Politics, Governance and Leadership Recruitment In 21st Century Democracy – By Babajide Kolade- Otitoju

Politics and governance pervade every aspect of our lives. To ignore that fact is to remain stubbornly ignorant, frustrated and isolated. According to Heywood, Politics is the art of government, the exercise of control within the society through the making and enforcement of collective decisions.

Politics is important because it determines what governance means. Far beyond the role of government, at any level, politics determines how we manage our own world and the world around us. Politics is supposed to be used in advancing the well-being of the citizens by ensuring the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people. It can be used in creating an egalitarian society if the right people are in the corridors of power.

However, come election season, we can barely talk about anything else; the closer the election, the more we have to discuss. There are many who do not really have a very clear idea of the political situation in their country. There seems to be a unanimous agreement that political awareness is necessary. In this piece, we will discuss why it is so.

1. It helps us to make the right choice: In any governmental system, it is necessary for the people to be politically aware for their own good. In a democracy, you need to go to the polling booths armed with facts and ample political awareness. The awareness is not just about which candidate is making the maximum promises, but how many of the said promises are likely to come true. It will require you to be really aware of the political history and general information about your country.

2. It goes beyond government. Politics remains relevant because it is the principal determinant of what governance is. It is easy to see why many people have an aversion for politics. The media is filled with a bunch of negative campaigning, you would easily be tired of the mud-slinging and mendacity of the political parties. But it is pertinent to note that this is the very reason you should be interested in politics. If you don’t look beyond sensational campaigns, you will easily be misled about what is actually good for your country and by extension, for yourself.

3. It promotes better citizenship. Being politically aware enables you to be a better citizen. If you are not oblivious of the political situation in your country, and you don’t like it, you can take an active part in changing it by becoming a part of the political system and fighting the corruption.

4. Affects every aspect of our lives. Political awareness is essential because it is extremely relevant for us to know what is happening around us. Politics is not something far removed from our lives. Being politically aware helps you have a say in the decisions the government will make and even in the formation of the government that will govern your country.

5. It brings about change. It would be impossible for a country to function smoothly if a political system was not put in place to run it. Without politics, there would be no leaders and without leaders, the country would definitely descend into anarchy. Without political awareness therefore, there would be no instrument of change neither in the political system nor in the society at large.

The realm of politics is restricted to state actors who are consciously motivated by ideological beliefs and who seek to advance them through membership of a formal organisation such as a political organisation. This is the sense in which politicians are described as “political” whereas civil servants are seen as “non political”, the state as “public” and the civil society as “private”. The institutions of the state (the apparatus of the government, the courts, the police, the military, the society-security system and so forth) can be regarded as “public” in the sense that they are responsible for the collective organisation of community life. Moreover, they are funded at the public’s expense, out of taxation.

GOVERNANCE
Governance is essentially related to politics, in that politics is often defined as the art of governance. Just as politics talks about governments, institutions, power, order and the ideals of justice, governance also deals with the public sector, power structures, equity and ideals of public administration. Nevertheless, they’re distinct from each other in the sense that politics is broader than governance.

Governance is the exercise of power or authority by political leaders for the well-being of their country’s citizens or subjects. It is the complex process whereby some sectors of the society wield power and enact and promulgate public policies which directly affect human and institutional interactions and economic and social development. As such, a great deal about governance is the proper and effective utilization of resources.

Governance refers to a process whereby elements in society wield power, authority and influence and enact policies and decisions concerning public life and social uplift. It therefore, not only encompasses but transcends the collective meaning of related concepts like the state, government, regime and good government. Many of the elements and principles underlying “good government” have become an integral part of the meaning of governance.

Good government also implies accountability, transparency, participation, openness and the rule of law, albeit good government tends to be a prerequisite for political legitimacy.

Governance concerns “big” questions of a “constitutional” nature that establish the rules of political conduct. It involves creative intervention by political actors to change structures that inhibit the expression of human potential.

It emphasises the nature of interactions between state and social actors and among social actors themselves.

Governance isn’t just decision-making because decision without implementation is self-defeating. Neither is it just implementation because there’s nothing to implement without a decision or plan. Thus, the two processes necessarily go hand-in-hand and are constitutes governance.

It must also be emphasised that good governance and development should not be based exclusively on economic growth. Through global persuasion, good governance and development signify a broader spectrum of things such as protection of human rights, equitable distribution of wealth, enhancement of individual capabilities and creation of an enabling environment to foster participation and growth of human potential. In governance, citizens are rightly concerned with a government’s responsiveness to their needs and protection of their rights. It encompasses the state, but it transcends the state by including the private sector and civil society organisations.

In conclusion, the concept of governance has over the years gained momentum. It has become a useful mechanism to enhance the legitimacy of the public realm. It has also become an analytical framework or approach to comparative politics.

LEADERSHIP RECRUITMENT

This piece is germane and suggests suitable metrics to install good governance via painstaking recruitment processes and to eliminate all forms of anti-leadership vices like corruption, godfatherism, nepotism, tribalism etc.

Philosophers have propounded theories in the course of the development of man about how he can be governed to engender peace, orderliness, progress and development.

If election is credible, free and fair, it represents the collective will of the people. Political scientists are of the view that it’s the best form of government, albeit representative democracy doesn’t always and necessarily guarantee a good government, but change.

Representative democracy affords the people the opportunity to recognise that their fate is in their own hands. It is pellucid to know that the entrenchment of good governance depends on good leadership. This is evident in the fact that lleaders have massive roles to play in setting the visions of a state, most especially in a democratic system like ours, the recruitment process of the leaders must therefore be given thr transparency it requires. A situation where a leader is appointed or voted for, to make key political decisions on behalf of the country, in the trust that the leader will make the decisions based on the public interests.

The country needs a leadership that is based on the cultural values of the people and takes a Bottom-top approach which holds the key to unlocking the development quagmire Android to iphone precipice Nigeria has found herself.

For Nigeria to be a cynosure of all eyes, it needs patriotic, missionary and visionary leaders. There’s no disputing the fact that Nigeria has failed in uplifting the standard of living of its citizens despite the enormous human and natural resources because the recruitment process is in favour of unreliable and unscrupulous politicians. For the country to move forward, the electorate should make it a duty to interrogate the process leading to the emergence of candidates. Unscrupulous politicians who are not reliable should be foreclosed from getting into or holding public offices.

There’s need for the electorate and the country to install and enthrone people who have the intensity and cardour to serve and the country must repudiate mediocrity, nepotism, tribalism and reject godfatherism in its entirety.

It’s not just leadership recruitment. If we look at at in a broad sense, many countries have very solid foundation. It’s like you want to build a house and you don’t have a solid foundation, that house will come down. There was a revolution in Russia which was led by Lenin.

The foundation for patriotism, for transparency. For leadership recruitment, most of the foundation was laid by that revolution and they are still on their path.

Even on the issue of social welfare. 80% of what they’re moving on is product of that revolution. Their system holds on to the strong and deploys excess resources to help the weak. Whatever is their own calculation is fundamental to existence. Go there, they are cheap and accessible to everyone.
Healthcare
Housing

In our case, we are moving in the direction of planlessness. Education sector is producing people who are not employable.

The structure of our country. Sector by sector if you check, our system. is not well planned as it applies to governance and leadership recruitment. Leadership and leadership recruitment can bring the solution if it is right.

They use our resources to tinker with the electoral system and force the people towards a certain direction. If they are forced by circumstances to pick a good leader, it will help the system to recover faster. The way it is in the APC and PDP, it is the powerful that bring candidates. Even the idea of consensus is meant to favour the powerful. We have the caretaker committee of the APC, trying to use it to position themselves.

The goal:
Put Jonathan there, get one of their own as deputy. The person who is deputy will now step in.

The E- transmission.
Controversy is meant to ensure the people can not freely choose their own leaders if the fidelity of our elections is guaranteed the people will be able to choose the best for them. Where politicians feel comfortable to rig elections and wilfully take away the independence of INEC, our national electoral body they would not feel that they are responsible to the people. There’s nothing so bad for the people than to realise that their votes do not count or that politicians can win elections in spite of the voter.

There’s no conscious attempt for us as a people to produce the kind of leaders that can drive our development. We are afflicted by things like regionalism, sectionalism, ethnicity. We have no concern for collective good. We look at people based on their faith, religion. People have money, and they think can buy prominence. We have no consensus about the quality of people we want in leadership positions. We look at primordial factors like faith, ethnicity etc.

The politician exploits that lack of coherent process and a conveyor belt that throws up solid people. A Yahoo boy suddenly shows up to contest, has nothing he stood for but he ends up winning. Our shopping list as a people is so disparate.

Nigeria is like a burning building with many trapped in it and finding no escape route.

7 female senators
22 House of Reps. We certainly can do better. Our system needs to throw up more women. I am convinced they can do a much better job than many of our men in leadership.