the exhibition of their exotic cars, power bikes,
mansions, companies, pictures from foreign lands
they went for holidays, their glowing wives,
husbands, children and concubines. They show-off
these on the internet, newspapers, TV and, make
commentaries on the radio for self-exaltation. They
see leadership as titles and not, how many of their
loved ones and followership they have positively
influenced or would do. They see their gallery of
wealth as the influence they are giving to those who
look up to them. Since the wealthy in the society see
these things as leadership, there has been
tremendous leadership shortage in the country.
Because of this type of mindset to leadership, the
consequences are where we are at present: virtually
everybody is shortcutting what used to be the
gradual process of living to attain a height of
financial wealth. While many are doing this, they do
not know that they are like those who ignorantly use
pills to reduce weight, oblivious that they are digging
for more danger to their lives than the natural weight
they had thought was unbecoming.
Shortcuts have consequence. A critical look at it
would attest to the fact that it's this reason that
governments at all levels in Nigeria have not gotten
anything right. They implement policies that are not
formidably executed; they read yearly budget that do
not commensurate with the on ground works, and so
on. Due of leadership shortage in Nigeria, many
things are now worse, than any emergency approach
given them.
Gaining influence is just the meaning of leadership
and not, showing of influence. Many Nigerians do not
think about the next step to take in order to uplift
humanity here, but the next exotic car to paint the
street red, the next mansion to build in order to
intimidate the next neighbour, the next holiday
picture to post online in order to compel family and
friends to begin to bite their fingers.
Those the leaders want to cheer them are hungry and
many do not even have hope of where their next
meal would come from, where money for their next
house rent would be raised from. What some of these
leaders define as leadership is just the addiction of
showing their wealth to their hapless followership, as
if they are employees working very hard for
promotions.
While they want the financially poor masses to be
promoting them, the only agenda they have for
them, are those intimidating outings they make for
the poor to be lavishly glaring at and admiring them,
without a twinge of conscience of where they placed
the poor in life. Their acquisitions mean a lot to them
and not, the welfares of the subjugated masses.
Leadership shortage has made many Nigerians to be
sitting on the bare ground today. The leaders want
the led to see Nigeria as a country that should mean
a lot, without them leaders seeing the poor to mean
anything to them. Rarely is there any opportunity
that would enhance the growth of the poor individual
like it is wont in the so-called developed world, where
the level of opportunities to school appropriates the
level of corruption in Nigeria.
In Nigeria, many people's understanding of the
concept of "God" is just political. They use 'God bless
you' in order to make people accept them as godly
people, whereas they find blessing anybody really
good somewhat hard thing to do. Apart from their
gallery of wealth, the next thing they so much show
in the public is "God". They do not have a more
realistic view of theirselves. They see the act of
leadership as a correlation between wealth and
amassing of it; not a relationship between leading
and the masses.
Because leadership has been assumed to be the
position of those with much wealth, the poor would
no longer guarantee self as one capable of being a
leader. The poor has been so much intimidated by
the rich to always believe that leadership has a
residence with those that call the shots in the
society. This is a widely misunderstood fact.
Leadership is not a position, but an activity, not like
the idea that the highest bidder goes with the prize,
but an act of showing comprehensive examples for
others to follow in the promotion of humanity and
not, when there is something that has to do with
politics and business alone.
Perhaps, this could be the reason a Vikas Swarup, the
author of The Accidental Apprentice (and Slumdog
Millionaire), was quoted as saying: "Leadership is the
one competency that cannot be learnt in
management school. A manager is trained to do
things right; a leader does the right things. It is not a
matter of training and preparation, but one of
instinct and conscience."
Therefore, the conscience of leadership has to be
reborn; not the everyday reborn of titles and
showing-off of acquisitions. Nigerians at all level
must make the citizenry better by eschewing the
love to obsequiousness. It is a killing behaviour,
when anyone sees the promotion of exotic cars as
leadership or those who purchase such cars for the
simple purpose to intimidate others as leaders.
It is time Nigerians began to see these types of
leaders who do nothing but to exhibit their numerous
wealth as persons who have limited contributions to
make for the wellbeing of Nigeria. Remove those
material items from them and be amazed how empty
they are. Everybody can have positive impact and
become a leader. Against this backdrop, leadership
must be seen as an art for influencing another in
direction for the wellbeing of the society and not, for
the individual buttering. We must take the advise by
a John Izzo, PhD, whose write-ups suggest that
Leadership is not about what your business card
says, what your title is, or where you sit on the
organizational chart in your company. Leadership is a
posture, it is a decision that you want to have
influence over others in a positive way.
Sent From David Aniemeka
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