It is three days to the election and I am happy that the choices before some of us in Cross River State north are clear-cut. If I was given a choice, I’d rather maintain my silence and mourn my loss, but this issue is time-bound and if not now, then I will probably never get the opportunity.
For a small section of people from the five villages of Obudu, whose ancestral lands were forcefully seized from them under false pretenses, my belief is that they will approach these elections with a determination to teach the people who have shown them so much contempt and have inflicted them with the current misery a very good lesson. I am not about to tell anyone how to vote, but I’ll tell you what I believe.
If you are a student of Simon Sinek, a good chunk of this reading will begin to sound all so familiar. I’ll start by saying that leadership implies one of two things; you either manipulate people to become followers or you inspire them to follow willingly.
If you choose the latter (which is to inspire), then you must have a decent degree of authenticity. Authenticity, in this case, implies that everything you do and say must prove what you believe. Your belief or better put, your philosophy is everything!
In order to believe what you say, I reckon that you will need to be honest – not coating deceit in hollow rhetoric. Hence when one focuses on telling the people what he/she thinks they want to hear, the result is that the people will get attracted to the lies, not to that person, and once the truth becomes obvious, they’ll desert.
That kind of followership does not beget the kind of loyalty where we become willing to turn down even a better offer and to continue to follow you and your philosophy come what may. Think about it, if the only incentive for working where you do right now is the money, then you’ll leave the moment you get a better offer – zero loyalty, zero commitment.
What you will find is that the ‘leaders’ who fall into the category above, usually end up surrounding themselves with people who are in need of what they have – perhaps money with absolutely no interest or commitment to such ‘leaders’.
The proof of this is that such ‘leaders’ usually find the need to gratify their followers – because the relationship is purely transactional. More like paying them for their followership and what you’ll find is that the nature of the gratification is commonly contemptuous. You see things like disused second-hand vehicles imported from Europe and America, motorcycles, cutlasses, you name it. The euphemism for this is empowerment.
What I still do not understand to this point is whether the costs for these items are borne by these politicians in private capacities or whether these are actually monies meant for our collective well-being. Sometimes they go a step further and try to do the right thing, but for the wrong reasons through the offer of phony political ‘appointments’.
In my view, nothing in my recent memory is more likely to put at risk the natural order of things than these ‘appointments’ if the beneficiaries are not properly managed following the completion of the tenure. If you temporarily engage people who are not so skilled and offer them salaries (in some cases) equivalent to those of permanent secretaries; how do you expect them to engage with society at the end of the tenure?
Now, the problem is that folks who do not appear to need what these politicians have been largely ignored in the larger scheme of things even when the issues being raised are critical to the survival of the wider society.
That is precisely the problem with the member representing the Obudu, Bekwarra, and Obanliku federal constituency Mr. Legor Idagbo. On the 20th of August 2020, I raised the issue of the forceful acquisition of the land upon which the Obudu Cargo Airport is currently being constructed (albeit without an Environmental Impact Assessment – EIA) and I was completely ignored.
I mean he did not as little as acknowledge my message. I then sent his friend, who happens to be living here in the UK to please ask him to kindly intervene to ensure that the poor vulnerable villagers get the compensation that they deserve – I wasn’t even asking him to confront the governor, of course, I know that they’ll all rather grumble in their bedrooms behind closed doors.
My message to him read thus: “Good morning sir. On the issue of the Cargo Airport, sir, are you aware that your constituents in some of the villages viz Igwo, Okambi, Ikwumikwu, and Atiekpe are currently internally displaced people (IDP)? The government through a certain Paul Obi has bulldozed their farms and abodes in the middle of the rainy/farming season. Is there nothing anyone can do? Can a case be made for the safe resettlement of these people, please? There’s been no EIA but construction work has been going on for more than seven months now. Please can you intervene in this matter in any way possible? These folks are desperate, this is beyond politics, please. Thank you and God bless. Kind regards, Emmanuel Ushie”.
Elections are here and I am thinking to myself; so, will this gentleman go to my village, or anyone of the five for that matter, and ask them to vote for him? I know how sophisticated my small village is and I know they will not need any advice on how to vote in the coming elections, but to those other four villages, is this the kind of representation you want? Folks, who appear to be doing the right things for all the wrong reasons? People, who hold you all in so much contempt? I believe you deserve better. Much better. I also believe that the people who treat you with contempt deserve to be taught a lesson, so this I believe is your chance!
Emmanuel Ushie is the former staff to Governor Ben Ayade, a CrossRiverian and writes from the UK.
NB: Opinions expressed in this article are strictly attributable to the author, Emmanuel Ushie, and do not represent the opinion of CrossRiverWatch or any other organization the author works for/with.