Nigerians are averse to telling the truth, Borno Governor, Professor Babagana Umara Zulum said. He made the statement when he served as a guest lecturer at the National Defence College, in Abuja.
The event featured participants of course 28, amongst them top military officers and civilian policy makers from Nigeria and other foreign countries. The governor spoke to the topic, Strategic leadership: The challenges of Insurgency in Borno State” which was both academic and practical.
“A strategic leader must be a strategic listener and reader. A strategic thinker must also be a strategic learner. A strategic leader must be willing to hear the truth and to learn.
However, telling the truth and accepting the truth has been our major problem in Nigeria. Some people will never tell you the truth when you are in power and honestly, many of us in power also do not want to hear the truth, we prefer to be told what we like to hear and that is a serious deficit in strategic leadership”, the Governor said.
Zulum enumerated issues relating to the Boko Haram challenges and listed destructions caused by the insurgents including the emergence of 59,311 orphans whose fathers were killed and 59,213 widows that lost husbands to the insurgency in different parts of Borno.
The Governor acquainted the audience with his immediate, short and long term strategic plan, in confronting the challenges from all fronts that include investing heavily on security, enrolling out of school children into existing and new mega schools, placing a ban against political thuggery with jobs being created as alternatives.
Rear admiral M.M Kadiri, and the College’s Director of Studies, D.G Prayero, who spoke differently, paid tribute to the Governor for his frank presentation and for his exemplary style of leadership which they said, have earned him respect and admiration within the few months he has served as governor of Borno state.