For long, I've been playing around with a few pet "theories" on how I think Nigeria is going to graduate from "third world" to "first world". I often talk about "progressive graduation" — that is, Nigeria is going to develop in phases and stages. We're not going to go to bed tonight and wake up tomorrow to discover that we have become the new Singapore. Given our internal challenges, especially our leadership struggles, I admit that this is going to be a painfully and frustratingly long process. For instance, it took decades to destroy the education sector and this cannot be repaired in one year. You cannot reduce dependency on oil overnight. The key factor, however, is to be sure we are making progress per time — not one step forward and two backward.
Another pet "theory" of mine is that for Nigeria to genuinely graduate from gutter to glory, we need a team of "competent and patriotic" leaders. Take note: competence AND patriotism, not competence OR patriotism. By competence, I refer to capacity plus track record. By patriotism, I mean putting Nigeria
