Adhoc Nations, Security and Leadership - Part 1: A Reflection on Nigeria's Leadership Crisis
When Alhaji Lateef Jakande became governor of Lagos State in 1979, he was appalled by the state of affairs and the challenges that awaited new leaders. He discovered that despite the military's pretensions, the government of Nigeria had effectively ceased to exist in 1966. Jakande observed that the actions of military governors and heads of state were all ad hoc, with no transferable system or process of governance.
The military's approach to governance was characterized by a lack of method, formula, or process. Soldiers simply bludgeoned their way through the Nigerian forest, calling it governance. Any criticism of this approach was met with accusations of unpatriotism and enemy of the state, leading to a corrupt, directionless, and hollow civil service. The military's power and influence were based on bravado and intimidation, with individuals rising to positions of wealth and influence through connections with army officers, rather than knowledge or contribution to progress.
The solution to problems, according to the military, was simplistic. Crime could be reduced by executing criminals, and neighborhood disputes could be resolved by the police beating up the offender and guarding them. The more crimes, the more checkpoints. Sanitation was a matter of citizens cleaning their streets themselves. The military's primary interest was in protecting their own interests and plundering the nation, with security becoming a means to safeguard their plunderers and their loved ones.
Security, according to Nigerian leaders, was always about them, not the citizens. The military protected themselves without their subordinates shooting them, and security against coup plotters was strong. This led to a wobbly government, with leaders handing power to their colleagues who were carrying their bags. The culture of Nigerian leadership, Jakande argued, was no different from the military's abuse of Nigerians for over fifty years.
Civilian leaders, he noted, had their own personal police and armies providing security, and checkpoints were still in place, with people still being slaughtered. The only difference was that instead of blaming saboteurs, leaders would blame rising crime and insecurity on their political opponents, agreeing to increase checkpoints and police forces. Jakande questioned the correlation between security and checkpoints, citing a lack of studies showing a relationship between low crime rates and checkpoints.
The police, he suggested, might even be part of the criminal network. The quasi-military leaders' approach to security was purely kinetic, and their security forces were more about intimidation than actual protection. The author had a firsthand experience with the lack of security at Murtala Muhammad Airport, where military personnel were more about scaring Nigerians than providing actual security.
The Boko Haram conflict, Jakande noted, was an example of the leaders' focus on body counts rather than actual progress. Visibility was not security; it was intimidation. A nation that cannot protect its citizens' lives and properties cannot ascribe to anything else in the civilized world. Security was a broad subject, and those elected to think were no different from the mumu soldiers they replaced.
With an epidemic of insecurity and a nation threatening to invade, Jakande expressed dismay that elected leaders had not addressed the challenges and what governments were doing to improve security. They were treating citizens the way the military did, with their police beating them like soldiers. One of the greatest contributors to insecurity, he argued, was the lack of prosecution and punishment of criminals, making it easier to be a SAN than to prosecute public thieves.
The author criticized the leaders' silence as the nation faced one of its worst security disasters, questioning their capacity beyond being local champions. None of the Senators or House of Representatives members could communicate with their American counterparts, and they failed to address geopolitical implications. Jakande concluded that leadership in Nigeria was beyond the politics of area boys, and that the worst thing that could happen to a nation is to be run by the military.
The author reflected on the military's destruction of Nigeria's civilian and intellectual heritage, the civil war, and the mediocrity it had fostered. He questioned what Obasanjo would have done with a third term and whether Buhari had actually fought for anything during his presidency. Leadership, he argued, did not require thinking, and the army had brought Nigeria to this state. The author vowed never to tolerate the overthrow of civilian governance and called for a task force to address the nation's challenges.
