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The Goodluck Jonathan Countdown Calendar: 1398 Days To Go By Sonala Olumhense

Every achiever has some kind of work plan.  It would outline not only the success he seeks, but also timelines and deadlines aimed at achieving the objective.  It is known as strategic planning.

Every achiever has some kind of work plan.  It would outline not only the success he seeks, but also timelines and deadlines aimed at achieving the objective.  It is known as strategic planning.

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Timelines are a key component of strategic thinking; they help the planner keep his deadlines and warn him he may be running out of room to run.  Today, I announce the Goodluck Jonathan Countdown Calendar.

It shows 1398 days left of his presidency. 

A caveat is necessary: only the Nigerian constitution guarantees those 1398 days; they are of no consequence to exigencies such as Egypt-style revolutions, labour rebellions, student uprisings or military mutinies.  And the only one guaranteed is today.

This is my second presidential Countdown Calendar.  In September 2003, I set up one that I hoped would be helpful to the adventure being led by one Olusegun Obasanjo, the same man who is sounding increasingly frustrated he does not have more time on his presidency. As I said at that time, the Calendar is a perpetual reminder of the time available for good or evil, accomplishment or excuses. A tool of this nature helps a man to focus on being a man. 

Among other things, the Calendar can help the serious leader ensure he does not sleep too much or read too many banal speeches.  It can help him guarantee policy implementation, and that funds are honestly invested on the future.  It can help him achieve sincerity.

In February and March of this year, Mr. Jonathan showered every corner of Nigeria with promises.  The Countdown, as a work tool, can ensure that not only does he always remember those debts that he gleefully incurred during that period, but that he is conscious of the limited time he has to pay them.

The Calendar will remind him of the people waiting for him because he promised jobs, electricity, education, water, roads, freedom from kidnappers, and even a sense of national pride. 

It will remind him, for instance, of the N50 billion he said in Ondo State on March 2 he had set aside in the 2011 budget for youth employment.  It will remind him that he said in Abeokuta on March 12 he will revive ailing oil refineries and build new ones, and in Abuja on March 21 that he will build car manufacturing or assembly plants.  Since no achiever can finish something he has not started, when is Jonathan starting?

What was even more impressive about Jonathan’s strategy four months ago was his announcement of specific four and five year national plans.  They include a five-year development acceleration scheme; a four-year plan for infrastructure development; and a five-year plan to revolutionize agriculture and establish industries in the country. 

He was also occasionally specific and lucid.  In Gusau, he promised to establish a federal university of technology within one year.  In Ilorin, he promised the farmers agricultural loans he said were ready to be given to them.  In Birni Kebbi, he pledged to ensure the take-off of the Federal University in Kebbi in 2012. In Awka, he said Nigerians would have electricity within his four years in office.  In Osogbo, he promised the immediate completion of the Lagos-Jebba rail project.

As I pointed out in “A Mountain of Promises” on May 22, Jonathan’s most significant promise was in Onitsha on February 27.  He told Nigerians: "I do not make empty promises in my campaign because whatever I promise to do, I had already carried out adequate study to make sure I can accomplish it in the next four years.”

Four years, categorically.  Not once did he promise six, let alone seven.
Jonathan also has another promise he has repeatedly made on his Facebook page: “I will never, never, let you down,” he says.

This is why I believe a man like him needs such a tool as this Calendar.  It will help remind him he has a busy four years—sorry, three years and nine months—and that he ought to be consistently busy in order that he might announce achievements, not offer apologies; and celebrate milestones, not seek hiding space.  It will help combat the temptations of amnesia, hypocrisy and indolence. 

It will help remind him that the power in his hands is beyond compare: when he wanted to buy three executive jets, for instance, he simply announced that the order had been placed.  His jets are arriving now.

The Nigerians who said they believed in him are waiting not for any jets, but for proof he is a credible man, and that he did not sell them fiction. 
I did not support Jonathan’s presidential aspiration because it lacked the content and purposefulness demanded by the Nigerian marketplace.  You do not send for a nurse when surgery is required, and my Nigeria needs drastic surgery. 

Hopefully, Jonathan grasps the linkage between power and responsibility, and that the challenge before him is about commitment and fortitude, and not about Mugabe-esque years in control.  In any event, he may wish to be advised that every Nigerian leader who has mistaken lunchtime for longevity at the buffet has lost both the battle and his name.

If Jonathan truly wants to “transform” Nigeria, let him begin by serving the constitution, not rewriting it.  If he serves creditably, the country will listen to him when he is out of office.  The spirit of the constitution is that people who administer Nigeria do so with conscience and patriotism.  On the contrary, what we have got from the People’s Democratic Party since 1999 has been the utmost in political irresponsibility alongside systematic, greedy and ruthless exploitation.
Early in 2010, BEFORE Jonathan insisted on running for the presidency, he had some credibility when he said he wanted to embark on electoral reform.  All that went down the river the moment he became a player in the same game he wanted to referee.

It is strange that once armed with a presidency he claimed he only wanted for four years, during which he said he would transform the country, and he says the four are too short.  The truth is that for as long as the focus is on power, not performance, no amount of time will ever be long enough. 
The Countdown Calendar would remind Mr. Jonathan four years is a long time if he counts with his heart because it is by the heart you love your country.  A farmer sows in the planting season, and works until the harvest; he does not sit on his hands and cry that the harvest is coming too soon.

The way I understand it, Mr. Jonathan celebrates the good luck that has carried him this far.  One of his army of advisers may want to point out that in view of the job Jonathan defined for himself in his electoral campaign, and the shoes and jets he now owns, it is his choice to focus on luck, or work.

But it is in his hands: 1398 days.  Armed like that, some will serve, and some will snore.
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