He spoke as President Goodluck Jonathan also extolled Obasanjo’s qualities and said the former president “…is a great man, a patriot, true nationalist, pan Africanist and global citizen”.
Shagari spoke in Abuja in his capacity as Chairman at the launch of two books on Obasanjo: “The Most Significant Achievements of the Obasanjo Presidency (1999 – 2005): Volumes 1 and 2,”.
According to Shagari, “This is not unusual. I did not achieve all the goals I did set for myself while I was president, either. No one actually does: whether it is in Europe, the Americas or Africa. The real issue is to put in your best, be accountable, honest, disciplined, focused, compassionate, courageous and committed to the common good.”
He said there were few leaders like Obasanjo and that Nigerians were lucky to have him in their country.
“He has served at all levels in war and in peace, as a military man and as a civilian, as an ordinary citizen and as a traditional chief and above all, as a man who believes in God and country,” Shagari said.
Represented at the occasion by Vice President Namadi Sambo, Jonathan lamented that Nigerians were always impatient with their leaders. He also said it was left for history to judge the leaders according to their conducts while in office.
He said to avoid the pitfall, Jonathan always consults with past leaders before embarking or taking decision on any national issues, often on one on one basis.
“The President often does this in order to draw robustly from their reservoir of experience. But this does not mean that those past leaders do not make mistakes,” he said.
According to the President, there are always challenges confronting Nigeria as a developing nation, which he said are numerous and complex, but said Nigerians must learn to appreciate the commitment, dedication, patriotism and sacrifices of all their past leaders.
“We also as impatient beings, rush to judgement about the records of our leaders. The truth is that our country has been blessed with some of the best minds in the world and with great leaders,” he said.
As a mortal, Jonathan said Obasanjo was susceptible to errors, but pointed out that his achievements and successes far outweigh his errors, hence the two volumes were very timely.
The president said Nigeria was gradually consolidating its democratic values and practices and urged that the opportunity be used to build new leaders and new voices. According to him, “the current leaders must deliberately set out to build a successor generation at all levels. If this fails to happen, we may live to regret this oversight,”
Though the book which is titled, “The Most Significant Achievements” of the Obas-anjo Presidency (1999 – 2005) and edited by Samuel Matthew Abuja, was launched without the presence of the Chief Host who also did not send any representative.
But the Head of Service of the Federation, Mr. Steve Oronsaye, attributed Obas-anjo’s absence to what he called “family emergency”.
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