Jakande: All-time model for state governors

On Tuesday, the first democratic Governor of Lagos State, Alhaji Lateef Kayode Jakande, turned 90! This is a milestone that seems increasingly unattainable in a country where life expectancy is put at 54 years by the United Nations Population Fund.  That is when war-torn countries like Afghanistan, Somalia and Syria have 65 years, 58 and 73 years respectively! Such a sad irony!

But this is the more reason why the celebration of Jakande should affect every single claimant to public office in Nigeria today. Perhaps, such introspection may save Nigeria from the very gloomy clouds that currently hang over the country.

Modern day governance in Nigeria is a heart-breaking reality that makes you wonder if any of our people was created with the capacity to lead positively.  Just ponder over it. From Abuja, down to Lagos, Maiduguri to Port Harcourt and Kano to Enugu, those who lead Nigeria make-believe that the art of government is rocket science to which only the initiated has an understanding.

And that is a useless point on so many fronts. Most important of this is the fact that virtually all of those who find themselves in elective offices today are not first choices of the people. They are overtly self-entitled individuals, imposed by a totally perverted process, which subordinates the democratic rights of the populace to the egoistic cravings of some political overlords.

So, gone are the days when politicians were driven by a genuine desire to serve, an intention governed by an undoubtable capacity built over years of self-development. Politicians of old got educated but before western education, they had parents who taught them the essence of humanity after which they got interested in public affairs, starting with youth and student union activities. They sat at the feet of more experienced politicians, imbibed ideologies that could guide their political ambitions, got into office on the strength of the ideas that they sold to the people and pursued those visions with all their might.

That is largely history in Nigeria’s current politics. With the exemption of a near insignificant number of the political class of 1999- 2019 and by extension,  the reality that stares at us as the prospect until 2023,  the emergence of governors, ministers, presidents and what have you, is a curriculum of superficial brilliance and self-centred ambition. All of these, usually inspired by the need to further grow already deep pockets of those who force themselves into office or some godfather who still holds the leash. But Jakande’s ilk invites Nigerian politicians to a new possibility, especially as a new term is just starting for most elected people here.

One of the most puerile and defeatist excuses you get from today’s crop of leaders is how it is impossible to make significant impact in a first term of four years.  That is the usual bait for the continuation of their mediocre performance and the ultimate reversal of the fortune of the areas they superintend. And there is no reason for this round failure than the lack of ideas as to what to do with power, not to speak of the road map to achieve the same. Jakande is a testimonial of the possibilities of a single four-year term.

Baba Kekere, (a sobriquet he got for his perceived closeness and likely succession of the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo) served as Governor of Lagos State between October 1979 and December 1983 when his second term was terminated in a coup led by, ironically, Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari.  And in those four years, Jakande laid a foundation that remains unbeaten in Lagos State. He indeed is the one who can be described as the father of modern Lagos.

While contemporary leaders make governance look complex and Herculean, Jakande ran a simple, people-oriented and compassionate government making people the epicentre of his administration. He set a standard in education, health, housing and rural integration that remains a milestone 36 years after his government was toppled by the messianic military which ended up jeopardising the moral pillars that held Nigeria together.

The United Party of Nigeria, on whose platform he was elected, implemented a free and compulsory education policy to which Jakande was extremely faithful. It is on record that his administration ended the dichotomy of morning and afternoon school system by the construction of makeshift schools.  This step led to an upsurge in school enrolment as opposed to what happened during the preceding military era.

It is also possible to wonder why upscale areas like Ikoyi and Victoria Island have the full complement of public schools when residents of these areas could send their children to the choicest schools anywhere in the world. But you had a government that spared a thought for the children of those who did the menial jobs in the homes of the wealthy residents of Ikoyi. The philosophy of the Jakande administration was that no Lagos child should be left behind!

He also led the campaign for universal education by personal example.  Modupe Jakande, his daughter, was at that time a student of Maryland Comprehensive High School. He was also said to have convinced his aides with direct supervisory roles in the education ministry to put their children in public schools without which their stay in his government would be unnecessary. In fact, one of his political allies, Alhaji Ganiyu Kolajo Oseni, was said to have withdrawn his daughter from Corona Schools, Gbagada to a public school in compliance with this directive. Jakande, it was who established the Lagos State University.

While it is the custom of current custodians of power to allocate land to themselves and their friends in the choicest areas of town, Jakande chose to develop housing estates for the poor in Lagos State.  He also refused to be caught in the narcissistic self-adulation of today’s governors who hang their name on every state project. However, Lagosians, who benefitted from this housing initiative chose to name the houses, which are scattered all over Lagos after the former governor. Those buildings exist till date as symbols of Jakande’s fidelity to the oath that he swore to.

His vision for the infrastructural development of Lagos remains yet unmatched. He is credited with opening the Ikotun, Ajah and Lekki areas of Lagos through the construction of roads. In addition to that, he envisioned that a city of Lagos’s positioning needed a multi-modal transport system and started the construction of an underground train system that would have set Lagos on the same pedestal with cities like London and others in the world but for Buhari’s directionless military adventurism.

While it is impossible to recount the various ways that Jakande still stands out as an administrator in the confusion that attends aspiration and attainment of public office today, there are two things that Nigerians should note about how Jakande went about discharging his duties.

The first is that he saw public office as an opportunity to extend the frontiers of public good and win the confidence of the people. He used his office as a platform to promote an egalitarian society focusing more on the people at the lower rungs of the society thereby removing social tensions and violent instability that currently define our politics and society.

Jakande saw power differently from the way the military-trained, spiritually-crippled and uncompassionate latter-day governors who use the instrumentality of power to convert the resources of state and advertise their empty self-importance and relevance.

Public policy of the Jakande era was people driven without any semblance of pretences and selfish profligacy of public assets that have become an integral part of our political culture today, manifesting in inhuman escalation of poverty in virtually all the states of the federation.

In addition, Jakande had vision. Much unlike today’s political actors, whose main motivation is the multiplication of filthy wealth or just the bragging right to office, politicians like Jakande had purpose. He had a mission and with this, he had his eyes fixed on legacy, something which the average politician of today grossly lacks.

By the myopic standards of citizenship in Nigeria, Alhaji Lateef Jakande would ordinarily not be a Lagosian. Although born in Lagos, his parents were from Omu-Aran in Kwara State, but he apparently saw the privilege to serve the people of Lagos State as a rare gift of Providence that must be put to optimal use.This philosophical foundation created the phenomenal performance of the nonagenarian in those 50 months that will remain unforgettable and continue to put the shame on the dwarfish minds that currently lay claim to various offices in Nigeria.

Here is wishing Chief Lateef Kayode Jakande, outstanding journalist, administrator, politician and leader of men many happy returns and Nigeria, the revival of purposeful politics!

Adedokun tweets @niranadedokun