For true change, Nigerians have to control the ruling class —Pastor Sam Adeyemi

Senior Pastor, Daystar Christian Centre, Pastor Sam Adeyemi, in an interaction with Matthew Asabor, speaks on what it takes to make excellent leaders, and his vision for a new Nigeria.

WHAT does the Excellence in Leadership conference strive to achieve in Nigeria?

The point is, everybody acknowledges we have a leadership issue and it’s about the quality of leadership. We keep thinking if we can exchange the people that are there, things will change. However, we have been changing, how come nothing is happening? That shows us we are dealing with a cultural issue; we need to go a bit deeper.

So, 15 years ago, we started a leadership school called the Daystar Leadership Academy. We teach leadership, because we found out that leadership is a skill; it can only be learned. All over the world now, we have upper degree programmes in leadership – Bachelor’s, Master’s and Doctorate degrees in leadership. It can be learned; so we have got to train leaders. We have had 37,000 people go through our school. For young people, who have passed through our training programmes, at the organisations where they work, they tell us they are usually the best there, because they have been taught leadership. So, we then started the Excellence in Leadership Conference because now, we are going into a tribe of leaders coming out of Africa – world-class global leaders. Thousands of people that were present at the conference, most of them are graduates of our leadership school. Also, we are trying to get the attention of the nation and the continent. We believe there are many, who are learning to be leaders, so we bring world-class speakers, just to remind us of what we have learned about leadership and practice them.

Do you believe in a new Nigeria?

One of the first things you notice about a leader is vision; the capacity to see people, places and things not just the way they are, but the way they could be. That’s why people follow leaders, because people want to know where to go with their lives. So, when you look from a leadership perspective, Nigeria is not just a bundle of problems; it’s a bundle of opportunities, huge opportunities – the population, the climate, everything. I see glory, beauty. Sincerely speaking, I see clearly in my imagination, a developed Nigeria and the only thing to do is to prepare the new Nigerians that will build the new Nigeria and the world, in a project where we are grooming people, training people, helping them to see that new Nigeria. We even tried to show them some pictures of what Nigeria would look like in the future and we train them to function in that new Nigeria because Nigerians want Nigeria to change, but they are not clear about what Nigeria should change into, because most Nigerians have not been out of Nigeria. Those of us that have seen the developed world and how it works, have an idea of what Nigeria will look like when it changes and we want to prepare Nigerians for that new Nigeria.

What has been the reason for failure in Nigeria?

If you read the book Why Nations Fail, by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson, two professors of Economics of world class, they did a fantastic research and they were able to identify the difference between developed countries and those that are not developed. In every country, you always have the elite, the ruling class and they said, what they do in every country is that they use political powers to channel economic resources to benefit only themselves and people close to them. It is in every country.

The countries that have developed the most on our planet right now; most of them are countries where that power of the ruling class is curtailed. The US built the most powerful economy simply because it’s the only country where citizens have control over the rulers, that’s why their democracy is so strong and powerful. The problem right now in Nigeria is that the ruling class is consuming most of the resources, Period! If you hear the budget is N3 trillion, at least N2 trillion of it will go in the bank accounts or pocket of the ruling class and very little will get to Nigerians.

The Federal Government should spend tax money. The tax is a fraction of the income of the citizen and that is the structure. As long as the citizens are broke, government will be broke, so government will always be working for citizens to prosper so that the government can have money to spend. In Nigeria, however, the ruling class doesn’t need citizens’ money. If we say we’re going on strike, they just relax. As long as the oil rigs are pumping oil, money flows to the ruling class; that is why Nigeria has not experienced change. We have a few countries where they don’t have democracy but they have benevolent rulers. They just happen to have rulers that have compassion for the poor. Nigeria can’t wait for that; we’ve been hoping for that. As it is now, it is not people in Abuja or in government houses that will change Nigeria; Nigerians have to decide to control the ruling class.

One of the speakers at the conference mentioned the Born Democrats. We have two sets of people in the country – the ones born before 1999 and those born after 1999. How are we going to blend these in 2019?

The reality is that they will not blend; the two generations will not blend. The people that grew up in Nigeria before independence grew up in Nigeria that was not as developed as it is now. So, to them, things were okay. Secondly, they were born with prejudice – ethnic divisions. That’s why when they occupy positions of leadership, they find it difficult to bring development to the whole of Nigeria. So, you see the different ethnic groups warring against themselves. What the speaker helped us to see at the conference are the opportunities in the generation that was not born with those prejudices. They didn’t experience military rule. They are an opportunity, although, they also are a potential danger because, unfortunately for them, the public schools they attend are not as good as the ones my generations attended. They say ‘What goes into a mind comes out in a life.’ You look at the state of schools; it’s the description of what the country will look like in 30 years’ time.

So, the challenge we got at the conference was to engage with those young people. Today was created yesterday; the Nigerians today were created 10 to 30 years ago. We should not expect magic. The important thing is that we need to be strategic and long term in our thinking. I would say we should not only focus on 2019 because it’s practically almost shaped. Although we need to jump into the arena and contest for power in 2019, we should fix our gaze on 2023, 2027, 2030. They may sound like they’re far but it won’t be long.

I would say Nigerians now need to be strategic; everybody should decide what roles they should play in shaping the destiny of this country. Give it long term, 10 to 15 years and start from now to build your own influence and power. If you can pay school fees for someone, it is for your own good, because that’s how you build your influence through service. All of us need to develop our leadership ability.

So, whether the old people like it or not, 30 years from now, all those that are 80 years old, they’ll be gone. It’s just a reality that they will not be in control forever. You don’t need to take from somebody’s power to have power; you can build your own. It is in building your own that you change the power equation. Where they have 100 per cent before, you cut it down to 90 percent as you build your own. And eventually, we can change the power equation. Let’s act from now and walk towards a new Nigeria.