Nigeria’s Dysfunctional Leadership By Mohd Musa

For all the invocations of hope and
change, the proclamation of making
Nigeria a stable democracy and
economically viable nation, the country
is still far away from being any
better. Apart from the unending
media advocacy of structural
reformations and the massive
corruption that have eaten the fabric
of the nation nothing else can be said
to look better as all sectors have
merely worsened. And all we hear and
read in the media are relics and reeks
of intellectual and dogma- policy
exhaustion and the unending journey
to making the country more pitiable
from hired mouth-pieces of the
powers that be.
The situation is becoming very
pathetic as national estimates say
about 70% of the population are living
below the poverty line, while insecurity
and heinous crimes have become a big
problem. Amusingly, the
infrastructural development touted
has remained witless, such as the
construction of befitting, standardly
equipped health and educational
institutions and the transportation
system is non-existent as the roads
can only be tagged as mere death
traps. Everything has become a
mirage with “the continuous lack of
priority, probity and prudence
patriotism spending thrift” which
unimaginably thrives at the expense
of the weak despite the many billions
of naira that the nation’s treasury
banked for the purpose of better
service delivery.
According to World Bank report
poverty rates remain very high in
Nigeria, particularly in rural areas,
yet our political rulers see nothing
wrong but rather keep insinuating
that it is good while signs are very
much in the open that we as a nation
we are sliding the wrong direction. We
are becoming worse off than we were
before the advent of democratic rule
14 years ago. It is high time that all
the voices of reason stand up now and
say it as it is that we cannot continue
as we are, enough of this show of
failure and potentates reprobate in
the false name of service delivery and
dividend of democracy. It is a wrong
insinuation as we have found ourselves
as a nation in the hands of
nonentities that view leadership as a
means of self-investment return.
A food for thought is to look at the
style of leadership in some other
African countries, that should be a
good lesson for our nation, the
citizens and the political leaders. A
nation full of hope and aspiration for
greatness must not be allowed to
flaw, its virtues must stand to
midwife its failures and successes. In
our country all our hopes of a new
democratic beginning have been
mercilessly drifted, our diversity that
should have been our strength has
created in us a lack of confidence,
intolerance and the fear of the
unknown.
We have a dysfunctional political
leadership, our nation slithering to a
police state where everything is
treated with suspense, youths turning
negatively against self, education
falling flatly hence building no
future, wanton abuse of power taking
over all our domain. Imagine the show
of shame exhibited by our 36 elected
governors when 16 proclaimed greater
than 19, look at the destructive
avalanche in the Rivers State
legislative assembly were 5
dishonourable lawless members claim
impeaching their leader in a 32
member body in the presence of the
State Police Chief given security
cover. Imagine the shameful re-
commissioning of an already
commissioned federal highway in the
name of another cover up for the
sinking of billions of our hard earned
fortune and unbridled terror acts that
has never been known to us or our
culture. We are no longer our
brother’s keepers and yet the
leadership pronouncements are always
affirmative despite the negativity. So
the question is ….where and how can
we hold back our imagined lust for
greatness?
A leader that serves common good and
does just that will remember and take
in to cognisance the majority
vulnerable populace. He or she will not
only revive that long lost sense of
historic responsibility but hope of
building consensus for genuine and
patriotic advancement of the whole
society. A test of a fledgling
democracy like ours is not just how
best it cares for the minority elites,
but how best it can protect the
majority against the failure of the
few elite minority to provide desirable
good governance. In our nation today
the negative dynamics in terms of
power evolution has become
consistent, as every leadership that
emerged thrived with negativity in
either its policy formulation or poor
will of implementation. However, with
perceptions of Nigerians increasing in
the direction of leadership non-
performance which brought about the
system dereliction. The high population
of un-employed youths, the non-
functional pension operation system
for retirees, the bad and corrupt
policing system has made it worst for
the nation to find ways to gainfully
alleviate the situation we found
ourselves in the hands of these non-
performing rulers.
Looking at the variables it will not be
out of place to sum up that Nigeria’s
annual growth rates that has been
averagely mentioned to be 7% in
official data is nothing but a
conceivable deception. Nigeria by this
figure is placed among the fastest
growing economies in the world
meaning the nation is doing well. But
Nigerians see it and feel it
differently as we are still battling for
daily meals, the ordinary man’s mind
is filled with an idea that when you
talk of service delivery by government
it is all about Corruption, and this
issue has alienated the core
institutions in the eyes of the
ordinary as mere centres of
embezzlement and adrift with weak
and poorly administered civil service
that have equally helped in the
squander mania spree. How long can
this continue when a majority battle
for a meal per day?