Governor Willie Obiano of Anambra State has said he supported the re-election of President Muhammadu Buhari because he foresaw his victory for a second term in office.
Governor Obiano, who disclosed this through his Chief Press Secretary, Mr James Eze, in a statement, said he knew that it was impossible to beat President Buhari in the election.
Eze said the governor made it clear to his close friends and allies that the opposition did not stand a chance against the president.
He, however, advised against “any excessively emotive opposition that would rub off on Ndigbo for the umpteenth time.”
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He argued that in a federation that has developed a thick skin for fairness, equity and justice, it was wiser to be subtle than confrontational. He warned that Ndigbo must not stumble twice over the same stone.
“And now that the chicken has come home to roost, it has become clear to Governor Obiano that foresight comes at a price. Foresight is a lonely path to tread. It breeds unexpected resentment and hate.
He noted that some of Obiano’s Igbo brothers could not understand why he choose to “tread the less emotive path” in the last presidential election.
It is easy to understand why this is so though. In a land that has suffered for so long from a biting scarcity of bold and perceptive leadership, it is not common to see a leader who has enough courage to point his people towards an unpopular direction.
It is in fact hard to see a leader who has enough conviction to damn the consequences and swim against the current towards a hostile direction that he alone has seen as the only realistic choice left.
And so, for those who still deride and mock Governor Obiano for his foresight in the last presidential election, those who wilfully seek cheap opportunities to laugh at him, it might be worthwhile to always remember; that even the Scriptures warned us in First Corinthians chapter one verse twenty seven, that sometimes, “God uses the foolish things of this world to confound the wise.”
Foresight is a most ignored attribute of leadership. But a leader without foresight is blind in one eye, he concluded.
and then