Re: How to choose political leaders

Few days ago I pubished an article on how to choose political leaders here and have gotten a lot of response. So today I decided to post one of the mails. Opinions are still welcome.

Re;

That would be a requirement for electing a Pastor or Choir master ,not for  a political leader. In politics we talk of blueprint or ideology, record of past performance and vision for the citizens.Selection of  leaders should be based on considerations beyond what the Dominion Article says it should be.

 I beg to disagree with the author that Christians should vote a Christian. This goes contrary to every known logic in leadership in the secular world. Leadership is about vision, it is about integrity, it is about love for country men and women, it is about the ability to inspire, it is about the will to challenge the led to aspire to greater inspirations for themselves and their country. That is what we should consider in choosing who governs, not religion. I have always maintained the views as extreme as it may sound that I would rather live in a nation governed by an Atheist or Buddist or Muslim or any person of contrary faith to Christianity if such a person would guarantee electricity, pipe borne water, good roads, decent living conditions, affordable health care system and fight against corruption than live in a nation governed by a Christian saint as we have today where all the maladies ranging from satanic corruption, under development, human induced poverty afflicted by the so called leaders, insecurity and insurgency has taken over the day. It was vision no religion that made the leaders pf China, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea and other Asian tigers over take and over run Nigeria economically and in every indices of growth. These countries don't have up to 20% of citizens as Christians or Muslims. They re mostly practising other religions we regard here as paganism. Yet they turned around their nations in less than 20 to 30 years and now competing with America and other advanced economies. It is my firm views that religion is only the opium of the masses in the words of Greek philosopher Socrates.

 Opium is used to calm frayed nerves and so is religion. In all the epoch in human history from the age of slavery to the modern era, religion has become a superstructure used by the few oligarchical/ bourgeois class to impose their wish on the masses. And the religious leaders act as a conduit for administering the dosage. In Nigeria where governance has failed, economy is failing and people are in the worst crisis of our time, religious preachers rather than toe the line of preaching the change gospel are  preaching voting for a Christian bas if the lives of Christians have been better of than they were before now, under  Christians president. We need to teach our people that like the popular saying goes, "the people deserve the kind of leaders they get".

Nations that advance and make progress don't publicize religion. In civilised world the embarrassment of asking a man his religion is similar to what you get for asking a man how his last night's conjugal duty to his wife was.  We desire a leader for a secular world of commerce, industry and trade and not  church leaders.

Chukumnonso Odum (Esq)