Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidate for Enugu State, Dr. Peter Mbah, has said the only way Nigeria could navigate out of its current multifaceted ordeals was through the right leadership in all the strata of the society.
Mbah, who is Chief Executive Officer, Pinnacle Oil and Gas Limited, disclosed while delivering a lecture as guest speaker at University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus, recently.
He bemoaned the state of the nation as discouraging to the youths, stressing that security collapse, high crime rate and ongoing industrial action by the Academic Staff Union of Nigerian University (ASUU) were products of bad leadership in the country.
Speaking on the theme of the annual lecture series, “Leadership in Modern Times: Youths Bridging The Gap” organised by the Medical Research and Humanitarian Society of the University of Nigeria, Mbah expressed confidence that only the right leadership would put Nigeria back to track by harnessing the huge potential of the nation’s youths to build a country of their dream.
“Good leadership should not only be about leadership traits, or visionary nature, but also about the ability of the leader to convey his vision and most of all, about his ability to carry his team through the motion of moving from their current state, to achieving their envisioned state. The test of leadership is the management of the journey and the dynamics of carrying the team along to the final objective,” he said.
Mbah said Africa is still battling with the kind of leadership model its colonial masters bequeathed on it which he called, heroic leadership complex, where leaders wanted to be worshipped as heroes rather than seeing themselves as servants of the people they’re representing.
“The collapse of leadership in Africa has had a reverberating effect on youths of the continent. Nigeria for example reflects this collapse in the different malaises suffered by the youths. For instance, the level of nepotism that is currently in the country, the collapse of security, the menace of students staying at home for upwards of seven months simply due to the inability of government and the lecturers’ union to come to an accord on issues of funding of universities have a linkage to this collapse. More significantly is the fear that the Nigerian economy can go bankrupt if no urgent steps are taken to halt the decline,” he said.
While looking at the dire implication of the leadership failure on the country, the 2023 governorship hopeful said the youths who are the most valuable resource are leaving Nigeria in drove in search of greener pasture abroad which he said is termed as “japa” often had such desperate youths journeying through the Mediterranean Sea to Europe and ending in disappointments and calamities.