A Message to My Dear President, His Excellency, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan – By Dr. Kunle Ojeleye

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By Dr. Kunle Ojeleye | Calgary, Canada | April 20, 2014 –

Your Excellency,

I have not met you and do not know you on a 1-2-1 basis. But I believe that you are a good man with good intents for this nation called Nigeria.

When we voted for you as President which indirectly means the father of the nation, we did not do so because of your age. Being a responsible father has to do with maturity and a sense of duty rather than age. There are irresponsible 70-years old parents just as you will find a responsible 21-years old just-beginning parent.

We voted for you on the basis of conviction that you would look after us individually and collectively as Nigerians regardless of our political, religious and ethnic affiliations. We did not elect a sectional leader which your speech writers, partisan well-wishers, media aides, etc. are now projecting you to be. We voted for a national leader willing and able to provide us with the environment in which we can thrive in all areas of human endeavour and rest from our daily labour without having to keep one eye open due to insecurity.

However, as the C-in-C and the Chief Security Officer for Nigeria, (1) by surrounding yourself with aides as well as PDP functionaries whose utterances and actions are not only irresponsible but reckless, and (2) by refusing to reign in officials of your government who would rather play politics with the lives of Nigerians rather than thinking out of the box to find solutions to the myriads of challenges facing the nation, the image you are projecting is at variance to the good nature and Godly spirit you supposedly have.

You promised to make us happy, to make us laugh, to make us thrive and to make us proud as Nigerians. But the truth is that the agony, the cries of pain, the cloud of death, the foreboding sense of calamity in Nigeria has significantly increased in the last three years than all the years we have known ourselves as an independent nation.

Your excellency, as a passionate Nigerian who still have faith in your ability to make Nigeria and Nigerians smile again, I am using this medium to beg you:

To see yourself as Nigeria’s male version of Esther. That God has been so good to you to elevate you beyond your own imagination and the wildest dream of your enemies, to put you in the position of power to turn this nation around for good. That you have become the President of Nigeria for a time like these, to rise beyond sectional, political, ethnic and religious affiliation to provide succour to the people of our motherland.

To have the courage like David to boldly confront all the giants of corruption, terrorism, religious/ethnic irredentism that threaten to make Nigeria desolate.

Be audacious enough to be fair to all parts of the country whilst ensuring that qualified and competent people are put in positions of power/administration. This means sacking all those ministers, aides, etc. who are in your administration just on the basis of political considerations, patrimonialism and nepotism rather than their professional competence.

Above all, your excellency, may I plead that you refuse to dance the tune of those within your political party who would rather burn down Nigeria if their personal interests (political, economic, etc.) ambitions and egos are threatened in one form or the other. These include all those who have deliberately sabotaged the efforts to make electricity work, as well as those who have inordinate ambitions to get into power for the sake of the privileges it brings rather than for service to the people/nation.

Leadership is about making the right decision for the benefit of the majority, more often than not to our own discomfort or the discomfort of those close to us.

God bless you, God bless Nigeria and all its inhabitants, and may peace as well as prosperity reign in our motherland.wp_posts