Former Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Attahiru Jega, has said Nigeria needs the best person with competence, capacity, and experience to be president in order to get this country out of its present challenges.
Jega, while responding to questions during a television programme on Monday, said rotational presidency being practiced in the country “cannot take us out of the challenges we have,” hence the onus is on Nigerians to “interrogate the capacity of that person to lead this country.”
“That person can come from the north, south, east, or the west, but the important thing is that even if political parties decide that a candidate should come from a particular area, what we need to do is that Nigerians must interrogate the capacity of that person to lead this country appropriately,” he said.
“This idea of rotational presidency cannot take us out of the challenges we have in this country, presently.”
The former INEC chairman also disagreed with former Head of State, Ibrahim Babangida’s submission that the next president should be in his or her 60s.
IBB, during an interview with ARISE News on August 6, said Nigeria’s next president should be in his 60s.
“If you get a good leadership that links with the people and tries to talk with the people; not talking on top of the people, then we would be okay,” the former military ruler said.
“I have started visualising a good Nigerian leader. That is, a person who travels across the country and has a friend virtually everywhere he travels to, and he knows at least one person that he can communicate with.
“That is a person, who is very versed in economics and is also a good politician, who should be able to talk to Nigerians and so on. I have seen one, or two or three of such persons already in their sixties.”
But, Jega said age shouldn’t matter in determining who the country’s next president should be.
“That is his (Babangida’s) personal opinion. But as far as I am concerned, the President of Nigeria should be the best choice of the people of Nigeria. Age may not matter,” he said.
“As a political scientist, I have read about Nigerian politics, I understand the challenges and I have also had the privilege for five years of relating relatively more loosely with Nigerian politicians, so, I have a clear appreciation of the serious challenges that Nigeria faces particularly, the dangerous trajectory, which many of our politicians are leading this country to; and if we all sit and watch and allow this, in no time they would wreck this country.”
