By NewsBits
The Founder/Chief Executive Officer, Pinnacle Oil and Gas Limited and Enugu State Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), governorship candidate, Dr. Peter Ndubuisi Mbah, has said that the only way Nigeria could pull herself from her present multifaceted predicament was through the right leadership in all the strata of the society.
Dr. Mbah, who made this known while delivering a lecture as guest speaker at the University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus, criticised the state of the nation as discouraging to the youths, stressing that security collapse, high crime rate and the ongoing industrial action by the Academic Staff Union of Nigerian University (ASUU) were products of bad leadership in the country.
Focusing on the theme of the annual lecture series, “Leadership in Modern Times: Youths Bridging The Gap”, organised by the Medical Research and Humanitarian Society, University of Nigeria, Mbah expressed confidence that only the right leadership would put Nigeria back to track by harnessing the huge potentials of the nation’s youths to build a country of their dream.
He said: “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 that 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.” This, he said, had caused the collapse of leadership in Nigeria where youths are now at the receiving end.
According to him, “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.”
Commenting specifically on the dire implication of the leadership failure on the country, Mbah said the youths who are the most valuable resources 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.
But the PDP standard bearer in Enugu State insisted that the rush to escape the country by the youth was a colossal loss to Nigeria as the country had lost hundreds of her prime human assets with potentials to rescue the country’s future from the tragedy that lies ahead.
He quickly added that Nigerian youths had become so disillusioned, disenchanted, and frustrated that they would never bother considering the risk involved in embarking on illegal journey to Europe. The oil and gas magnet further charged the youths to put their acts together for leadership by equipping themselves with leadership skills and techniques.
He also appealed to various institutions and bodies to deliberately set up leadership programmes that would address leadership deficiency on the youths even as he commended the MEDRHUS for organizing this year’s lecture, noting that it’s a right step in the right direction.
Explaining why leaders fail, Mbah said many leaders lacked emotional intelligence which goes beyond good technical or work skills to factors such as self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, and social skills. He stressed that every potential good leader must study and imbibe the characteristics of transcendental leadership.
Explaining the quality good leaders must also possess to achieve breakthrough in their defined goals, Mbah said such leaders must “imbibe the spirit of perseverance, humility, and commitment with a strong sense of mission, focus and teamwork.”
Mbah, who also shared his experience over the past two decades as a successful public and private sector figure, said that the youths and other aspiring leaders must never stop learning new things in a technologically driven dynamic system, adding, “they must seek out opportunities of responsibility or service; build self-discipline; learn to be good team players; build virile communication skills and always think of innovation or new ways of doing things.”
Further emphasizing on what the Nigerian society expected from the youths whom he referred as the leaders of tomorrow, Mbah said the country needed a modern leadership that is driven by empathy for the people and is hunger for the change of status-quo, calling on the youths to seize the opportunity presented to them to make good leaders and better their society.
