The Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ovie Omo-Agege has decried the dearth of quality leadership in the country, noting that without good leadership the country will continue to remain underdeveloped.
Omo-Agege spoke at the 3rd annual lecture/graduation ceremony of students of the African Centre for Leadership, Strategy & Development (Centre LSD) Leadership School, Warri run in collaboration with Value Rebirth & Empowerment Initiative in partnership with Konrad Adenauer Stiftung.
The Deputy President of the Senate was represented by Mr. Chuks Erhire, Director General, Omo-Agege Campaign Organisation and state treasurer of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
He said, “We must create the desired synergy between leadership and followership so that every leader will understand that he or she is also a follower and every follower a leader. This is central to security in every community where there are leaders and followers.”
Omo-Agege also said there are growing incidences of insecurity both in intra-country and cross-border with security agencies because the continent lacks good Leadership.
He appealed to Nigerians to embrace the community policing initiative of President Muhammadu Buhari as a way of tackling insecurity in the country.
The Executive Director, African Centre for Leadership, Strategy & Development (Centre LCD), Mr Monday Osasah, who also spoke at the ceremony noted that the idea of starting the leadership school was borne out of the realization that leadership is a major problem especially in Africa.
Osasah said, “the challenges faced across the world especially in Africa and Nigeria has confirmed our diagnostics of the primacy of leadership in dealing with challenges facing humanity.
“Many scholars and commentators agree that leadership failure is one of the major factors responsible for the underdevelopment of Africa.
“However, it has been proven that leaders can be trained. The School is therefore designed for people who want to be equipped with leadership skills for transformation of organisations and society.”
Guest lecturer of the occasion, Navy Capt. Herman Efenudu (rtd) while delivering a lecture titled, Leadership and the Security Challenges in Nigeria,” said the quest for quality leadership and adequate security is the aspiration of citizens in most countries of the world.
“This is because the task of harnessing scarce resources in pursuit of human and national development is dependent on the quality and output of leadership.
“In the years passed, developments of nations have been by leaders who played vital roles in transforming their societies through good governance.
“Good leadership improves the quality of life of the citizens and emplaces adequate security and hence overall development of nations,” Efenudu added.
On his part, Edewor Egedegbe Executive Director, Value Rebirth and Empowerment Initiative and Director of Studies, Value Rebirth-Centre LSD Leadership School, Effurun-Warri Study Centre, stressed on the need to train young leaders across the country.
Egedegbe said no development can take place where there is not quality leadership, adding the school was instituted to tackle global issues on leadership relating to governance and bring true leadership to bear.
“Our Vision is a Nigerian society with value driven institutions for sustainable peace and development, Mission, to build citizens’ capacity, value re-orientation, mentoring and work through networks to ensure probity and accountability in governance and society.
“The school runs for free for one year, and the graduation/matriculation ceremony holds every May since inception except for this year occasioned by Covid-19 pandemic.
“At the end of this graduation ceremony today, we would have graduated 182 students to the glory of God,” Egedegbe said.
