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Obasanjo's Dynasty Ambitions By Abdulsalam Ajetunmobi Abdsalm@aol.com
The widespread report of President Obasanjo’s ambition to succeed himself at the presidency after next year general election has now risen to a sudden crescendo at the National Assembly where the legislators are openly wrangling between encouraging and opposing the constitutional amendment that will facilitate the President’s romance to prolong his stay beyond 2007.
However, it is my candid opinion that the President should rather quit at the expiration of his second-term next year and allow another leader to come on stage. By amending the constitution to elongate his stay, President Obasanjo in office, at the third time, will be fostering a personal cult rather than creating a culture of leadership in the country and this may rumble on for generations.
The difference between creating a leadership cult and fostering a leadership culture can be illustrated by the familiar situation that either cripples or sustains a once successful company after the departure of its Chief Executive Officer (CEO). In the cult of a leader, once the near-domineering personality (i.e. the CEO) that creates the success of that company departs, the company fades away and goes into oblivion.
However in the culture of a leadership, the success generated by the company is much more robust and durable because the success of the organisation is based on the combined energy and efforts of many people aligned toward a common vision and does not depend on the presence and personality of a single individual who, in this more level-headed.
An essential part of a good and responsible leader's job is to become dispensable through creating a culture of leadership that extends throughout his administration. A good leader must be able to identify where he can add most value or jump ship for others to come and express the same leadership actions and qualities he may be known for.
Those who argue in favour of prolongation of President Obasanjo in office beyond 2007 on the basis on his achievements, notably on the economic front, are overstating their case. There is no question that the President Obasanjo and his technocrats have brought more than scintilla of economic stability to the country after the near-comatose of the earlier years of Presidents Babangida and Abacha. But neither too is there any doubt at the level of electoral malpractice that went further in 2003 under his watch, securing for him and other politicians the current second term in total disregard for the right of Nigerians to free and fair elections.
Electoral abuse is an affront to democracy. As a reborn ‘democrat’ he is acclaimed to be, instead of allowing people to jostle round him for the purpose of perpetuating him in office, let President Obasanjo demonstrate his seriousness and commitment to democracy and introduce before next year general elections the necessary legislative changes that will make electoral fraud a criminal offence, with a wide range of penalties against its violation. If this can happen I am sure that, beyond those political charlatans he may be wary of their succession after him, there will come on scene credible and capable Nigerians with wide range of skills, knowledge and experience gained through academic, business and work activities ready to take baton from him at the Poll.
The sad truth is that President Obasanjo’s Nigeria now is effectively a one-party state. And, as long as the results of elections bear no significance for a string of our other conspicuously able leaders at home and the Nigerians at large, the ballot box will continue to be regarded as the object of immoral actions to shun.
America’s 22nd Amendment which prohibits a US president from serving more than two terms should be a barometer of how the debate at our National Assembly should be conducted. Over the years, there have been unsuccessful calls to repeal the Amendment, notably, by former Presidents Dwight Eisenhower, the first US leader affected by this Amendment, Ronald Regan and more recently Bill Clinton. But the point to take home here is that these calls were never made until after the respective presidents had left office.
For instance, speaking at the John F Kennedy Library and Museum in Boston in 2003, former President Clinton who left office in 2001 after the expiration of his second term said this:
"I think since people are living much longer... the 22nd Amendment should probably be modified to say two consecutive terms instead of two terms for a lifetime.”
But Clinton was not unmindful of maintaining a high moral ground for speaking openly in favour of the repeal of this Amendment, so he went further to emphasise to his audience that “such a change probably would not apply to him but would benefit future generations.”
We all should be wary and not excited at the prospect of President’s Obasanjo’s third term in office. No doubt, the ongoing attempt at a constitutional amendment to allow the President Obasanjo to serve more than two terms may have its validity in law as long as a due legal process is followed to the end, but law in itself is underpinned by moral virtues. How can we accord President the moral sentiment known as virtue (or praise) in consequence of him benefiting from the action initiated by him or by those close to him while still in office?
Powerful leaders (like Mandela and so on) always have epitaphs and legacies in their minds, because their goal is not to win a few rounds in the endless game of votes, while they hold the leader's baton, but to equip their countries to go from strength to strength long after the baton has been passed on. What is President Obasanjo’s legacy if after eight solid years he still not sure of his ability to retain and develop one, two or three individuals in his party as best future leader(s) for the nation?
If he is given another 4 years, I have my doubts that this would be achieved. In fact, my doubt has been further accentuated by the report of the reaction of the President to the allegation of financial impropriety recently levelled against Chief Bode George, his anchor in the South West. His Information and National Orientation Minister, Frank Nweke had to go all the way to brief the press on why the President thought it convenient to reject twice the report of the probe of Chief Bode George's chairmanship at Nigeria Ports Authority (NPA) between 2001 and 2003 conducted by Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) investigation team.
How many of such reports have been rejected by the President in the past? By the way, who should determine Chief Bode George’s innocence or culpability in this instance? Is it a competent court of law as done in the past on similar cases or, based on cronyism, the President?
To refer back to the above analogy of a company, the most impressive organisations are those with an array of capable hands who can take over the mantle of office from the CEO whose term as finished without any members of the company seeking the extension of such a CEO just because of his outstanding performance.
Also, in such organisations, the term of office is sacrosanct and must be obeyed for, staff at all levels are always acknowledged and valued as individual members and contributors. In other words staff are viewed as equals who are in different roles since they perceive roles in the organisation are being based on the development of individual capabilities and rather than on a reflection of the intrinsic value of the person.
Are we for really calling for a leadership cult, a rudimentary, incomplete, inherently ephemeral phenomenon that disappears once the personality that creates it goes away and hence in support of the third term agenda or, are we for a leadership culture that is self-sustaining, with or without the presence of its creator and hence, against the third term agenda? My analogy of a company above should be a reminder that we must never forget which side we are on in this prolongation matter.
Yours faithfully, Abdulsalam Ajetunmobi
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