“These leaders fail to mentor those who are to take over from them and what we have instead are sit-tight leaders who decide to die in office. Nigeria will only be placed on the path of progress, growth and development when we start to prepare our youths for leadership."
Former Speaker of House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole, has blamed politicians for the many problems bedevilling the country.
Bankole, who is currently facing corruption charges in Abuja, said this while delivering a lecture at the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta on Wednesday.
In a paper entitled, “Mentoring and the Challenges of Leadership in Africa”, the former Speaker said the political class had worsened the woes of the ordinary Nigerians.
He noted that if Nigerian leaders had returned to the standards of the nation’s founding fathers, many more concrete achievements and tremendous breakthroughs would have been accomplished in the country.
Bankole, who stressed need to mentor future leaders properly, said it was a sure way for the survival of democracy in Nigeria. He said, "Proper tutelage is indispensable for success in any vocation and Nigeria must urgently start the process of disallowing untutored and untested persons from mounting the saddle of leadership.”
