‘Obasanjo, Yar’Adua, Jonathan, Buhari are Accidental Leaders’ –Na’Abba
‘Obasanjo, Yar’Adua, Jonathan, Buhari are Accidental Leaders’ –Na’Abba. Former Speaker of the Nigeria’s House of Representatives under Former President Obasanjo’s first tenure, Ghali Umar Na’Abba, has come out to describe all the leaders who have ruled Nigeria since the days of Obasanjo till the current administration as “Accidental Leaders”
The former speaker said that accidental leadership brings about trial and error in governance which as been the problem of Nigeria since 1999.
Speaking during the weekend at the 2016/2017 Matriculation and Fellowship Endowment Ceremony of National Institute for Legislative Studies, NILS, in Abuja, Mr. Ghali Na’Abba revealed that the situation in the country is not the same as the prepared and vision-driven leadership obtainable in other democracies of the world.
The former speaker also suggested that in order to tackle the current situation in leadership, regular tutorials for political leaders at all levels must be practice and more Nigerians most try to involve themselves in politics to open up the political space.
“Circumstances at hand or situations on ground have, to a large extent, over determined who and who was elected into office in Nigeria as President since 1999, against level of preparedness on the part of the leaders in terms of clear vision and programmes obtainable in most democracies of the world, culminating in accidental leadership for the country,” the former speaker said.
Na’Abba added;
‘I believe that not just the legislature, but every arm of government serving the purpose of governance, must invest in exposing democracy to the people. “It is a sad commentary on our political life that today, recruitment into leadership has been subverted by a few politicians because they deny Nigerians opportunity to contest elections and achieve their aspirations through the systematic appropriation of political parties to themselves.
“These politicians have stopped the growth of democracy. And it is true that unless democracy is allowed to grow, we cannot achieve the desired political growth, we cannot achieve the desired economic growth and we can also not achieve the desired social growth in our country. That is why we are still in political, economic and social doldrums. We have been having successive accidental leaders since 1999’.
