Ojedokun: To Nigeria, ‘I have found my voice’

AS we enter into this crucial election period, to Nigeria, I sound a clarion call; to those who are dissatisfied with the current status quo, I conclude with a series of posers. If there is anybody out there who still disbelieves that my life is an example of someone who demonstrates the art of the impossible becoming possible; who still wonders about the legacies that my ancestors left me; who still questions whether a small diminutive boy with little academic potential can rise to great heights; then this article is your answer. If there is anyone that doubts the potential of the question called ‘Nigeria’, this is my response. If there is anyone who asserts that our country will only end in sorrow and tears and blood, today I challenge that assertion.

    It is various Nigerians who reject the myth of their generation’s apathy who have challenged me to take on the orthodoxy of current thinking and to ask the hard questions. They have challenged me because they understand the gravity of our task, which lies ahead and the futility of doing nothing. 

     The pathway ahead remains hard, our ascent steep, and we may not get there with one election, but I am filled with more hope now than ever before that we will get there and we will reclaim our voice. I do not in a thousand years suggest that my words conceived in the depths of my anguish should end on the screen of a computer.  I am certain that this election may not bring about all the changes others and I seek; but it creates a space for us to make that change. As the electorate, this is our chance to reclaim our voice to answer the call for this is our moment and this is our time. By default, we have had bad governments in Nigeria because we have allowed the past and present rulers to operate on the unending margins of despair and apathy. They acquired power not because they had a genius about them but because we were asleep in deep slumber and the coalition of progressives was fractured.

    In the past, I have made reference to the template of President Obama, the improbability of a black man becoming the President of the United States. I have written about the near impossibility that was overcome when the first man was sent to the moon. The obstacle that Apartheid presented and the dismantling of it without a bloodbath, the impregnability of the Berlin Wall which came tumbling down! I therefore lay down a challenge to the cynics who claim that Nigeria is an impossible case and that without our abject surrender to corruption and its accompanying violence, we simply do not have a chance at mounting a challenge to the status quo.

   I ask what do we have to lose by trying? I suggest we lose more in not trying at all. I go further to state today that by helping the people find their ‘voice’ across the Diaspora in Nigeria from Sokoto to Lagos, Kwara to Taraba, Borno to Imo, Cross River to Kano, we will be able to proclaim with all certainty and voices soaring above the skies of Nigeria that our time has come!

      I visualise a quality of leadership whose style is outstanding. Leadership that influences others through inspiration, generated by a passion and ignited by a genuine and sincere purpose.  Not a leader who lords it over the governed and is only after personal aggrandizement and avarice. The vision is of a new crop of leadership, which demonstrates the passion and willingness to serve and serve responsibly.

    I suggest that the principle of good governance is acknowledged as essential for the success of any Nation. Leaders at the helm of our affairs should play a vital role in serving their causes and communities through committed passion as well as skills and experience to the instruments of governance and the governed. The principle of good governance enhances the provision of long-term vision and protects the reputation and values of a Nation. To make a difference, our politicians need to have proper procedures and policies in place. The principle of good governance will ensure the delivery of welfarist promises made through a team that is accountable, sincere and astute.

    For me I know my stand, my search has ended and ‘I have found my voice’.  My fervent hope is that we all discover what we seek as we tread our own respective path, proceed to the election booth and are faced with the ballot box.

• Dr. Ojedokun is of Lead City University, Ibadan.