Leadership and the Future of Nigeria

The Nigeria state on the other hand remains non-hegemonic.  Yet, a degree of hegemony is required to maintain the sovereignty of a country, keep the dominant classes under control, maintain an environment that promotes accumulation and define a nation’s location and role in the global system.  To be sure, part of the reasons for this, aside from the limited hegemony of the state is the lack of cohesion amongst the ruling or power elite, the distortions in the economy, the vulnerability of the political economy to external interests, and the general condition of poverty in which the majority of Nigerians live.  Yet, our elites appear to be disinterested in purposeful and progressive visioning, building state and class hegemony, and establishing viable foundations for holistic progress.  In spite of changes in the world, the Nigerian state and its custodians remain rigid in its ideas and politics.  It finds it difficult to move from government to governance, respect gender equality, structurally transform the foundations of society, distinguish between rulers and leaders, and refocus the nation for sustained progress.
The basis of Nigeria’s leadership failure can be found, in its concentration in largely unproductive ventures.  We have a lot of people with cash capital, but with very little capitalist drive or initiative.  They are traders, commercialists.  Such a class has never built a sustainable economy or polity.   In addition, the state is the primary means of accumulation.  Until the accumulative base shits from the state or public treasury and speculation to investment in technology, research, ideas, and production, the leaders can only be superficial and opportunistic.
The power elite appears to have a pathological fixation on subverting the foundations of the state, collaborating with undemocratic forces to abridge democratic rights, and designing dubious and diabolical strategies to close political spaces, suffocate civil society, enthrone a culture of anti-intellectualism, and rusticate opportunities and possibilities for progress and development. Until recently, the culture and obsession of the power elite was on building a parallel or alternate state at the expense of the public good.  In its failure, it has created private alternatives in the following areas:
o Water – private boreholes as against public water systems
o Health services – private and foreign hospitals as against general or public hospitals.
o Schools for children – expensive private schools in and outside the country at the expense of public schools
o Security – private bodyguards and security systems as against collective or community and public security.
o Electricity – private generators as against public electricity supply.
o Foreign travel – use of foreign as against national airlines, vacations abroad rather than local alternatives
o Banking Stolen funds – stealing is bad, even then they patronize foreign banks.  Their counterparts do not even consider Nigerian banks for this purpose.
o Houses as prisons – high walls, complex security gadgets, electrified fences, huge dogs, close circuit televisions etc- more defended than local prisons!