By Valentine Obienyem
I came into Lagos yesterday and moved straight to St Agnes Guest House in Maryland. If you have not stayed in a facility maintained by Reverend Sisters, you would not believe how secure and neat they are, and how well they are maintained. Even when the facilities are old, they are well kept. This is why I prefer their facilities, before Oderaigbo would say that I forgot to add that they are relatively cheap.
In Abuja, I stay at Pope John Paul II Centre. Around Ikeja, I stay at St Agnes, and around Ikoyi, I stay at Cornelian Centre. I have not had any reason to regret my choices. How else do I explain this? I remember an Oriental teacher trying to explain yoga to his students. Frustrated that they were not understanding, he told them that only through yoga may yoga be known. You can only discover the beauty of those places by staying in them.
This morning, familiar with Lagos traffic, I left Maryland around 5 a.m. and went straight to Mr Peter Obi’s house. I was told he had gone for morning Mass. Shortly afterwards, he returned and immediately went into his exercise routine. After that, we retired to his office. “Val, now that you are here, let us deal with all the letters and outstanding issues.” Straight away, he dictated seven letters, and while I was working on them, he took turns going through other mails. He would occasionally ask, “Val, how far? Are you done?”
A whole lot of other things came up, including the booking of flights, hotels and even train tickets, which he did leisurely, like an Italian drinking his wine.
At about three o’clock, the mother of the house strolled in. Her type is rare. She is simply Madam Margaret and does not wish to pretend to be anybody else. Generous to a fault, when that woman gives one something, she will pretend she does not even notice the presence of her husband. Good enough, the husband has since learnt to allow her to remain Madam Margaret.
She has such physical loveliness and vivacious wit that once she enters any unlit house, she lights it up. Looking around, she asked, “Val, have you eaten, or are you not hungry? You should know that if you wait for or look up to your Oga, hunger will deal with you.” She said she had rice and yam porridge and proceeded to take the orders of everyone present – Benji, Johnson, Son of Man (Chief. Tony Obinugwu) Mama P, Zekeri and Esther, Within a few minutes, she came in with food on a trolley. We did justice to the food, some of us even eating to our cubic capacities. Very soon, she returned with juices, oranges and apples. We did justice to those as well.
Soon afterwards, Mr. Peter Obi continued working. I have often marvelled at his capacity for work. Like Napoleon Bonaparte, who famously described his own mind as a chest of drawers, saying, “My mind is like a chest of drawers. When I wish to deal with a subject, I open that drawer and shut all the others. When I am wearied, I shut all the drawers and go to sleep,” Mr Obi has a similarly furnished and organised mind. His only occasional pause was remembering the death of Chief Okey Ezibe in a manner that shows he was deeply pained by the loss.
As I left him around 7 p.m. to check into a nearby guest house run by the Sisters, I could not help imagining Aso Rock. It will be interesting to see Mr. Obi work round the clock for the good of Nigeria, with Madam Margaret reminding everybody that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.
What Nigeria needs today is a healthy, energetic and focused leader who can devote himself fully to the task of restoring our country to health. A sick country cannot afford the luxury of being led by a sick president. We need a leader whose physical vitality, mental alertness and capacity for sustained work match the urgency of our national predicament. Nigeria is ill, not beyond recovery, but in urgent need of healing. We need someone who can work tirelessly to restore the health of our economy, our institutions and our national life. Watching Mr. Peter Obi at work today, I could not help imagining what it would mean for Nigeria to have at the helm a man with the energy, discipline and determination to undertake this demanding task. To restore Nigeria to health, we need a leader who is healthy enough to lead the recovery.