I was pleased with the interview in the september issue of Diplomat East Africa on the role of ex-presidents in giving back to Africa. The excerpts from former Nigerian president HE Chief Olusegun Obasanjo were really insightful. Any citizen would agree with me that ex-presidents really do owe Africa and it’s good to see that the former Nigerian president is aware of that. The former president was shown to be involved in projects that would help change African leadership in future by mentoring the youth. One of the issues that were mentioned was incumbent leaders. As his excellency put it, “the successor generation would have nobody to succeed unless we tackle the issues of the incumbent leaders.”

I ask the question: Should we blame the leaders in office or ourselves? Aren’t we the ones hellbent on tribalism, always ready to accept bribes to do our leaders bidding? We should evaluate ourselves because if we did then these ‘incumbent leaders’ would probably not be in office now. We should strive to elect more leaders who have the interest of the country at heart rather than those whose only interest is to line their pockets as is most common with leaders. We do not want a repeat of the same mistakes lest we stagnate as the rest of the world moves forward.

The leaders should borrow a leaf from Obasanjo and return the favour which saw them in office. We are the ones who voted for them, so, would it be asking too much if they did something for us that will be remembered in the long run?

I do not mean erecting a building and having your name as the person who officially opened it, we want long lasting solutions. For instance, putting up a fight against corruption would be a start. Imagine if every leader in office was keen on fighting corruption then we would have already kicked it out of Africa. Let our leaders think of posterity and not just the five year term they are in office.

Llian Muhwezi,Tororo, UGANDA