Tinubu not cause of current hardship, says Ambode

Erstwhile Lagos State Governor Akinwunmi Ambode has said President Bola Tinubu is not the cause of the hardship in the nation and should be absolved of any blame.

Ambode spoke at the Chapter Eight of Akinjide Adeosun Foundation’s 2024 Leadership Colloquium and Award with the theme: Economic Asphyxiation – The Wisdom of Authentic Leaders, at Alliance Francaise in Ikoyi, Lagos.

Ambode said Nigeria’s problems had long existed, and needed a courageous leader like President Tinubu to address holistically.

“It (current situation) has nothing to do with the singular person called Mr. President. But if we don’t understand the fundamental, we will start doing the blame game. We need to face our problems frontally.

“The major issue is that we are even tired of not fixing our issues. Now, we have found somebody that has decided, in person of President Tinubu,” he said.

The former governor, who stressed the need to make executive reforms on the coordination circle around the President, urged Nigerians to be supportive, resilient, and patriotic.

He traced Nigeria’s problems to the slave trade era, describing it as “the divide and extract strategy”.

According to him, Nigeria needs self-awareness strategy to address post-COVID-19 era problems.

“Until we decide ourselves to say that we should unite for the common cause called Nigeria, the security issues will not go. We are all in a position to actually support Mr. President. Let us start to look at it from a different prism.

“We don’t have to wake up in the morning and be talking ill of Nigeria. We get what we profess about Nigeria.

“We must think out of the box. We have to feed ourselves. When we start to think by ourselves and we resolve the issues concerning Nigeria, we will smile,” he added.

Commenting on the essence of authentic leadership, Ambode said regardless of how weak the followers might be, Nigerian leaders must stand in the front and continually show confidence that tomorrow will be alright.