THE MOST TRAGIC TENDENCY IN NIGERIAN LEADERSHIP

ONE OF THE MOST TRAGIC TENDENCIES IN THE NIGERIAN MODEL OF LEADERSHIP

There is something I have not yet understood that makes a previously empathetic person get into a position of leadership in Nigeria and almost immediately become impervious to what once seemed to give him concern.

This sort of insular attitude cuts across all levels.
How many times have we seen people who were close to the masses before they got power become detached from them almost immediately after getting it?

Probably uncountable.

I remember when President Obasanjo first got elected in 1999; during an event he saw a soldier whipping the surging crowd in a bid to control them, and in a fit of rage he snatched the whip from the soldier and used it on him. Obviously he remembered what he suffered during the time of his incarceration in Abacha's gulag a few short months earlier.
But as the months progressed that connectivity of empathy he previously showed began fraying and progressively he seemed to become callous.

A governor of a South-East state was a champion of the masses before he got elected. The people gave him an overwhelming vote of confidence and he beat the incumbent who was a member of the party in the centre.
But today he is the one destroying markets and using the money he should use for workers' salaries to build statues.

And it seems to go beyond Nigeria.
Robert Mugabe was once celebrated as a deliverer, but today on the streets of Zimbabwe celebratory dances and shouts are greeting news of his removal.
He got disconnected at some point.

And this is the same attitude I have seen among most who enter positions of leadership irrespective of what kind (religious or secular, corporate or political) and what level.

This penchant for a disconnect is something that transcends all types of leadership (in Nigeria especially) and I can only assume that one major reason is the culture of sycophancy that makes those who lead detached from the realities of those they lead.

Whatever it is we must get the right model of leadership in all strata.