Give President Tinubu Time
Let’s Give President Tinubu Some Time
Public Leadership is not a tea party. It’s not a cocktail 🍸 party, either. But it’s not rocket science. And even if it were rocket science, there are masters in that field.
The journey into public leadership in a democratic society has a clear beginning and a definite end time. Having gone through the processes of selection, whether judged credible or not, once persons have been affirmed to assume public office, every other controversy becomes irrelevant. This must be clear. The right thing to do, going forward, is to give support to those now in leadership and put them in check through constant demand for accountability.
The demand for accountability is the single most important duty of a citizen in a democracy. Those who do not demand accountability from their leaders have no moral right to complain if the leaders don’t live up to expectations.
The ability to understand the turf, master the terrain, and get grips with the convoluted contours of the public space in a diverse socio-cultural and religious society is not possible in a jiffy. It takes time because so many landmines are often laid along the way. So many intrigues and contests are involved. So many layers of interest need to be dissected and isolated. These take time. Meanwhile, ordinary citizens expect that the system continue to run seamlessly. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way.
This is where citizens need to exercise some patience with those newly inaugurated into public leadership. Every stage of public leadership comes with its set of challenges due to its peculiar intricacies. Being a governor of a majorly homogeneous state in Nigeria cannot be equated to being the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Nigeria is an incredibly high-wired public space. It is a space where there is no clear national ideology, no clear national identity, no clear national interest. Instead, we have regional interests, ethnic interests, and religious interests.
This is evidenced by the statements you often hear from your leaders such as: “This matter is against the interest of the North or South”. “This is against the interest of Igbos, Fulani, Hausa, Yoruba, as the case might be. “This matter is against Christians or Muslims”.
Hardly will you ever hear any public leader, who is not directly in government, make any intervention to protect or promote Nigeria’s national interest, because there is virtually none to promote. Public Leadership in Nigeria is challenging because you have to wade through muddled-up sectional interests before you can attempt to address what might seem like national interests.
The journey of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu into Nigeria’s public leadership has lots of punctuation. Nevertheless, we need to give support and support to get the job done. We asked for the job. He’s got it. He may have started on the wrong foot but still has time to make amends as he tightens his grip on the handle of public leadership on the national stage.
Let’s support the government of President Tinubu to stabilize and get its acts together again.
We were here in the past 8 years. We saw pepper, but we survived. We shall yet overcome this season 🙏. Evidently, the current challenges are damn too tough. But to those who suffered the brunt of the 30-month civil war, namely the Igbos, what is happening now is a feast, when compared to what they went through. That may explain why many of them don’t seem to feel the pains of the moment that much. They have gone through the worst times.
We are persuaded that this season shall soon pass, it might take a bit longer because of the deep economic hold dug by previous administrations, particularly the last one.
We must stand together to win, not together to protest. Protests won’t solve the problems. Instead, it will throw our nation into the hands of those who have ever desired to see us disintegrate.
At a time like this, the greatest responsibility of citizens is to be strong and demand accountability from those in public office and refuse to be distracted. We must draw from our ingenuity and resilience to overcome this season.
This is the time to bring forth the transformational leaders. This administration is still young 🌱 The table can still turn for our collective good. North, South, East, and West, let’s stand with this administration to deliver on its touted Emilokan mandate. May peace and development envelop our Nation.
~ Dr. Joseph C.
Ibekwe
Leadership Consultant
@ Fled Institute, Abuja
Tel: +234-8033261363
Email: jibekwe907@gmail.com
