How Nigerians destroy companies from within and the evil of bad leadership

One of our pastors gave an insightful testimony of his life. He had started smoking Indian hemp in secondary school and really got addicted to hard drugs while schooling in a  polytechnic in the North.

He became a cult member and the head of drug addicts in the school. Although very mischievous, he was very brilliant and did very well in his studies. By providence, he served with YMCA in Ibadan, Oyo State, and later got a job in a card company where they paid him #20,000 monthly.

After spending a short while there, he got another job (factory manager) in a multinational company based in Lagos, where his monthly salary was #97,000. Thereafter, his life began to unravel deviously. Hear him.

“Brethren, when the Lagos offer came in 1990, I didn’t even know what to tell the card company. I just told them that my mother was dying and she wanted me to come and bury her. I was an unbeliever, so the lie flowed freely. People of God, the very first day I resumed at the multinational, just about two hours on the job, I started stealing. I didn’t plan to steal. What happened!? The General Manager (GM) – a white man – sent for me, and asked me to find out why the workers were scampering about as he approached the factory.

When I got into the factory, two directors of the company (Nigerians) came into my office. They put an envelope on my table and said, “You have to help us. Just mellow the thing down. That’s #850,000.” So, I sat down and cooked up a big lie in my report to the GM.

Remember, I was an unbelieving sinner and lying was no big deal for me. When I came out of the GM’s office, the directors gave me another #150,000 for a job well done. So, on my first day at work, I went home with #1m. That’s how I joined them in stealing and defrauding the company.

I didn’t touch my salary at all during the first two years, so much so that the bank sent one of their staff to our office to make inquiries about the anomaly.

Fortunately for me, the lady they spoke with was my girlfriend, and she cooked up another lie to cover me. otherwise, the company would have known there was something seriously wrong, and that could have led to further investigation and the probable termination of my appointment.

As the factory manager of an organization that made over 500 products, everybody wanted to relate with me. Before GOD, and I lie not, every day, I got nothing less than 1.8m in bribes. And I worked in that company for 4 years.”

The bubble burst when the directors of the company (18 of them, all Nigerians) tried to forcefully initiate him into their Ogboni cult just to be sure he’ll never betray them because they were diverting company goods (worth billions, even back then) to other places for personal benefits.

At the birthday party of one of the directors’ children, they called him into a private room and asked him to enter into a blood covenant with them. He refused. Then and there, they threatened to chop off his head with an axe, before one of them informed the others that he didn’t come to the party alone.

Meanwhile, our brother was screaming frantically as he searched for an escape route. Luckily, he got out, but the following day, he met a freshly chopped-off head of a dog on his table at work, meaning, ‘We can reach you even behind closed doors. Leave! We don’t want you here anymore!” Thus began his travails and frustrations in the office, leading to his exit from the multinational, and eventual Salvation and transformation. Today, he preaches the Gospel of our Lord JESUS CHRIST. Praise the LORD!

However, his story reveals to us why the likes of Michelin, Dunlop, Exide Batteries, Volkswagen, Peugeot, Leyland, Steyr, and many other multinationals have folded up, and become history in Nigeria. ‘Ajewonrun ni!’, meaning, we ‘ate’ them to destruction! There are many such unrepentant ‘eaters’ in churches and mosques all over the country today. These are co-destroyers of Nigeria.

Question: Are you building or destroying the country, state, your employer, your family, yourself, and future generations by your actions (lifestyle) of today?

Our problem is not only bad leadership; beyond that, many Nigerians are too self-serving and avaricious beyond sensibility. We ‘kill’ industries and establishments that should serve generations with our greed and lust for ill-gotten wealth. Let the real change begin with you and me.

Let our churches, mosques, spiritual leaders, and all ‘faithful’ of the different religions in Nigeria, return to the Living God and treat one another with brotherly love and kindness.

As we celebrate our 62nd Independence Anniversary, let’s stop our religious hypocrisy and lead lives that truly bring Glory, Praise, and Honour to our God.

DA