Yes, change indeed began with him

It is true that President Buhari launched the ‘Change begins with me’ campaign, hoping that we will look at ourselves in the mirror and resolve to change. But the September 8th 2016 national re-orientation exercise only reminded me of when I sensed ‘the change’ within Mr President himself, since his second coming. On June 9th […]

It is true that President Buhari launched the ‘Change begins with me’ campaign, hoping that we will look at ourselves in the mirror and resolve to change. But the September 8th 2016 national re-orientation exercise only reminded me of when I sensed ‘the change’ within Mr President himself, since his second coming.
On June 9th 2015, I was one of those who believed Dr Bukola Saraki will not go to bed as the president of Nigeria’s senate. Though he had successfully executed the first civilian coup in this country, when he defied the President and outsmarted his party to emerge the senate president that day, I thought he will soon learn that he had messed with a no-nonsense General.
But no such muscle-flexing came from PMB. And when days turned to weeks and weeks to months, I was forced to accept that Saraki had won this battle of wits. Not even the code of conduct trial and the resultant disclosures of sharp practices by the former Kwara state governor, could disturb the peace he enjoys as Nigeria’s Third Citizen.
As he sits pretty on his esteemed chair in our hallowed upper chamber, Dr Saraki is not only really chummy with President Buhari now, he also appears to be the mouthpiece for some of government’s intended actions. How else do you explain his call for the sale of our national assets just three days before the federal government announces its decision to do just that?
Whichever way you look at it Senator Bukola Saraki has come a long way since the day we were told he had sent two aides to a bank 50 times in one day to make deposits for him.
So, as President Buhari beats the drum for change, we are forced to ask which change do we dance to; the one that saw him mellow down from a hard-hitting corruption fighter to an accommodator of corrupt politicians or the one that will imbibe virtues in us and make us exemplary citizens?
If it’s the latter, then PMB must know that we Nigerians also have our wish-list for him in this change campaign. Like my senior colleague Mahmoud Jega argued in his column last Monday, Nigerians have already changed enough in the last 17 months of this administration, the next change should come from our leaders.
In this vein, I would like to suggest to President Buhari a vigorous personal change routine that will inspire the rest of us to follow suit. As we all know, no amount of pontification can work better than leading by example. A body language that says ‘I’m ready to make sacrifices for the sake of our fatherland’ will send inspiration trickling down the spine of every Nigerian, in every village or hamlet across our federation.
Therefore the first on my wish list is for President Buhari to stop patronising foreign doctors and hospitals. He must develop confidence in Nigerian doctors and begin to trust them with his life. Unless he does that all those Nigerians selling their plots and farmlands to go for medical treatment in Egypt and India will not stop. Nor will those who loot our treasuries to go to Germany and the US, ostensibly for the same reason. Should Mr President find himself in such dire need of expert medical attention that our doctors can’t provide, then the very best such doctor should be sought anywhere in the world and be brought to Aso Rock Clinic to attend to PMB. This will certainly cost the country much less than flying the President abroad, paying for his and his aides accommodation and picking the bill for parking our own ‘Air Force One’ in an advanced country.
Talking about packing our planes abroad brings me to my second ‘change’ wish for Mr President. It is for him to instruct that all but two of the planes in the presidential fleet should be converted to commuter planes for commercial use. In a country with no national carrier to boast of, it is amazing that there are more than 10 aircraft in the presidential fleet. PMB should correct this anomaly by disposing of them all to the ministry of aviation for revenue generation, leaving only two for his and the Vice President’s use.
My third wish is for President Buhari to return any of his children or wards studying abroad to Nigerian schools and universities. In this ‘change’ step some Nigerians have already beaten him to it because their kids were chased back home by the foreign exchange nightmare. But PMB’s making such a move will have a much greater impact in getting numerous Nigerian parents to copy him. Not only will they troop back with their kids, thereby saving the country precious foreign exchange, those children will also benefit from better equipped and better funded Nigerian universities. This will happen because the return of children of the president and other big shots to our universities will certainly earn them much needed attention from the government itself. At a local level, we saw this in practice when the governor of PMB’s home state, Aminu Masari moved his kids from private to government owned schools.
My final change wish for President Buhari is to start diligent prosecution of all individuals fingered in corruption scandals by the EFCC. In the beginning so many cases were pursued that we began to applaud the fact that treasiry looters will soon meet their retribution. But suddenly all went quiet on the prosecution front and some of us were left to wonder whether we dreamt all those corruption allegations or heard them in real life.
Nothing can convince my fellow Nigerians that this administration is truly out to battle corruption until they see looters really facing judges and bagging their well-deserved prison terms. So here again we need to see change from His Excellency, PMB.
In the final analysis, this government must understand that my compatriots and I are willing to search our souls and accept that change begins with us and that it is  only when individuals change that societies can change. But to attain meaningful attitudinal change, the President and his men must display a body language that shows us the way. In his speech while inaugurating the campaign President Buhari had said: ‘This is why we have among our cardinal objectives “change” which implies the need for a change of attitude and mindset in our every day life.’ Well said Sir, but this must start from the top to bottom.