Leadership Must Be Earned Through Service, Not Seized – Aregbesola

Former Governor of Osun and ex-Minister of Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, has said leadership must be earned through service, accountability and sacrifice, rather than seized through plunder and abandoned when the opportunity to serve ends.

Aregbesola spoke on Thursday in Abuja at the public reading of Ogbeni: The Osun Renaissance Years, a book authored by journalist Olakunle Abimbola documenting his tenure as governor of Osun State.

Describing the gathering as an intellectual rather than political event, Aregbesola said books provided a better platform for examining leadership than political rallies because they demanded deeper questions and scrutiny.

He said the book was deliberately different from the usual praise songs or defensive accounts that often followed the end of political tenures, describing it instead as a collection of verifiable facts and a manual for leadership and leadership training.

According to him, the book demonstrated the importance of presenting a clear manifesto and programme to voters and remaining committed to them long after the applause had ended.

“In our country, a term in office rarely ends with a report card. It ends, far more often, with a song of praise, or a defense dressed up as an achievement. This book stands apart from both, offering verifiable facts rather than an anthem or an alibi, set down as a manual for leadership and for leadership training.

“It is about presenting a manifesto and a programme to the electorate, and keeping faith with both, long after the applause has ended. It is about marshalling resources to meet objectives with discipline. It shows how one programme, education, can build a chain of value that reaches into every corner of society.

“This book explains how a state programme, the school feeding initiative, grew into a model the Federal Government itself would later adopt. Essentially, this book is a case study of what good leadership can produce, measured in outcomes people can still point to, rather than slogans. Those afraid of their own past are unfit to lead a people toward their future. Such leaders leave behind little worth inheriting,” the former Governor noted.

He said leadership was “serious business”, adding that it should be built on personal example, accountability and the discipline to continue working even after public attention had shifted elsewhere.

Citing the philosophy of the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Aregbesola said those entrusted with leadership must be prepared to “grasp the nettle” and demonstrate probity, unselfishness and self-sacrifice.

He also stressed that the achievements associated with his administration should not be attributed to him alone, describing the “Ogbeni Years” as the product of a broader movement of people who shared a common vision.

“Leadership is serious business. It is earned through service, rather than seized through plunder and abandoned in flight. It is built on example, on accountability, and on the discipline to keep building after the cameras leave. As the inimitable Chief Obafemi Awolowo counselled, those placed in a position of leadership must be prepared to grasp the nettle, and if they unite in doing so, and set a worthy example in probity, unselfishness, and self-sacrifice, the people will follow, all too readily, in their footsteps.

“As you would appreciate, what people call the “Ogbeni Years” speaks less to one man than to a movement, a collective of hands and convictions. I thank every member of that movement, and everyone who, in ways large and small, carried us to what we achieved in Osun,” Aregbesola stressed further.