demoCRAZY indeed: 13 years of leadership in disarray

I am starting out in a traditional Nigerian way of greeting people on a particular occasion even when not a strand of hair on your body agree with such greeting. I wonder why a man who hasn't eaten nor has any hope of getting food in the morning would walk past me and say good morning; in fairness, there isn't a thing good about the morning except for other hidden theological things like it’s good to have life but then we still ask, how many people wish for a life without food? Hypocrisy!

That said, Happy Democracy day.

Yes, today marks 13 years of democracy in Nigeria counting from May 29, 1999 when Chief Olusegun Obasanjo took the oath of office. While it is natural for people to always have different views as to how well we have managed this democracy, there would always be a meeting point on certain issues bothering on governance in the last thirteen years.

We should place side by side what we are now and what we were post 1999. I think it won’t be enough to just hold on to the need to have a democracy without doing this comparison. While I am not an advocate of a military rule, I have always told my audience that when leadership is true to her promises and listens to her people, it won’t matter the nomenclature given to the leadership but because we as a country seem to have lost touch with true leadership, we get to hide under name.

In my opinion, the most important thing to celebrate today is the free 24 hours we have which is of alternate benefits to different people. For the employed, it’s a time to spend with loved ones and stay out of the mostly unrewarded labour. For the unemployed, it’s a time to fraternize with their employed mates who can at least stay at home for a day. Besides this, we have nothing in the real sense to celebrate except we want to quickly adopt the half a loaf principle.

Government has not just the responsibility of performance but also reassurance, let the people see that you are on top of your game. That’s not what we have here in Nigeria. The celebration has been called off today again like the Independence Day celebration because of the fear of the unknown. That’s the democracy we have.

A democracy that overnight transforms elected officers into demi-gods once the electorates cast their votes; it is not to say the votes actually count in the first place. We have a democracy where those who suffer the consequences of bad leadership are the people who have actually fought to put the leaders in place, where what we get after every attack are weak and never-to-be-redeemed promises.

I am just certain there is something crazy about this demonstration but would love to have your take on it too.

Let’s take a quick stock:

Health Care Services

Education

Job Creation

Road infrastructure

Security

This is not of the many articles that sets out to nail anyone to the cross but calls out to our subconscious. Lets every reader do an appraisal based on his or her understanding and then score our leadership character in the last 13 years.

The importance of this is that we have to leave the era of “Falana said” or “Fawehnmi said”, we should be able to say for ourselves based on what prevails around us, things we have heard of and confirmed, things we have seen and those that we feel. Let not your emotions run haywire, be as realistic as possible and you would be shocked how much you have endured in the name of making this democratic experiment work.

Take out time also to look at behavioural make up the kind of leaders we have had and still have; that should also help.

I have my opinions of all of these and my opening remarks should give you an insight..

May I just appeal to you that we take this test and drop a feed-back?

STOP PRESS:

Just when I was about to publish this on my blog and facebook, I got a message on my old blackberry that the prestigious University of Lagos, (UNILAG) has been renamed after the late. Moshood Olawale Abiola.

Interestingly, it is possible to just ask whether or not MKO Abiola deserves such honour, to that I would say, yes, he does. What about the timing and choice of school? I may want to take time after now to think about the rationale, but what comes to mind right away is that it won’t be enough for Mr. President to think that would get him our votes!!! If my memory isn’t failing me, there’s a polytechnic in Abeokuta, Ogun State that already answers that name. Could I be missing something? MKO Abiola all of a sudden is GEJ’s new found hero?!