Nigeria Leadership Of Shamelessness: A Case Of Extravagant Govs’ Wives

I can’t believe that in a 21st Century Nigeria, under the leadership of President Mohammadu Buhari who professes sainthood, wives of governors would, along with a retinue of hangers-on, fly to Dubai to present a birthday cake to the 1st Lady, Aisha Buhari.

I can’t contain how shameful I feel right now, for this mockery of leadership under Buhari. This is a country where avoidable barbaric killings, induced by bad governance, are so rampant that the people have become insensitive to the daily death tolls in Nigeria and would rather only worry about Ukrainians killed in the senseless war with Russia.

In a country where governments can’t pay civil servants salaries, governors’ wives would aggravate the sufferings of the masses by mobilising the commonwealth to transport a birthday cake to the UAE/Dubai just to please the1st Lady of Nigeria.

So in entire Nigeria, no place is befitting to celebrate a birthday party for Aisha? So, governors’ wives have to encourage the capital flight of the little we have by flying foreign airlines, sleeping in expensive five/seven stars Dubai hotels and likely claiming travel allowances for visiting Aisha.

I asked the President, governors and their wives, how many times have the wives of Presidents of other countries flown into Nigeria to celebrate an extravagant birthday?

Do we blame these enjoyable wives? They are copying their husbands. Their husbands and other political officeholders are known to be more extravagant. Recently, it was Godwin Emefiele who was displaying how well off our CBN Governors can be at a Jamaican birthday party in a viral video. The House of Representatives Speaker, Gbajabiamila has also done the same for his mother’s birthday party in Dubai.

These are persons not known to have celebrated their birthdays beyond the shores of this country outside the political offices they enjoy today. All these extravagances are at the expense of the common good.

We have so demeaned Nigeria in failed leadership to the extent that there are no leisure spots fit for officeholders and politicians to celebrate birthdays.

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We now export birthdays to Jamaica, UK/London, US, France/Paris, UAE/Dubai and just about every destination outside Nigeria. While the leaders engage in extravagance at the expense of the people, Nigerians daily face barbaric killings in an atmosphere of intense insecurity.

Those running away from mass poverty, hunger and insecurity are going through acutely distressing ordeals trying to cross land or marine borders, risking their lives to cross into Europe and other foreign lands.

Now there is a shortage of fuel, no light, no water, deprivations everywhere. And governors’ wives are carrying cake from here to Dubai to show induced loyalty to the 1st Lady.

I’m disappointed in Buhari. When he came to power, he asserted that he was going to scrap the Office of the 1st Lady. The constitution has no backing for the Office of 1st Ladies, yet every year, the President and Governors vote humongous sums for an unconstitutional office.

The government at all tiers have not been able to fully implement minimum wage as a law. Some states are owing civil servants billions in unpaid salaries and entitlements, yet the President and Governor’s wives are globe-trotting on a spending spree with public funds. And Buhari has failed to keep his promise.

How many foreign leaders and their wives have come to Nigeria to celebrate birthdays. No white man, Asian, American or European leader or their wives would fly to Nigeria with some flamboyant cake to celebrate a birthday, especially in his or her nation is on the verge of collapse with widespread economic hardship and insecurity.

What a country are we, that we have lost all sense of modesty and conscience. Shame on Buhari, shame on our governors and their insensitive, extravagant wives.

Zik Gbemre
April 4, 2022