On creating the right atmosphere for leadership
It has now gotten so bad that the doomsayers of our nation are beginning to concoct stories all over and make allegations of an imaginary face-off between the First Lady and members of the president’s cabinet. Such doomsayers have gone to the extent of attributing to her the power to influence the sack of members […]
It has now gotten so bad that the doomsayers of our nation are beginning to concoct stories all over and make allegations of an imaginary face-off between the First Lady and members of the president’s cabinet. Such doomsayers have gone to the extent of attributing to her the power to influence the sack of members of the President’s cabinet or other key public officers. The most laughable is the allegation making the rounds around some sections of the media about an alleged face-off between the First Lady and the Secretary to the Federal Government, Alhaji Yayale Ahmed.
Granted that the First Lady is influential by virtue of the fact that her husband is the president of our country, but all the same it is unfortunate when the media, in discussing the issue of governance, keep advancing the thesis that the First Lady is such a demonic wielder of power who would, on a mere whim, order the sack of someone as highly placed as the SFG. Such thesis is a great disservice to the Office of the First Lady and a complete misrepresentation of the actual kind of personality she is, which is basically that of an amiable and kind lady who is doing her best to contribute to the development of the country through her office. Her effort in this direction is something that is open to every Nigerian to see. She is a passionate advocate of child health and child welfare and of the primacy of the family in our national life. Recently, she is an indefatigable fighter against the scourge of cancer that is ravaging the Nigerian society and has been working to see that Nigeria acquires a world class centre for the diagnosis and research on cancer so as to reduce the ravages of the scourge among the citizens of this country. Clearly, for someone so determined to effect a positive change, unnecessary distraction by way of media reports purporting to carve her as a power-hungry woman is a misrepresentation.
It is doubly unfortunate that in such a misrepresentation, the name of Yayale should be brought in to achieve a goal that is clearly nefarious. Yayale has been one of Nigeria’s most distinguished public servants and has displayed a rare talent for competence, commitment and service to the government of our country. This is attested to by the distinguished positions he has occupied over the years, serving successive government as best as he could. During all these years he never amassed the kind of wealth which has come to define our public servants of late. It would be recalled that not so long ago he was evicted from the residence he occupies as the Head of Service of the Federation when he couldn’t purchase the official residence he occupies when it was put for sale by the FCTA. This at a time when colleagues of his and subordinates were putting up millions of naira to buy up their residence. But now to come and put the integrity of such an exemplary public servant to question is a misrepresentation that any patriotic Nigerian should be sad about. That basically makes public service in Nigeria a curse and if such spates of spurious allegations are made to flow through the mainstream media, a time will come when this country will have a shortage of good men wanting to come forward and serve their country.
In addition, anytime efforts are made to discredit a public servant, it has now become fashionable to associate him with Obsanjo. One would think that by now such a pedestrian form of journalism has been exhausted three years after the demise of the Obasanjo administration. But alas for commentators with the least clue about what is going on in their country, Obasanjo has become a convenient scapegoat to explain everything that is wrong under the sun. Probably, the whole essence is to portray people like Yayale as disloyal to the Yar’adua administration. If that is the aim, it is pointless to waste so much ink in such an exercise when one remembers that Yayale was the current administration’s first minister of defense, a highly sensitive portfolio, before he was later appointed as the SFG at a critical time in the life of the administration when it is most in need of an anchor that will help it roll out it plans for the development and progress of the nation. We should be positive about Nigeria.
Allasure writes from Abuja