Fellow Africans, please lend me your eyes and ears. I have just experienced a pleasant surprise in a place I least expected, Bénin Republic, just a stone throw from Nigeria.
Believe me, I actually said a word of prayer for President Patrice Guillaume Athanase Talon, the 63 year old President of Bénin, his wife, Madame Claudine Gbenagnon, their children, Karen and Lionel, and their unborn generations, for making Africa proud by their spectacular performance in power. I’m prouder that President Talon is a Taurean like me, also born in May and about two years older than me.
I’m sure you all know how difficult it is to find African leaders worthy of adulations talk less of prayers. The last time I found one was in 2016 when President John Dramani Mahama wowed me with his extraordinary projects in Ghana. I had screamed his names on the rooftops and many politicians got angry and jittery and jealous and envious. I didn’t mind because the color of truth is always constant. I thought it would be difficult to find another Mahama in West Africa except President Macky Sall of Senegal, a country I first discovered in 1992, during an unforgettable trip to Goree Island with Chief Moshood Abiola. Lately, though a Nigeria, I saw a brilliant in Port Harcourt, where Governor Nyesom Wike has scattered everywhere with monumental projects.
Let me confess that my curiosity about President Talon had been aroused by my very dear Brother, Wole Omoboriowo, sometime last year. He had regaled me with tales of how President Talon is transforming Bénin at the speed of light. It sounded too good to be true and I must have subconsciously felt Wole was just being hyperbolic. Where would Bénin find such resources from, I had soliloquised quietly! If Nigeria with all its natural resources and mountains of debts has nothing tangible to show, I reasoned Bénin would be the most unlikely of places to witness such sporadic developments.
What was more? I had tried to establish the French version of Ovation International magazine in Bénin in 2006 but the country became too small for our dreams. We couldn’t make money and we had to be subsidizing our operations, as if the subsidy syndrome had followed us from Nigeria. Most painfully, we had to shut down our beautiful and magnificent waterfront office at the Marina. As a pan-Africanist under the influence of Dr Kwame Nkrumah, Walter Rodney, W. E. B. Du Bois, The Nwalimu Julius Nyerere, Leopold Sedar Senghor, Amilcar Cabral and others, my dream had always been about how to unite African economies. This utopic ambition has burnt my fingers several times in different parts of Africa but I remain undaunted and unbowed.
The Cotonou I returned to was just too refreshingly different. I took extensive drive around the city and could almost not recognize most parts. My God, please, continue to imbue your son President Talon with vision and wisdom and courage to do what is needed and right for his people. I was dazed like a kindergarten baby seeing Father Christmas for the first time. I can confidently confirm that Nigerian leaders should be ashamed of the backwardness in our own country. Lest I forget, the road from Lagos to Cotonou remains under perpetual reconstruction and painfully rough, undulating and dangerous. Once we crossed the Seme border into Cotonou, it was a totally smooth ride till we came back. We did not see a single checkpoint manned by desperately greedy officers and their accomplices who looked more like ghommids out of D. O. Fagunwa’s Forest of a Thousand Daemons (Wole Soyinka’s translation of Ogboju Ode Ninu Igbo Irunmole). Without exaggerating, the Nigerian side must have had over 20 checkpoints with all of them openly extorting money from their helpless and hapless victims. This nonsense and eyesore must be scrapped urgently. And by the way, the same extortion continues in leaps and bounds at Murtala Muhammed International Airport.
President Talon became President in April 2016 when he sprung a major upset by winning election as an independent candidate, a rarity in most parts of the world. His emergence and remarkable performance confirms my long held belief and theory that it is difficult for full time career politicians to develop a nation. My thesis is simply that power should always be handed to mostly those who have had records of personal accomplishments. No leader can give what he does not have. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Dakar and barely missed attending the National School of Aviation in Paris after failing his medical test. But God must have had other fantastic plans for this wonderful child of Destiny.
Rather than allow this setback to his dream weigh him down, Talon moved on with equanimity and forayed into trading, packaging and agricultural products. He planted his Intercontinental Distribution Company, Societe Distribution Intercontinentale, suppliers of cotton products. He later established cotton factories in Bénin. Before ascending the seat of power, he was listed as one of the top 20 richest Africans.
His audacious move into politics did not appear feasible or promising to many onlookers but he shocked the world when he came second in the first round of the elections against then Prime Minister, Lionel Zinsou but Talon miraculously won the second round with a whopping 65% of the votes cast and interestingly the Prime Minister conceded defeat. It was the beginning of a new lease of life for the people of Bénin, formerly known as Dahomey.
Talon had hit the ground running from the moment he was sworn in. The business acumen in him was instantly on display. He announced the composition of his government same day he was sworn in, an impossibility in most governments of Africa and he did the uncommon by appointing two of the co-contestants , Pascal Koupaki and Abdulakeem Bio-Tchane, who had backed him in the second round, to key positions… This was how he succeeded a government of national unity, in principle. After serving his first term in office, he sought re-election and won by a landslide of 86% of the votes, almost as good as unopposed.
Since no human is perfect, opposition leaders have accused him of dictatorial tendencies. His war against corruption has been smolderingly merciless. But his supporters insist he would have failed like most African leaders if he treated issues of corruption with kids’ gloves. They support him unconditionally and he’s reported to have built a new and expansive prison for criminals and “saboteurs.” According to my good friend Alberto Koumagnon, aka Alberto Dinero, an unrepentant fan of President Talon, “this is the best President we’ve ever had in Bénin no matter what anyone says.” We drove round the city and I could not believe my eyes, like a victim of optical illusions. I could see a palpable look of national pride in my friend who could have easily passed for the Minister of Information the way and manner he reeled out endless stories about the plans of Talon to transform Bénin into a modern wonder. For example, the national airline being contemplated and the newly expanded airport in Cotonou are just truly admirable.
Bénin is home to a huge of population with Nigerian ancestry, especially members the Yoruba race, who continue to worship their traditional religion and deity in its pristine form. There’s even a national declaration of holiday for the Orisha. Sango is one of the most popular of the deities, the reason the Grammy Awards winner, Angelique Kidjo’s popular song was dedicated to Sango. In an interview she granted me in London about 25 years ago, she confirmed her fascination for the Yoruba gods.
I’m excited to witness and feel the progress Bénin has made under the leadership of the visionary President next door to us while we continue to wallow in primordial politics. I pray God would open our eyes to see the need for fresh leadership with great ideas and the determination to succeed where others failed…
- Popular columnist and presidential aspirant, Aare Dele Momodu first published this via thisdaylive.com
