Posted by By Olamilekan Lartey, Benin on
The President of the Nigeria Labour Congress, Mr. Adams Oshiomhole, has called on Nigerians to scrutinise, not only candidates.....
The President of the Nigeria Labour Congress, Mr. Adams Oshiomhole, has called on Nigerians to scrutinise, not only candidates jostling for public office, but also the antecedents of the parties through which the candidates are seeking offices.
He said the time had come for Nigerians to stop lamenting the failure of the past, and summon up the courage to identify those responsible for the failure.
Oshiomhole spoke in Benin on Saturday, at the presentation of a document titled, 'Edo State and its future, a message of hope," prepared by a group of Edo State intellectuals and leaders of thought, to the public.
He said those responsible for the misery in which the country had found itself must never be allowed to rule the country again.
'We cannot be neutral. If we know those responsible, we must expose them; no matter the colour in which they appear," he said.
The labour leader stressed that it was a risk to the nation's political future to evaluate candidates only on individual credentials, without evaluating the route they were taking to power.
He said it was unfortunate that some political parties had been admitting responsibility for the nation's failed dreams.
According to him, how a person got into office had become very important because of the experiences of the past.
He warned that prominence should never be defined by positions, but by the performance of the occupants of such positions.
He said, 'In seeking changes, we must seek a total change and not cosmetic reforms. We need a total break from the past. What we need now are credible candidates and credible parties."
He added that community leaders owed it a duty to educate their people about the reality of the political parties canvassing for votes in country.
He warned, however, that some politicians were already at work fanning the embers of ethnicity to divide Nigerians for their selfish ends. He said they had forgotten, however, that poverty had united the people.
He said, 'The merchants of confusion know that when people are organised, they demand accountability and ask simple questions. They will only get con artists to queue behind them. A lot of the thieves have already lined up to steal again."
Oshiomhole said it did not matter where the next president came from.
According to him, a South-South person should rule Nigeria, not because he is from the South-South, but because he is a real Nigerian that can set the people free.
Specifically, Oshiomhole said he did not become the president of the NLC because he was from the South-South, but because he had a genuine vision for all Nigerians, based on the values that his people shared.