Dele Momodu Pinches Peter Obi on Leadership problématique in Nigeria - As written by Sesan Michael (SMB) JOHNSON
Within the realms of the Internet-of-things, one of
the frenzy, currency and problématique of the period of COVID-19 pandemic
in Nigeria is IG chat session - a Social Media showmanship and social craft stage
by celebrities, opinion moulders, social commentators and statesmen to open up
new thresholds and to create progressive trajectories for the people and for
the nation. Such was today’s exotic dialogue between two icons who are both
businessmen-cum-politicians.
With little pinches of technical convolution,
encrusted with contested tensions in the chat rooms and without the shenanigans
that usually greet conventional press briefings and interviews, Chief Dele
Momodu’s IG chat with Sir Peter Obi began around 7: 26 pm on Friday, 17th
April, 2020. It is apt to note that the tête-à-tête was also syndicated on Facebook and Youtube. It
started out with a friendly opener when Dele Momodu asked how Peter Obi has
been able to go far as a success brand. Expectedly, Peter Obi just like every
other successful Nigerian replied pointing to the grace of God in his life. Who
else will argue against what has to do with God, after all, Femi Otedola said
the same thing when he was asked similar question sometimes ago.
Anyways, the next question of Dele Momodu centred on
the main problems or challenges militating against the progress of Nigeria. In
his characteristic manner, Peter Obi harangued that lack of effective educational
system is the foundational problem of the nation. On the part of leadership, he
reiterated that Nigeria’s leadership is not presently anchored on business
orientation. Hence, no direction and no progress! He argued that leadership
must be premised on understandable vision/mission that is measurable and
embedded with clear-cut plan of actions that will practically lead to a
destination. Peter Obi is here recasting the SMART framework for a successful
business. Whereas, such leadership configuration will invent proactive public
pedagogy to aggressively educate the masses about the new progressive
trajectories the whole nation must collectively follow.
In his disquisition, Peter Obi did a binary comparative
analysis between Nigeria and Ghana within the frameworks of the nations’ GDPs,
external reserves and national budgets. He acquiesced that Nigeria’s leadership
sky-rocketed internal and external vulnerabilities of the masses as a result of
bad decisions. He wondered how citizens of Ghana are faring better than
Nigerians. Markedly, Dele Momodu interjected him by highlighting the fact that
perhaps Ghana is better because of its small population when compared with
Nigeria’s population. However, Peter Obi swiftly referred to nations such as
China and Indonesia with huge population higher than that of Nigeria.
When he was pinched by Dele Momodu on the leadership problématique of the country, Peter Obi
categorically submitted that it is not just about the Presidency alone, as all
leaders (ward councillors, local government chairmen, state and federal
legislators, state governors, president, etc) must understand where the
‘vehicle’ of the country is heading to.
Consequently, Dele Momodu asked, how can we now solve
this leadership debacle? With affirmation, Peter Obi argued that the process of
selecting leadership in Nigeria is faulty. Without mincing words, he retorted
that the electorate is at faulty also because they are habitually complaisant, credulous
and uncritical.
Appearing not done with the ruling elite, Peter Obi
pointedly mentioned a time during his stint as the governor of Anambra state.
He recalled when there was a sudden gush in crude oil revenue leading to swell
in National Foreign Reserves of the country. With catalogue of back and forth
arguments on what to do with the largesse, the majority opted for outright sharing
among the federating units. This was against few dissenting arguments.
Surprisingly, while blaming this unproductive decision by the nation’s leadership
then, Peter Obi did not exonerate itself. His submission was that, if the Sovereign
Wealth Fund was well managed then and probably, was thereafter well managed by
the current government, the nation will currently be having billions of dollars
in its Sovereign Wealth Fund. Evidently, this would have been useful in this
period of COVID-19 pandemic. In an unprecedented manner, Peter Obi said leaders
in Nigeria do not usually feel remorseful by tendering apologies for their
boorish decisions that had caused national misfortune, talk less of being
subjected to the nation’s justice systems. He opined some should be rotting in
jail.
Paradoxically, in his words, ‘all of us are still in charge’.
As if not satisfied yet, Dele Momodu squeezed Peter
Obi again, then, what political template could the nation adopt to produce good
leadership? Peter Obi emphasized that the proletariat (workers) are not ready
for a change – a paradigm shift. He grieved that politicians will always seek
for the dividends of their ‘investments’ in the electioneering process. Dele
Momodu quickly asked, what must be changed then? We must change the process of
selection, Peter Obi replied. The electorate must not support the people that
do not have capacity. He opined that the electorate are not ready to make the
political leaders accountable and accountability is sacred.
Dele Momodu bickered that lack of men and women of
capacity and competence is not the problem. He cited few high performers like
Peter Obi, himself, Donald Duke, etc. He once again pinched Peter Obi by
asking, how come good performers has not ended up at the presidency? While
aligning with the agitation of Dele Momodu, Peter Obi argued that these
so-called high performers who are presently interested in engaging the
political process in Nigeria are very few compared to poor performers. In his
words, it is a case of 5% versus 95%. For Peter Obi, there is a great need for
critical mass engagement. The generality of the people must know and believe in
the new threshold for the progress of the country.
Not done yet with the issue of good leadership for the
country, Dele Momodu further asked Peter Obi on how do we form or forge a mass movement
in Nigeria, since this appears to be a herculean task. He hypothesised how the
trilogy of ethnicity, religion and money (cash! cash! cash!) are rapidly and
consistently becoming spanners in the wheel of progress of this country.
Categorically, Dele Momodu declared that ‘I don’t see this happening’. Peter
Obi concurred that the trilogy of ethnicity, religion, and cash (ERC) cannot
lead the nation to progress. He elucidated further that the populace should shirk
the whims and caprices of money sharing politicians. According to him, what has
become of the money we shared from the revenues from coal, petroleum, etc? For
him, what we need is ‘Smart and Creative Governance’. We need leaders who have
something to offer. Leaders, who are past performers with good antecedence. We
do not need a man with no known resume or job coming into leadership. Our systems
must be engineered to evaluate and assess peoples’ past performance in order to
be so sure of their future trajectories.
Following comparative paradigm utilized earlier on by
Peter Obi, Dele Momodu cited how things changed dramatically in Liberia after its
Civil War, though not perfect. How in Ghana within three years, light was
becoming regular premised on rationalizing along a zoning system that make
power available at specific times on a regular basis. Dele Momodu put it to
Peter Obi, how do we deal with the issue of bureaucracy? Among other things,
according to Peter Obi, the President must speak out and challenge any one creating
bottlenecks for effective running of government. For instance, he berated the
meddlesomeness in the way the present government is handling the issue of
Nigerians in Diaspora who are planning to come back home due to COVID-19. He
lamented on how can a nation be saying it does not have enough bed space in
isolation centres for these returnees? He referred to how Ghana handled that
effectively without any national embarrassment.
In retrospect, Dele Momodu recounted 1978 Ali Must Go
struggle in his early days at Obafemi Awolowo University. He lamented that such
agitation for progress in Nigeria still persist till date. Premised on that, he
asked Peter Obi to take a punch on the issue of restructuring, being one of the
main agitations in today’s Nigeria. Peter
Obi’s cogitation centred on the need to totally embrace ‘True Federalism’ and
to shun over centralisation of the federal frameworks of Nigeria. He opined
that most of the agitations and issues of insecurity in Nigertia point to
leadership failure at all levels of government borne out of insincerity of
purpose to restructure Nigeria.
When charged on the issue of corruption, Peter Obi
retorted that there is no nation that is free of corruption and criminality. He
said what must be done is to always follow due process and also to create and
strengthen systems and institutions of governance. Using his experience as
governor of Anambra state, he practically described how he dramatically cut
down costs of governance and blocked loopholes that would have facilitated huge
corruption.
On a lighter note, Dele Momodu asked Peter to express
his thought on the current cash transfer going on the country. Jocularly, Peter
Obi wondered how we are physically distributing cash in this period. He added
that Mexican and Brazilian templates on conditional cash transfers are there
for Nigeria to reference. He emphasized that government must provide for the
needs of its citizenry in a precarious time like this if the government does
not want contravention of laws and orders.
On the issue of insecurity in Nigeria, Peter Obi
stated that internal mechanism that guarantees security infrastructure must be
forged. He enjoins governments to provide internal security infrastructure for
markets, churches, local governments, schools, communities, state, etc. He
reiterated the effectiveness of this security model in Anambra when he was the
governor.
Dele Momodu climaxed the IG conversation by asking
Peter Obi to share his experience in the last General Election. Peter Obi
succinctly replied that they (Atiku, Obi, etc) believed the electoral process
was faulty and that was why they challenged the validity of the outcome of the
election up to the Supreme Court. In his words, ‘we did so because we believe
in Nigeria... I have no other country other than Nigeria’.
Finally, Dele Momodu picked on Peter Obi when he
asked, ‘before you ventured into politics, you are a wealthy man, how come you
are stingy? (Dele Momodu put on a smiling face). Shrouding himself up on his
chair, Peter Obi in the affirmative declared that ‘wealth must be for a purpose
and not for weekend parties; money has its purpose – not just for wearing nice
shoes. We must use money purposefully’. As his final words on the IG chat with
Dele Momodu who is also a fellow businessman-cum-politician, Peter Obi, a
former governor of Anambra state and Vice Presidential candidate of the
People’s Democratic Party during the 2019 General Election concluded that ‘let
us work collectively to move this nation forward’.
