Doyin Okupe, former aide to the
immediate past President, Goodluck Jonathan, has faulted the nationwide speech
of President Muhammadu Buhari.
Okupe hinted that the speech was
hurriedly done without consultations.
In a Facebook post, the former
Presidential aide revealed how former President, Olusegun Obasanjo and his
former principal, Jonathan prepared their Presidential speeches.
“All presidential speeches
invariably become part of our history, hence the seriousness and importance
placed on their preparations by all Presidents.
“Some speeches are hurriedly put
together because of the urgency of the events they are meant to address while
others may take upwards of three or more months to put together.
“Those that are institutional or
departmental are by far easier to put together because the ministries or
departments always come up with drafts which the Presidency reviews and fine
tune them, depending on the major message the president wishes to pass across.
“During the Obasanjo era, he most
often prepared a general guide on the outlines of what he wanted to say or
discuss, of and on, with his speech writer Mr. Adobe who then came up with an
initial draft which is circulated to very few government officials and close
aides who also gave inputs with which a “final draft” was done.
“This final draft was amended and
adjusted daily until the final date of the event. When I eventually collected
the read speeches they always still had corrections and amendments in green ink
by President Obasanjo.
“In the Jonathan years the style
was a bit different. For a major Speech the president calls a fairly large
committee meeting of resource persons including the media aides, close
ministers and some departmental heads, the chief of staff and a few relevant
presidency staffers, and even some friends of the administration who were not
in government.
“I was in this category several
months before I joined the administration. Prince Nduka Obaigbena was perhaps
the most notable and consistent personality in this group.
“President Jonathan will brief
the meeting about the event and his line of thought about what he will like to
say. Sometimes he came with some 2 or 3 drafts from other sources, which may
also include Ruben Abati, or the late Oronto Douglas who were his two main
Speech writers.
“All available resource materials
were considered and “married” so to speak and it was Ruben’s job to do a final
draft.
“Sometimes however, the main
draft was prepared by Ruben, Oronto, my humble self and one or two other
persons. it was on this draft that the larger committee worked on.
“Evidently therefore preparing a
major presidential speech always is a laborious assignment and yet often times
it still ended up “off tangent.”
“A classic one I remember was an
independent day broadcast where the renaming of the university of Lagos was
suggested and accepted enthusiastically by all committee members including the
President and yet it turned out to be a PR fiasco of monumental proportion.
“It was a fiasco not because it
was wrong but because the prevailing mood in that section of the Nigerian
society in question was in total disallingment with the Presidential speech
writersm and essential officers.
“Such is the fate of many presidential
speeches in spite of the efforts put into them and the patriotic zeal and
fervour that drove the writers. Often a yeoman’s job that goes awry.
“If perhaps in the instance referred
to above we had taken advantage of the available technological instruments and
presidential outreach, to cross check and gauge the likely response, we may
have dropped that part of the speech and yet nothing would have been lost.
“The Americans seem to understand
it better for obvious reasons. In my 10day crash program understudying the
Presidential communication, I learnt many things which were later very helpful
in my presidential assignments.
“Mr Joe Lockhart, spokesman to
President clinton in my time who I under studied, once told me that prior to
Bill Clinton’s attendance at a state function, a quick opinion poll on the
preferable colour of the presidents tie is done with a sample of about 5000
women across the country.”
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I like ur stile of written no insult, no hate, no tonguelash unnecessarily.
ReplyDeleteI also believed dere r more to be included in speach, example d issue of npower, d issue of assu, d issue of hailing d VP for a work weldone etc.
tnk u Mr doyin
Of a truth it was hurriedly prepared. A lot of vital issues was missing
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteOf a truth it was hurriedly prepared. A lot of vital issues was missing.
ReplyDelete