COVID-19 has exposed true leaders, followers, and sycophants. Those who were in denial of the childishness of Donald Trump can no longer sustain their delusion without announcing to the world how deluded they are. True followers whose elastic limit of tolerating incompetent and corrupt leaders like Muhammadu Buhari must have gotten to a breaking point, unless they are individuals like Bola Ahmed Tinubu who is now a slave to his ambition. Tinubu can be crowned without contest as the most influential sycophant in Africa. And his sycophancy can be traced back to when he was a Sani Abacha boy like Buhari his present master whose administration’s COVID-19 palliative disbursement has again shown the unprecedentedly corruption and callousness of this administration.
A sycophant is someone who massages continually the ego of a benefactor. Most sycophants do it for material benefits, others are faceless volunteers with skewed herd mentality. Most Americans, Nigerians, and Lagosians who still support Trump, Buhari, and Tinubu respectively easily fall into the above definition of a sycophant. They are the ones who give these leaders a delusional sense of accomplishment and essence. These leaders continually surround themselves with yesmen and women like Festus Keyamo who justify actions they find difficult to justify. Sycophants are one of the reasons Adolf Hitler succeeded for so long. Sycophants will be the reason why America’s most childish president will probably get a second term. They are the reason why Buhari got a second term by skewing the electoral commission and the judiciary with sycophants. They are the reasons why Tinubu who once boasted to be richer than Osun State is the unofficial treasurer of Lagos State for decades.
As followers, we have the strength to dethrone them if we act collectively beyond our ethnic and religious biases. If the powerful, semi-powerful and powerless among us don’t act now, a killer virus might emerge later that discriminates between leaders, followers, and sycophants. If COVID-19 was only infecting the underprivileged, these leaders would not have taken the actions they are now forced to take. Buhari who is now a domiciled president against his former penchant for foreign trips is facing the reality of the scandalous Aso Rock Clinic that was used to embezzle N10.98bn in the 2017 budget. Followers everywhere must congregate after this isolation to strategize on how to dethrone sycophants and the leaders they support.
Ata Ukuta – Editor, www.towncryyers.com