The Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, SAN, on Thursday faulted President Goodluck Jonathan, for inviting parents of abducted Chibok schoolgirls to the Presidential Villa for the purpose of sympathising with them.He described the development as lack of empathy, saying Jonathan's leadership style "has re-defined empathy by inviting the bereaved parents to the presidential villa for commiseration.
"Fashola stated this in Abuja while delivering a lecture on 'The challenge of Democratic Governance' as part of activities to mark the 50th birthday celebration of a former Governor of Bayelsa State, Chief Timipre Sylva.
He insisted that Jonathan's attitude was "Truly strange and Truly unAfrican"He asked, "How does this sound? 'Hello neighbour, I heard you lost your child to abductors. Please come and see me at home so I can sympathise with you'."This is my paraphrasing of what has so far transpired. As if this was not bad enough, the event had been followed by another round of lies about whether or not they tried to give money to the bereaved parents.
For me, it's a low point for leadership, it suggests lack of empathy."According to him, "The first lie when the news of the abduction broke was that all the abducted girls had been retrieved.
When that was exposed, the next lie was to raise doubts whether they were truly missing. "When that was not enough, they are now telling us that they know where the children are. We are prayerfully waiting that they will bring the children home."
Fashola, who had earlier canvassed for the active involvement of the elite in politics in order to provide necessary professional skill to drive the nation's development, said, "Until recently, we all used to think that our national development was inhibited by the fact that we never had a university graduate as leader of any national government in an executive capacity."This perhaps alludes only faintly to the issue of the elite consensus, but it is not the same. Thankfully, the myth of graduate leadership as desirable as it is, has been exploded now."We have two graduates (one zoologist and an architect) and I think the majority of Nigerians will tell you today that their lives are worse off than they were four years ago."So there is more to leadership than a university degree and educational qualification.
There is character, vision, courage, empathy, compassion and many more attributes that you simply will not find in a classroom or school. They are in homes, in communities and also in the value system of society."Fashola therefore encouraged politicians to make politics interesting and worth being participated in by the professional elite.He said, "Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, it is still regrettable that the majority of the members of our political parties and politicians do not yet include the critical elite of our society."Whether we like it or not, history has shown that the elite of any society, especially its professional cadre, and the very best of them decide the direction of the nation when they come to a consensus about the pathway for their nation, even if they belong to different political parties.
Where are all the people who have built things with their hands in our society? Where are the founders of the big banks, businesses, telecoms in our body politic? Are they just content to finance and yet remain unwilling to take the plunge?"Are they willing to identify with the ruling party in Abuja, and the party in Government in their states when they get to their bases for fear of reprisals?" he asked.
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wise saying but i disagree with u on something- our president is a graduate. there is a wide difference btw being a graduate and being educated
ReplyDeleteWhat is the point. He is not educated ??!
Deletethanks ur Excellency u talk alot wisely, but do only graduates should bring positive changes?
ReplyDeleteFashola has become a huge joke as governor of the largest city in Africa. I will begin by faulting your statements. In Africa, it is not only the village head ths visits the bereaved. It is the subhead that visit first, then make way for the overall head. Fashola should have defined empathy by going to Chibok to see the parents of thr Chibok girls after all he runs a state with 10 times the budget of Borno state. Fashola's Lagos has become a nightmare with no good road in place. Lagosians are worse of under his administration yet he has the impetus to caricature the president. Fashola has no regard for the office of the president and from all indication he will not smell the office.
ReplyDeleteunfortunately it appears as if these guys have lost ideas as to what leadership is all about. At every fora the topic must centre around Good Luck. A Bola Tinubu stooge is here insulting my president.
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ReplyDeleteDon't they have better things to do? Rather than making inflammatory statements they should think of how to fight ebola. please
ReplyDeleteJust that we like lies in this country.
ReplyDeleteIt is wrong to make a zoologist as a leader; a person whose skills are to take care of animals; the persons that had gotten no education in managing human being but to manage dangerous animals, aquatics and other reptiles.
5 years ago, I say there was nothing special about this Fashol guy, some people said no. Here you have it...Dumb Speech celebrating a dumb man in a very dumb way. How can you say FG did not acheive anything in 3 years?
ReplyDelete- Bank Stability
- Roads (Benin Ore, East west, Abuja 10 lane, Lagos Kano Rail way,)
- Agriculture food import bill reduction\
- Cement Sufficiency
- Local content in Oil and gas
- 22 airports re-modelled
Even the 3rd mainland bridge which is the major infrastructure in Lagos has been maintained 2x in the last 3 years...These are all acts of a sleeping government???
You see why I told people Fashola is a polished "dumb" man irrespective of been a SAN. The man is not in charge of Lagos. Tinubu must have told him to get more aggressive on the ruling.
A SAN who does not respect the no 1 office of the land is a illiterate and poorly behaved one akin to moronic tendencies at the highest level. About 20% of nigerians live in Lagos...Am sure if you were busy touching their lives, the opinions will be different.
Permit me to say this. Im in no way political or support anyone and my comment is neither in support of fashola comments or yours. May I ask you this...lets say you are a civil servant or salary earner, do you send your boss a thank you card each month he pays your salary or always talk about how things could be improved in your workplace? Well I know Nigeria is a peculiar place where non performance is the benchmark for measuring performance. Even the so called fasola just like gej has done nothing other than what they ought to do. But can we question if they do nothing? Even if we do..it gets us nowhere thats the nigeria factor. I support objective criticism and if Nigeria could have shadow political appointees from opposition party so that present ministers could be criticized by opposition shadow minister.
DeleteCan Fashola who is asking educated Nigeria n's to run for office come out to say categorically that he will run for senate in 2015? Of course he can not without Tinubu's permission. He is probably the only incumbent governor who can not dare to run for senate on completion of his term so he should just keep quiet and remain the stooge he is.
ReplyDeleteFashiola should know that he lives in a glass house. A governor that openly discriminats against other tribes that allows touts free reign that taxes citizens more than they earn that does not regard a non yoruba as part of stake holder in Lagos such governor should keep quite because Tinubu could not have kept quite if tax payers money is not been used to settle him. Educated tout calling himself a san.
ReplyDeleteLet love lead. Tribalism or not we are all human being. The Yorubas should stop discrimination. It not good.
ReplyDelete