Former President, Goodluck Jonathan, has said that Nigeria’s firm adherence to tribal and religious sentiments remains one of the biggest obstacles to national development.
It was reports that Jonathan, who stated this in an interview on ‘Talking Books African’, a programme by the Rainbow Book Club, lamented how Nigeria has always gotten it wrong in leadership.
Jonathan attributed the wrong choice of political leaders to religious and tribal sentiments. He urged Nigerian youths to refrain from choosing leaders based on tribe or religion, stressing that they should be selected based on competence and capacity.
According to Jonathan, tribe and religion are major setbacks to the country’s leadership recruitment process.
He said, “Nigeria today — we are divided along tribal and religious lines, and it worries me. And if we don’t make any changes, which are difficult to make, it may continue to our grandchildren because we started wrongly.
“There is no effort to make sure we change, and it is a major problem. Most of the problems we have today in the country are because of this division.
“Young people should know that the issue of tribe and religion is a major setback for this country. It creates problems of leadership recruitment. If somebody is holding a political office and wants to make an appointment, he begins to see that even if Mrs A knows the issue better than Mrs B, and Mrs B is from his tribe, he wants to use Mrs B.”
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