The academia in Nigeria has been urged to interrogate the emergence of leaders in order to help develop a blueprint that makes it possible for only qualified persons to occupy positions of authority in the country.
Making the call at a colloquium with the theme ‘Perspectives on the development crisis in Nigeria’ organised by the Department of Sociology, University of Lagos, recently, former Director-General of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Dr Muda Yusuf, said it was time for scholars to take an active role in Nigeria’s development in all areas.
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Yusuf, now Chief Executive Officer, Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprise, said, “For too long, academia has not been active enough in key issues in the country.
“A lot of things are falling apart and I think academia has a very important role to play in policy discussions and direction.”
“When we talk about development crisis, the quality of political governance is very important. It affects the quality of appointments and composition of cabinets at state and federal levels. Those cabinet members make decisions and if the leader is mediocre, the quality of discussions won’t be good, the output will be affected, which eventually affects everybody, and the quality of institutions will also be affected, which will affect the results.
“These leaders determine the destiny of all of us, so we need to interrogate how they emerge. We need a model that can work for this country. We need a model that would enable people with character, capacity, competence and integrity to emerge as leaders at all levels of government.”
Revealing that they will continue to incubate ideas that can move Nigeria forward as scholars, Head of Sociology Department at UniLag, Dr Franca Attoh, said, “The colloquium will become an institutionalised platform where sociologists tackle the problems of the society.”
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