By Valentine Amanze
The Dean, Faculty of Social Sciences of the Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka Prof. Chinyere Stella Okunna, has described Mr. Peter Obi’s emergence on the Nigerian political scene as phenomenal as his leadership “was extraordinary and transformational”.
The don spoke on “Nigeria’s Ailing Economy: Focus on Peter Obi Leadership Style,” at Agulu in Anambra State, during a lecture organized by African Community of Transformers with the theme, “South-East Political Culture: Peter Obi as Paradigm Shift”.
Explaining the secrets of Obi’s success at governance, Okunna said that it was because, he worked with a team, identified needed change, created a vision to guide the change through inspiration and executed the change in tandem with committed members of his team.
Okunna, the lead speaker at the event, said she agreed with other Nigerians that Obi’s emergence as the Vice Presidential candidate for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was one of the best things that had happened to Nigeria.
According to her, Obi’s emergence would be the first time Nigeria shall enjoy a leader that “possesses the capacity to achieve extra-ordinary things; is daring enough to seek transformation; embodies the right values to raise his/her followers to higher levels of morality; possesses the charisma and enthusiasm to inspire and motivate followers to change things; is imbued with vision to guide change in the right direction and possesses the intellectual stimulation to think out lasting solutions.”
Okunna, however, submitted that the combination of Atiku and Obi had the capacity to solve Nigeria’s unemployment problem, deplorable infrastructure, militancy, health and educational challenges, pathetic weakness of the Naira, pervasive poverty, under-performance of the power sector, among others.
Other speakers – McCcool Nwosu and Bruno Ibekilo – were united in their insistence that the halmark of true election was allowing the votes of the people to count.
They called on voters to be vigilant on election day so that all votes shall count.
One of the organizers of the event, Mr. Chigozie Ebefu, said that the urge for lectures on Mr. Peter Obi was because he was eminently qualified to be held out as a role model in all ramifications.
But Obi had described the February 16th (election) as a choice between how to make Nigerian to start working again through tackling of employment, creating a new Nigeria that would provide the basic needs of Nigerians and how to remain fixed in the country’s present economic backwardness.
Obi explained that he agreed to contest with Alhaji Abubakar Atiku because they shared the vision of making Nigeria work again.
