some progress, but is a far distance in its stage of development from where it could have been after 57 years of independence. Nigeria’s case is especially disappointing when we consider the country’s vast reservoir of human capital and the dynamic nature of its enterprising people.

    Nothing illustrates Nigeria’s challenge better than three statistics: the country produces only 4,000 megawatts of electricity when South Africa, with 50 million people, produces 40,000; despite being the largest economy with a GDP (Gross Domestic Product) of about $345 billion (the figure was $568 billion in 2014 but has been decimated by the country’s worst recession in 25 years), its 2016 per capita GDP is $2,260 and the average figure from 1960, when we became an independent country, up to 2016, is $1,648. This means that there has been very little real progress in average individual income and human well-being.  Malaysia’s GDP per capita is $9, 360, Brazil’s is $8,727, and South Africa’s $7,504. And the third statistic is that Nigeria is ranked at 187 out of 189 by the World Health Organisation ranking of health systems around the world.

    As the great African writer Chinua Achebe wrote: “Nigeria’s problem is simply and squarely that of leadership”. This leadership failure has led to slow progress (and many outright reversals) in the quest to build a united nation, and a dependence on raw mineral and commodity exports (crude oil) for foreign exchange earnings that has prevented real economic transformation.

     

    Citizen-solutions

     

    How can African countries overcome their leadership capital deficit?

    Fortunately, democracy offers a great opportunity for an improved process of leadership selection. This brings to mind the role of the citizen. In a normal scheme of things, it is leaders that shape the destinies of nations, but in functioning democracies the citizens’ act as a check on leadership performance. In those countries where contemporary African leaders have performed poorly, then, it is time for citizens to stand up for their own future.

    Our citizens must exercise their democratic rights more effectively and make choices informed by objective leadership selection criteria. That criteria needs to include character, competence, and relevant experience, as well as the track record of persons seeking positions of leadership. To do so, voters must understand what really is in their best interest. That “what” is frequently different from the primordial affiliations and the patronage systems that politicians exploit and build to continue ruling us instead of leading us. When citizens in our countries in Africa, including my own country Nigeria, focus on subjective factors instead of objective leadership competence in leadership selection, they become very active accomplices in their own poverty.

    A paradigm shift in leadership selection will require voter education by civil society organisations. It calls for increased demands for democratic accountability by citizens and civil society, the institution of a real social contract between states and citizens as demanded by the latter, and an all-important emphasis on leadership training for the up and coming generation of youth who we should want to be real leaders, not rulers, of tomorrow. GOTNI is blazing a trail in this regard.

    The African Diaspora has a role and historic responsibility here, and they have much to contribute the development of their home countries. But few, if any African countries have been able to position their diaspora as a core component and driver of development strategy in the manner that Israel, India and China have done.

    First, the diaspora must demand and secure the ability to vote abroad in elections at home, and thereby participate in leadership selection. Second, they must demand a more institutionalised framework for diaspora engagement and contributions to governance and economic life. Here, I note with keen interest the recent issuance of a Diaspora Bond by the Federal Government of Nigeria. The spirit behind this initiative is a commendable one. But the devil is in the execution. We need more transparency on the bondholder base and the subscription process for the bonds. These bonds provide an important window of opportunity for diaspora to engage with economic governance at home by checking to ensure that the bond raised is utilized for appropriate purposes. It is not enough simply to get your financial returns.

     

    Conclusion

     

    The economic, social and political conditions in African countries are the responsibility of African leaders. It is not that of Donald Trump. Indeed, one of the ultimately beneficial outcomes of the rise of populism in the West for African countries is that it will enable our countries look inwards and take responsibility for driving their own destiny; even in a world of globalization, sovereignty and the authority and responsibilities that go with it have not gone away.

    Our destiny is not the responsibility of the foreign aid agencies. And we cannot continue to blame the colonial powers. The leaders of our countries must build real nation-states out of what Count Clemens von Metternich, Europe’s leading statesman in the early 19th century, referring to Italy, called “a mere geographical expression” – in other words, countries that are artificially formed and are not nations in a real sense. Our leaders have the responsibility of building institutions that can create a level playing field for everyone and shield citizens from tyranny, to achieve economic transformation, and to reclaim our countries’ place in the world.

     Citizens, for their part, have the responsibility to decide who has responsibility for their welfare. In many African countries, they have not taken this duty as seriously as they should. Prof Ameena Gurib-Fakim, the competent and erudite President of Mauritius – one of Africa’s most successful countries – put it so pithily: “But the onus is also on all Africans. People have to start asking the right questions. Politicians, leaders, policymakers in normal democracies are all accountable to the people. But, and I am sorry for saying this brutally, we get the government we deserve. The one we vote in. It’s your vote”.