A presidential aspirant under the auspices of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Alhaji Mohammed Hayatu-Deen, has declared that if elected as the president, he was going to be an empathetic leader, promising to create an egalitarian society in which all the needs and wants of society are properly reconciled.
Hayatu-Deen stated this in Abuja while fielding questions from journalists after a press briefing, where he reeled out his plans for the country.
Aside measuring pulse of the majority, the ADC aspirant noted that as leaders, one of the responsibilities are to forge a consensus in society in terms of what will best work for the society based on peculiarities and circumstances.
Hayatu-Deen stated further: “A leader must be someone who is a reflection of that society.
“First of all, these are some of the soft elements that are important. Every morning when I wake up and I look at myself in the mirror, you will not believe this.
“What I see is 105 million Nigerians who are living below the poverty line. These are people who are terrified, who are living in actual poverty, and who for all practical purposes have lost hope. If you are careful, I know we are the elites, but if you are careful, you can actually absorb a lot of information as you just drive from my house in Victoria Island to my apartment in Ikoyi.
“The number of human beings that you actually see on the streets, fighting and struggling to just squeeze into a bus, a 25-seater bus, 60 people trying to go by. What kind of life is that? So the first thing is for you to actually assimilate the pains and sufferings of your fellow human beings.
“If you do, then you will have the pleasures of mind in terms of what it is that afflicts them. That’s number one.
“Number two, you have a responsibility to actually forge a consensus in the society in terms of what will best work for our society based on our peculiarities and circumstances.
“I’m going to be an empathetic leader who all the time measures the pulse of the majority.
“Secondly, to create an egalitarian society in which all the needs and wants of society are properly reconciled.
“You’re not going to be able to do everything because there are resource constraints, but you’re going to do the greatest good for the greatest number of people.
“Three, there are certain low-hanging fruits. For God’s sake, for God’s sake, in their history, it was created over 100 or 150 years ago in other times.
“Why is it in Nigeria that today we behave as if it is something that you need to go to certain heavens to go and get it and bring it? There are many things that people have overcome and have.”
