For as long as anyone can remember, our society has been on the quest for knowledge and skills on how to lead. Schools at all levels have concerned themselves with identifying, developing and rewarding leadership traits in learners. Youths are motivated by being oft-reminded that they are leaders of tomorrow, a role they in fact opt against, preferring rather, to be leaders of today.
Nobody it seems, is prepared or being deliberately mentored to be a follower of today or tomorrow. But that stands against the stark reality that the entire society consists of followers, save for a few, who mostly by chance, emerge as leaders and if chance does not allow, those best trained for leadership end up as followers.
Thus if indeed, society should attach greater value to what applies to the majority, then, grooming followers should be the priority for, in any case, good leadership is impossible without equally good followers. It is only when the public are capable of upholding the principles and imbibing the ethics and norms prescribed by leaders that the society can be healthy.
Social and economic policies cannot succeed if the people, for whose benefit they are pursued, lack the requisite attitudes and capabilities to support them. A social policy, no matter how noble, wil fail if the masses subscribe to practices that negate its objectives. An economic initiative, however potentially beneficial, will not have effect, if its targets are ill-disposed, incapable or simply unproductive.
While the duty of leaders is to promulgate laws issue regulations, formulate policies and set codes of conduct, obedience to and active participation in these is the obligation of the followers. This is the required balance for societal progress, without which progress will not be achieved, even if the leaders themselves endeavour to adhere to them, without reciprocation by the public. And since leaders emerge from followers, who rise to assume control along with the baggage of previous attitudes and attributes, they will not, even after ascending to power, uphold any standards or obey any law.
It follows then, that the foundation for good leadership is good followers and thus the best means of producing good leaders is to nurture the society to follow. A community of upright indigenes will almost certainly have morally upright leaders and vice versa, as much as a nation of productive citizens will most likely be led towards more prosperity by enterprising leaders.
Still, this balance is often inverted in the sense that leaders of all societies do on occasion, realise the need to obey the desires and standards set by the people, either by volition or due to the exigent need to acquire or retain power. In governments run through partisan politics especially, holders and seekers of elective offices give the electorate the aggregate of what the electorate want, as distinct from what they need.
This fact is amply illustrated by the current state of different parts in Nigeria, where while some states are launching electric train systems, industrial estates and power grids, other states are preoccupied by distributing rations of foodstuff to their people or embroiled in unending royal succession disputes. In one scenario the leaders are simply responding to what they understand to be need of their society, as expressed by the people. In the other situation, the masses are getting from their leaders what they seem to desire, even if that is not what they actually need.
Understanding these dynamics necessitates the need for a shift from the focus on producing only good leaders and devoting equal attention to turning the society into good followers. And the latter are not composed of citizens who only obey the law, adhere to standards and support policy but also more importantly, those who have the capability to command leaders towards progressive action, through the awareness of and will to seek what is progressive.
Contrary to the widely held view, that task is not the exclusive preserve of governments for operators of government will always seek to nurture the people to comform to the actions and desires the establishment. Rather, the responsibility in whole or greater part, rests with the civil society, non-governmental groups and individual actors in the society. These include NGOs, professional leagues, religious institutions, the media, the clergy and opinion leaders.
There is the need for these segments of the society to shift the paradigm of their activities to educating and enlightening the masses on their proper position and role in state affairs. The people need to be sensitised on their obligation to be upright, proactive and productive, as the only condition for producing good governance and achieving progress.
If the majority of citizens are transformed into such good followers, they will achieve without effort, what over half a century of agitation and struggle by a few government critics has so far failed to achieve.
Shekara is a media practitioner based in Sokoto
