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If Nigeria’s governance problem is
simply that of leadership, it could have been fixed through our collectively
efforts but Nigeria’s problem is partly of leadership but majorly of
followership. Leaders are like parasites, they get their nutrients from the
followers. It is what the followers tolerate that leaders will feed and
magnify. The premise here is, a nation gets a leader it bargains for. So far,
our leaders have been dishing out to the citizens of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria what citizens bargained for. But how does followership drive the intent
and content for effective leadership? A simple example can be found within the
current US presidential contest.
A few days ago, Senator Obama backed
what his grass root supporters considered a controversial bill. The bill
granted the executive more spying powers and immunize telephone companies
accused of illegal surveillance. This same group that placed Obama on radar
screen of political relevance worked assiduously to organize, protest and
pressure Obama to change his mind from a bill they considered to be against
their interest. If Obama wishes to win the November election, he cannot but
listen to these powerful grass roots, the $25.00 contributors of new but young
American voters who will probably determine the outcome of the general November
election. This is simply an example of how followership can drive the agenda of
the leaders. Granted, there are several components to the followership (grass
roots, religious, lobbyists, National Riffle Association, Oil companies, etc.)
and, of course, some are more powerful than the other. But even the less
powerful ones have latent power which is largely derived from the constitution
– we the people and from the very definition of democracy, government of the
people and by the people which we now pretend to be following, the derivative
and participatory power which Nigerians are afraid to tap into because of
selfish objectives.
No government and no democracy can
thrive unless men and women of good spirit and patriotic zeal are able to take
advantage of the sacrifices of those who stepped up,
stood guard, and put their lives on the line to protect the nation called
Nigeria from the ever-present threat of harm ready to be inflicted by few
greedy, Ready, Able, Willing and unpatriotic leaders.
The followership issues
we must consider as Nigerians are: 1) Why is it that when our state is gloomy
and dark, the more money the nation makes from oil, the less development we
observe?; 2) Why is it that the more civilized we think we are as a people, the
more our morals become degraded and corruption in our land become rampant
everywhere around us?; 3) Why is it that the more religious we are, the more we
give the devil credence of being more power the God we serve while we become
more inhumane?; and why is it that the more educated we are, the less tolerant
of one another we become and the more illogical we sound?
Surely, we cannot blame
all of the ills of our society on past and present leadership without
followership taking the larger blame. If the followers are not ready to
tolerate a corrupt leader, they have the power to get rid of the leaders. This
power is power of cohesiveness towards a common purpose. This statement may
sound Greek to many Nigerians but it is true.
The fact that our
leaders function in a chaotic environment created by followers implies that
followers also feed from the corrupt environment in a symbiotic but lucrative
way. When Nigeria has a new leader, the first thing Nigerians do is to
postulate, seek the path of least resistance and the weakness of the leader so
that they can take advantage of the system the new leader is a custodian of. We
often hear, “Mr. President asked me to come home to take up a position” even
though we may have intrinsic values to add. Many Nigerians in Diaspora are
happy to throw words like, “Mr. Governor is my uncle and I am going home, to o
partake in the sharing of the loot. Is it possible to leave these leaders alone
to do their job such that their efficacy in office can lead to democratic
dividend for all citizens? Surely in any society, the nation should give 10% of
success to “who you know.” In Nigeria, however, ability to succeed is 100% of
“who you know” and these leaders take advantage of the carrots thrown to them
by the followers. Not only that we create “gods” who can destroy businesses of
any citizens they disagree with, but we also unfortunately worship these gods
call leaders.
Religion has also become
a weapon used to cover up any evil we perpetuate on citizens. Religion, instead
of enhancing the quality of life of citizens, is making matters worse because
true Christians and Moslems are few amongst us. We have many churches and
mosques but we do not follow the moral precepts ordained by the bible and the
Qur’an. These moral percepts are often ignored as well as defied by the
privileged and powerful but followed by the less privileged amongst us.
Politics and religion have a common purpose, that of being social advocates for
the poor and the disenfranchised.
While Aso Rock allocates
close to a billion Naira to entertain ghost visitors, many citizens are
wallowing in poverty and joblessness. While politicians are housed in splendor
and the nation keep their generators going just to make sure they do not add
value to our nation, citizens are in perpetual darkness and justifying why
their leaders should continue to oppress them. These same citizens, when asked
why they are in total darkness, they always have ready made answers for anyone
that cares to listen, “God go answer our prayers one of these days.” God is who
we are because he created us in His image. It is how we make our beds that
we’ll sleep on it. In most cases, our church and mosque – attending has lead us
to a pathetic dry husk of meaningless ritual and degrading superstition simply
because doubts creep in as if god of money and power seems to be more powerful
than God.
God has become our punch
bag for all the failure we collective inflict on ourselves and our Nigeria.
Nigerians seems to think devil is more powerful than God because instead of
taking responsibility, we rather give glory to the devil for our failure. Devil
must be a citizen of Nigeria by the number of times credit is given to him
everyday. We encourage political aggrandizement and we turn around to blame
these leaders for taking all our daughters as their girl friends and for
carrying all monies meant for development overseas. For this, the followers are
to be blames not the leader. We take bribe during election and turn around to
blame politicians for not listening to us when they get into office. Don’t we
realize that these politicians have fully paid us a four year salary with the
=N=1000.00 they bribed us with.
Why do we have the
temerity to abuse the leaders when we actively create a no good leader because
of the followership collaboration. Followers become eventual leaders; therefore,
if the leader is bad, it is as a result of bad followership. If the followers
are good, there is no way the leaders can be bad without any repercussions. We
now have every justification to unload venom with both barrels blasting for
such nasty politicking we acquiesced to, and with as great an opportunity to
set the record straight if followers claim mea culpa and have a change of mind
to be good to each other and to our nation. Only few of us have ever questioned
the choices the leaders made on our behalf, but why? It is because we are
hoping that one day we too will get to a position of authority and oppress
fellow citizens, and for this reason, we are not in a rush to stop the abuse of
power.
We have also elevated
political parties to a religious orthodoxy that citizens just go to polls, like
robots vote for candidates they do not believe in and vote against their own
interest. The morning of political reformation and citizens awareness is dawned
but the great re-awakening of our political sanity must begin right away
through dedicated followership. The almighty created thinking human beings and
contrary to this, we have consciously performed contrary to the almighty’s
design purpose for our lives.
One thing that is
characteristic of the followership in Nigeria is the lackadaisical attitude
towards industry. We refuse to work for what we want but pray for what we want
God to do for the nation. One remembers that when J.F.K wanted America to go to
the moon, he, as the leader did not tell Americans to carry their bibles and/or
Qur’an and pray. He first challenged his nation as a leader and the followers
responded in unison with dedication, industry and improved technology and then
with prayers that the astronauts would go and return safely. America got to the
moon. In Nigeria’s case, the first thing we do is run to church or mosque to
pray for what we have not used our God given talent to walk through and at the
end of it, we fail. Any pastor (the leader), no matter how close to God he may
be cannot pray for mission expansion without having the disciples to help and
willing congregation (followers) to willfully contribute funds and the efforts
to record achievement in God’s vineyard (Nigeria).
Meaningless probes are
very common in Nigeria by leaders that want take the nation off course. The
results of our probes are very predictable as in: Probe is set up; money is
distributed; the corruptly enriched politician is free to go and continue
oppressing his people; and millions of Naira is again wasted on a mirage called
probe. Watch this prediction against the result of the EFCC probe against
Borishade and group. Nothing, practically nothing will come out of it, so what
is new? Why is nothing coming out of the probes? Nothing is happening because
the followers are requiring nothing to happen with their lackadaisical attitude
toward leaders taking them to the cleaners and 419ing them. Until we have a
change of attitude towards accepting corruption as a mantra in Nigeria, our
resources will be transferred out by a few oppressors and we’ll remain a beggar
nation in perpetual darkness.
Indeed, when we pray for
mercy and we too must exhume merciful, so, we get mercy. How can Nigerians ask
for mercy while her citizens believe in no mercy? Surely, we cannot be in this
political wilderness for another 48 years. Where is our Moses? Who will safe
Nigeria from the impending self inflicting political Tsunami?
In view of the ignoble
and false propaganda mounted against the leaders, followership need to rethink
its strategy by first accepting responsibilities for creating bad leadership
and then and only then will Nigeria’s leadership problems be corrected. It is not Leadership, stupid but followership problem that we have
in Nigeria, I stand corrected. And, ha, surely and goodness shall follow us all
the days of our lives and we shall duel in the house of the Lord for ever, if
and only if we ooze out goodness and mercy. We can choose the smartest leaders
in this world, a political Einstein, without participating followers, the
ability of the leader to surround himself with needed technocrats, we are just
waste our time. We cannot continue to plant okra and expect to harvest corn.
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Posted by Robot| 03.07.2008 00:24