Two things worry me about President Muhammadu Buhari. I wonder why he has given the most definitive directions about his administration when he is out of the country. It was while the President was being interviewed in the United States that he promised to appoint his cabinet in September. Before then, nothing that was said or written in Nigeria got more than the tentative explanation that he was shopping for the best hands. It was also in the US that the President, last week, revealed his plans to be the Minister of Petroleum Resources although there were conjectures about that earlier. So, why does the President not talk to us at home?
The second and most important concern is what I consider to be the President’s messianic complex. While it is possible to situate this in the possibility of his starting to believe the hype that he is the only Nigerian who can turn things around as a lot of his supporters sold to us during the elections, I think the tendency dates back to the President’s days as a military leader.
The coup that brought Buhari to power in 1984 was a salvaging mission as the proponents made us believe. However, those who eventually drove Buhari out of office told Nigerians that their coup, which produced the Gen. Ibrahim Babangida administration was a result of the former’s arrogation “to himself the absolute knowledge of problems and solutions and acted in accordance with what was convenient to him using the machinery of government as his tool…” The veracity or otherwise of the allegation is known to the gladiators but this was what the putschists put in the public glare about the erstwhile head of state.
Fast forward to 2015 and the President is gradually drawing into the cocoon of a one-man riot squad, the one who knows everything good and bad for the country and the only one,able to turn things around. Nigerians are building the image of an infallible super humanoid for Buhari and he seems to be falling for this fallacious proposition.
This is what I read from the President’s decision to hold the petroleum portfolio when his cabinet eventually comes into shape later this month, hopefully. I have heard arguments justifying his position but most of these points of view are based on one of sycophancy, ignorance or delusion.
One of these was the statement credited to the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu, to the effect that those who are opposed to the President’s ministerial position are “crooks.” While it is expected for Shehu to defend the actions of his principal, the President, his tirade against people who submit that Buhari should not hold a ministerial position appears as the onset of that inclination to dismiss criticisms no matter how constructive. The usual attempt to cow dissent into submission, which is adversative to democratic development.
The other argument which was reverberated by Shehu in his Monday intervention is that the President is qualified to be the Petroleum Minister because he held the position in the 1970s and that he retains the integrity to put an end to all forms of economic sabotage that has crippled the oil sector in Nigeria. I intend to attempt to impeach the first point after which I will suggest that Buhari’s integrity is not enough reason for him to superintend over the Petroleum ministry in spite of other urgent challenges that Nigeria has.
So, because Buhari was the Federal Commissioner for Petroleum and Natural Resources and chairman of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation between March 1976 and March 1978 confers him with the qualification to be minister almost 40 years later? Seriously? In a dynamic and ever-evolving industry as that of oil and gas? How much petroleum did Nigeria produce during Buhari’s commissionership and what was the population of Nigeria then?
That aside, do we realise that the realities of the oil business have changed dramatically in these four decades? For instance, when the President was commissioner, crude oil sale was a sellers’ market in which oil producers were supreme. Today, we have a buyers’ market requiring an alertness of mind, which even if the President could muster, would detract from his effectiveness on the more important task of putting Nigeria on the track for sustainable development. The United States of America, which used to be a leading importer of Nigerian crude, was itself reported to have overtaken Saudi Arabia as the biggest producer of oil in 2014. This year, China which remains the second biggest consumer of the product is said to have developed cold feet for Nigeria’s crude even as more countries begin to discover the resource and science is showing prospects for alternative sources of energy. The world has moved and the complex economic and business model has changed from the 1970s. Managing this ministry is therefore a combination of a deep understanding of the issues, outstanding diplomacy and absolute concentration on the ball. Something clearly difficult for the President to effectively handle, if you ask me.
While no one is able to impugn the well-advertised integrity of President Buhari, it will be outrageous to suggest that we cannot find any other Nigerian with character and a profound understanding of the oil business other than the President. Someone who the President could share his vision with and leave to run the show with utmost honesty especially as it is agreed that the President has a body language that will make it impossible for people to cheat Nigeria under his watch.
This is what I think the hallmark of leadership is all about. According to America’s sixth president and statesman, John Quincy Adams, a leader is someone whose actions “inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more.” Buhari should mentor more Nigerians to become the kind of people he envisions to be in government rather than believing that he is the only one who can do it.
It is unfortunate that in spite of all its human and natural capital, Nigeria is still largely dependent on oil currently and reversing this situation is what I imagine should be of utmost importance to any leader at this time.
To my mind, the job of the President should be supervising the expansion of economic opportunities, freeing the country from its mono-economic circumstance which is engendering assorted economic crimes.
The President should get busy with fixing the institutional architecture and delivery channels like the civil service, police and judiciary. He should be thinking about expanding the frontiers of prosperity by providing jobs, reforming the educational system which has broken down with the potential to abort the future of the country. He should be paying attention to recreating the country’s decaying infrastructure to promote businesses, formulating policies for national rebirth, and deepening the contents of our democracy and leadership requirements. All of these are too demanding for a president with limited tenure let alone combining the burden of ministerial duties. In any case, we have travelled this road before and six of the seven years of Buhari’s mentor, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, as minister of petroleum did not change the tendency for corruption and looting in the sector. This is why the sector would benefit more from institutional and legislative reforms than the hold of any strong man.
President Buhari should not believe the lie that he is the only one that can do it. In fact, the world and more so Nigeria do not need leaders with such a messianic disposition at the moment. As American inventor and philanthropist, Bill Gates, once said, leaders of this century must be those who empower others. Anything less than the capacity to boost the esteem of the people to rebuild the nation and become confident about being Nigerians is a disaster and an unworthy legacy for any leader to bequeath on a nation.
Twitter: @niranadedokun