Where are the fifth termers?

In the wake of electioneering campaign for last general elections, some Idoma sycophants drummed support for Senator David Mark. Among their laughable reasons was maturity and experience. I for one countered and deconstructed their sycophantic posture on pages of newspapers and social media. They forgot that even lawyers come to the legislative chambers to learn […]

In the wake of electioneering campaign for last general elections, some Idoma sycophants drummed support for Senator David Mark.
Among their laughable reasons was maturity and experience. I for one countered and deconstructed their sycophantic posture on pages of newspapers and social media. They forgot that even lawyers come to the legislative chambers to learn the nuances of the tradition. Leadership must have succession as heritage for continuity of any system. Those who want to sit tight and die in position of power are not in sync with the reality the modern time. If the younger people are pervasively excluded from political participation and yet expected to be the leaders of tomorrow then we shall have social anomie. Those who manipulate them today shall live to see the negative results. If the National Assemblies are rendezvous for ex-governors or gerontocracy, some body tell me why many of these tired Legislators sleep through legislative sessions. Our Fifth Termer has not been very active lately since his party lost to APC and invariably he fell from the most coveted seat of Senate President to a floor member. I doubt much if he would not have schemed to be the Senate President for the third time had PDP won the last general election.
In developed countries of the Western world today, national leadership at the executive and legislative arms of government are increasingly becoming an exclusive reserve of the youths. While in Africa, the reverse is the case as recycled group of ex- military men and their civilian collaborators in the Civil service and private business dominate the political space.
Yet, the media is always inundated with the lip service of “the youths are the leaders of tomorrow”. It is a systemic failure that bothers on recurrence decimal as the seed of destruction was sown right from the time of self-rule. Instead of concentrating on building a solid national foundation based on integration and development, the three major ethnic tribes were busy fighting primordial ethnic and religious war of hate and suspicion. Today, we are living witness to a slide towards disintegration as these three principal stake holders in the Nigerian project struggle to maintain the fragile oneness.
The writing on the wall shows signs of the youths becoming leaders of tiny parts of the larger territories as they become kidnappers, armed bandits, militants, fundamentalists, cultists, pirates and war lords. Who then is to blame? In the face of growing unemployment, cost of living keeps increasing astronomically. How can a hungry man not be angry when he is not an angel who falls from the sky?

Ogbu Ameh, Akatekwe, Benue State