By Oseloka H. Obaze
President Bola Tinubu’s Maiden Presidential Media Chat on 23 December, 2024, elicited understandable eclectic reactions. There were rave reviews and some unfavourable judgments. As 2024 ends and Nigerians behold 2025, there will be more punditry and assessments of the 500-and-something days of Tinubu’s rulership and a peep into the crystal ball to ascertain what the political future portends for him as a leader and for Nigeria under his watch. For the moment, two viruses have afflicted Nigeria’s policy and decision-making space – bad leaders and bad advisers. Often, observers focus on the leader and hardly on the coterie of advisers that are indeed ill-advising the leader.
Except perhaps for researchers and academics, most Nigerians will not readily recount who were the Ministers, Special Advisers, and Advisers to former Nigerian military leaders and presidents. Except for a few, most advisers faded into oblivion with the passing of their respective regimes and time. Most, did not even record the accounts of their stewardship for posterity. Still Nigeria’s history is replete with public policy decisions obliquely foisted on the nation by whimsical and insensately ambitious political advisers, who never serve as good governance guardrails. That mindset persists in the present administration.
It is worth recalling that Ironsi’s imposition of unitary government on the nation in1966; Gowon’s decisions to renege on the Aburi Accord in 1967 and to postpone the military handover date in1975; Shagari’s decision to travel to India while Necom House was burning in 1982; Buhari’s enforcement of the infamous ‘Decree 4’ of 1984; Babangida’s annulment of the 1993 elections; Shonekan’s decision not to retire Gen. Abacha in 1993; Abacha’s decision to execute the Ogoni Nine in 1995 and Jonathan’s decision to run in 2015, were all products of policy recommendations by the so-called presidential advisers.
INEC’s decision to dump the BVAS and IREV during the 2023 presidential elections was fraught with controversial consequences. Likewise, Tinubu’sremoval of the petroleum subsidy without a default option caused national havoc; while a skewered 2024 Tax Reform Executive Bill had to be withdrawn due to public opposition. Not one single adviser took responsibility for these warped national policies that impacted negatively on the nation. There were no consequences whatsoever. Ironically, these advisers do not go through legislative vetting. And those who do, often, do not face rigorous confirmation processes.
In the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, there were a slew of good and bad political advisers. The niche and excesses of the bad advisers were not so glaring then because there was ethnic balancing and Nigeria’s oil wealth and the accruing global clout mostly did the talking. Then also, we could afford to throw oil money at our national problems and oil countertrade at our interlocutors. Not anymore!
Yet as in Nigeria and elsewhere, political experts seized with philosophical basis of governance, contend that “Political advisors are playing an increasingly important role in modern democracies, prompting various attempts to describe and understand the evolving and complex aspects of their new responsibilities.”
Thinking along these lines, any political science or governance undergraduate worth his or her grades, would readily tell you that they read Niccolò Machiavelli’s The Prince in their first year; and that he or she believes that every purposeful national leader should read the pithy book at least once. Indeed, it is assumed, and correctly so that most successful political leaders keep a copy of The Prince on their nightstands, after all, there is hardly any modern language into which at The Prince has not been translated.
Present and future global leaders will need to heed Machiavelli’s counsel insofar as the role of their advisers. So too must President Tinubu. After all, as surmised by Professor Haig Patapan,“The Prince is arguably the most well-known and provocative assessment of the relationship between leaders and advisors.”
What is the relevance of The Prince to Nigeria’s present leadership? Shall we tell the President? Incrementally there’s absence of robust bipartisan policy debates. Rather, the present crop of Nigeria leaders and their advisers seem fixated on insatiable pursuit of wealth and materialism at public expense. The attendant risks are profound. Covetousness will never result in satisfaction, especially when greed eats probity for breakfast. Our leaders seem unsatisfied of robbing Nigeria blind.
As Machiavelli warned “When advisors and princes are thus satisfied, they can trust each other, but if not, the end will always be disastrous for one or the other.” As he admonishes, “any bought loyalty is insecure.” Hence his advice to leaders is to act for the good of the state and to avoid self-interest. Thus, rulers should choose wise and honest advisers. In the past 18 months Nigerians have gleaned certain negative values from extant governmental policies, practices, and programmes. Official malfeasance is rife and prevailing Malgovernance stretches incredulity; as advisers seem to be in government for themselves. Also Machiavelli averred that “the first opinion which one forms of a prince, and of his wisdom, is by observing the men he has around him. If they are capable and loyal he will be considered wise….But when they are lacking in those qualities, one form a bad opinion of the prince, for his first error was in choosing them.”
Our present crop of presidential advisers tends to exhibit crass political idiocy. They engage in state capture and consider Nigerians ignorant. If Nigerians have thus formed a bad opinion of President Tinubu, it derives in part, from his error of choosing his advisers. The men and women he has around him are very un-Nigerian; they are neither patriots nor on the lookout for broad national interest and inclusivity. They fan bigotry and willfully put themselves first, before country. Perhaps they follow their leader’s precepts. At a time when Nigeria is on life support and needs urgent resuscitation; at a time when Nigeria needs selfless and exemplary leadership in all arms and tiers of government, our national leaders and their advisers are hardly forthcoming. Such faux leadership style and disposition is simply disconcerting. History does not always repeat itself; but it has very comical but wicked ways of mimicking the atrocious past.
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Obaze is MD/CEO, Selonnes Consult – a policy, governance and management consulting firm in Awka.
