Opinion
By Layi Deinde
Everyone needs a good surround, those who are so endowed to draw strength from people close to them easily make a mark out of life. Climbing the rungs of the ladder of life to be leaders.
One of the greatest strength a leader should always develop is the ability to attract sound minds, this goes a long way to ease leadership tasks.
What stands leaders out is the ability to listen to a diverse input, sieve and pick necessary ideas therefrom for planning and execution purposes.
The art of drawing people can attract benefit to them or otherwise, above all, people should establish a good reason of association.
On the surface, loyalty and allegiance are pledged on the lips.
It takes people with the vision to decipher what subordinates, hangers-on are up to.
The hard nut a leader must have the ability to crack is how to understand members of his/her team, collectively and individually. Based on principle.
How well a leader understands his/her team distinguish such leader.
Subordinates are human their effectiveness is a function of utilisation by a leader.
A subordinate could serve a great purpose with a particular leader and do otherwise with another.
Subordinates form a wall of different nature around leaders. A wall from its name is a shied, as much as it protects the leader, it should offer platforms through which leaders can silently have a good view of the horizon, independent of aides, to feel the pulse of the people and get some public opinion.
A leader is one person who should develop the ability to get information from a multiple sources for the good of the system he/she operates or manage.
Being a step ahead in thought processing and policy formulation is the hallmark of leadership.
The people found around @Muhammadu Buhari has a reasonable number of who can be referred to as his “ACHILLES*
This is no fault of the aides but that of a leader whose tolerance is highly elastic, almost unending.
Looking back to the episode of the former Secretary to the Federal Government, @Babachir Lawal.
It does not speak well for a leader to rely on external information or pressure before having a-know of events around the government. A government should be on top of every situation, having a know of all that is important. That the government was almost compelled to see the existence of a misdemeanor that requires a sanction is not good enough. The statement credited to @Babachir Lawal, asking “which presidency” when journalists besieged him for his opinion on his sack at the time remain a minus for the presidency.
The headship of the @DSS at the time the president forwarded the name of @Ibrahim Magu to the Senate for confirmation as the EFCC chairman, Lawal Daura happen to be from the same state and town with the president. One of the key reasons leaders bring people from their locality around is for consolidation of trust, however, it is never a license for such people to work at cross purpose with their benefactor, they are even supposed to make the job of the president easier.
That @Lawal Daura seat atop the security agency and two versions of correspondence were traceable to the agency on @Magu is a monumental embarrassment to a leader who in his magnanimity settled for his kinsmen as @DSS head.
Security operations are done close to the chest. Since the public got wind of the two letters, i don’t think it is out of place if the public gets to know of the punitive measures taken on the issue, if any.
The invasion of the National Assembly of 8th August, 2018 happened to be another horrible episode in our annals of history.
The People’s Democratic Party in reaction to the episode accused the government of being behind the despicable act.
It took the decisive and timely action of the Acting President to douse the tension by making the head of the security agency to pay a heavy price for the action.
The constant outcry of the wife of the president @Aishat Buhari must never be sidestepped.
At the beginning of the outburst of the existence of those who hold the president down by the jugular. The opinion about it was diverse, some people didn’t take her for her word.
The leaked video over the use of some sections of the presidential villa between the immediate and extended family of the president reinforce what she was trying to express.
Then the recent one between one of the presidential aides and the immediate family of the president again where gun shots were fired within the villa premises.
Incidents like the aforementioned points to the existence of people who lower the rating of the exalted office of the president with the needless struggle.
Thus putting the president in a fix.
A leader with an experience of betrayal of trust by those who served with him (1985 coup plot) is bound to continue to nurse the nightmare of whom to trust. Not minding we are in a democratic regime.
This is not unlikely to be one of the reasons @Muhammadu Buhari is working with those close to him and those they have come a long way together.
This gesture ought to be reciprocated with excellent delivery. This depends on what the President sets as standards of performance.
One of his close aides from the Congress for Progressive Change @Abubakar Malami have the ear and heart of the president. Some of the activities of the two time Attorney General of the Federation seems not to be in sync with what the President has as a pact with the Nigerian people.
Many of the incidents have come under public scrutiny, one wonders if the fence built around the President allows for him to have a feel of important events like the recent one whereby a Oil theft suspect has the authority of the Attorney General of the Federation to be involved in the sale of petroleum products seized from the same firm.
Assume no law forbids a suspect from exercising fundamental human rights.
The Minister of Justice is better off trying to establish the guilt of the suspect and not turn to be his counsel as portrayed in his defense of the auction of some petroleum products.
Moral compass can be applied
People found around a President who rode to position with the portrayal of integrity should also have such at the back of their mind, applying same in all their dealings.
Those who mouth and proclaim integrity should encourage obedience of our laws and those who uphold it.
In a nation of 200 million people, to get reputable firms without blemish who can perform a similar role as the suspected Oil thief should not be a herculean task.
It is unfortunate many people around the President travel in a different ideological direction from his, made possible entirely by no one but the Commander in Chief himself.
*Layi Deinde is a public commentator, lives in Ogun State, South-West Nigeria.
