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01 July 2012
By Abdulwarees Solanke
In theory and practice, in books and from mentors, at
home and in the public, in the private sector and in
government service, we see leadership in action and
inaction. There are men and women with pretensions of
servant-leadership and those with acclaimed skills of
entrepreneurial leadership; there are those with
obsession for history; there are those with mission
without vision; there are democrats and there are
autocrats as leaders; there are laizes faire leaders
as there are also the charismatic; there are those
with the eyes for the loot; there are errand boys and
yes men on parade as leaders in the public sphere
just as there are failures and jobless men and women
strutting the leadership corridors and arena of power.
There are men and women of diligence and distinction
making little successes in their private arena or
hidden in the back offices of power or making waves
and long lasting impact in the public glare too just
as there are lousy occupants of power centres in our
general polity as well. For now, we are in a quandary
as to which form of leadership will serve our national
interest better, now or in the future. Therefore, our
nation must decide which typology of leadership
eventually predominates in our leadership training,
recruitment and selection process.
It is not the fault of those who find themselves in
leadership and they started misbehaving. Those who
rose to power to loot the resources of the state
should not be blamed for their indiscretion and
corruption. We must sympathize with those who landed
in the opulent state houses or the hallowed green or
red chambers without a clear idea of what they are
supposed to do other than to debate their allowances
and official perquisites. But it is a national tragedy
that we are still struggling to evolve a system that
will guarantee the emergence of credible leadership at
various levels of our polity to drive productivity and
integrity in our nation.
What seems to be lacking for us is the correct
appreciation of leadership. Leadership is vision and
mission erected on conscience. Conscience on the other
hand is nurtured by sincerity. Sincerity is a product
of certain spirituality, altruism and fidelity. This
leads us to raise more questions? What are the
hallmarks of sincerity? The defunct national Concord
has as its credo, Truth is Constant; The Guardian
proclaims as its motto: conscience nurtured by truth
and goes on to adopt Sheikh Uthman ibn Fodio's maxim:
Conscience is an open wound, only truth can heal it.
Between the notion of truth and sincerity is a just a
thin divide. In fact they overlap. The presence or
lack of Truth or fidelity and sincerity are what
defines or qualifies the purity of conscience and
action when we get to leadership. When conscience is
clean, service is rendered unconditionally; power is
sought to serve purely; leadership is anchored on the
utilitarian worldview, For God and Man. But these
assumptions and positions are not adopted just
voluntarily. No. They come from a disciplined
orientation over a long period. They are cultural.
They are systemic. So, we should ask if our system of
leadership training, recruitment and selection has
evolved through such a disciplined orientation
process. We should ask if our national culture
conduces to producing leaders who will serve with
integrity, for God and Man. We should evaluate our
leadership benchmarks and standards to see if they
meet the best performing indicators in other climes.
There is an irony: a large chunk of the followership
also hate to see the emergence of a credible
leadership in action. We tend to favour someone who
will bend the rule in our favour. We dislike a leader
who has the courage to make difficult choice and
decision because it is unpalatable, albeit
temporarily. But it is also from the followership that
the leadership evolves and emerges. So, if we have a
followership that is easily pliable, that cannot
endure difficulty, it becomes a recipe for a
compromising and corrupt leadership in the future. The
point to be made here is that we are still struggling
to erect a conscious and consistent leadership
training, recruitment and selection mechanism in the
country. The reality, however, is that it is extremely
difficult now to prescribe where leadership training
should start. Who taps or what institutions discover
and train the future credible leaders? This is a tall
order of a question.
We are in a situation where reform institutions are
heavily compromised. We are in a world where
ecumenical centres are cesspit of depravity. Right and
value oriented parenting has given way for media
surrogating at a time globalization is advancing the
clash of civilization, with the authentic African
values being the victims of materialist merchandizing
from the West. Agents of social change and
socialization are today easily the best vanguards of
moral corruption. Institutions that should glorify in
character and learning are today the bastions of
intellectual fraud and licentiousness. Elders who
should mentor future leaders are guilty of defiling
the innocence of youth. Scholars who should be
embodiments of intellectual honesty are deeply
enmeshed in academic fraud. Workers in the Lord's
vineyards are the apostles of apostasy.
So, what quality of leadership do we expect to emerge
in this confusing scenario? We can guess that they
will be leaders schooled in hedonism where the flesh
and the belly take precedence over conscience, the
intellect and the spirit, or they will be products of
the school of Machiavelli where competition, distrust
and betrayal are the main values. Here, little or no
room is given for cooperation and compromise. Our
leadership experience seems to suggest that we do not
believe in win-win. We seem to relish in the winner
takes all mentality. While competing with others, our
subconscious seems to always tell us, ‘it's either me
or nobody else'. It is usually no mercy, no
forgiveness. No friend, no foe. No permanent
friendship but permanent interest. We easily forget
that power and sovereignty belongs to the Most High,
even though we are also aware that power corrupts and
absolute power corrupts absolutely.
However, the leadership training vacuum is not
entirely irredeemable; after all, not all conscience
will be dead. Some souls will always see hope.
Therefore, the long wait to mind the gap, fill the
vacuum or compensate the deficit for and evolve the
right leadership recruitment and selection process is
worth all the endurance, faith and hope. It begins
with YOU, not the system, not the school, not the
screen, not the one you see before you pontificating
on salvation. This is because the Almighty will not
change the grace or condition of someone until he
makes the resolution and takes the initiative.
Bridging the leadership lacuna begins with your
resolve.
Abdul-Warees Solanke, Head, Voice of Nigeria
Training Centre, Broadcasting House, Ikoyi Lagos
studied Mass Communication and Public Policy and
writes via
korewarith@yahoo.com |
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