Former United States Secretary of State Colin Powell yesterday in Abuja admonished Nigerians to look into the future and move beyond the 2007 general elections.
He also re-echoed President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua’s servant-leader stance, saying in a democracy, elected leaders are servants and not bosses.
Powell spoke at an international conference put together by Tell newsmagazine to celebrate 10 years of democracy in Nigeria at the Transcorp Hilton Hotel, Abuja.
“Don’t be tied to the elections of 1999, 2003 and 2007. Focus on the future. You must remove the residues of the past and build the future,” he said.
He said: “elected leaders are servants in a democracy but not bosses. American democracy is driven by performance.”
Powell was also a special guest at THISDAY Africa Rising Music Festival last year in Washington DC where he endorsed Barack Obama for US presidency.
For democracy to flourish, he said the people must be free and allowed to form political organisations that argue and battle in the field of ideas unmolested and unhindered.
He said: “You cannot grow democracy that does not have opposing point of view; people must be allowed to organise political organisations that argue, that shout, that fight with each other not in the battle field but in the field of ideas. When a ruling party thinks there is no need for the other party’s view, then you are already out of democracy and back into tyranny.
“Democracy must have elections that are honest, transparent without corruption without anybody buying votes; without any big man or godfather pushing people around. The government and its leaders are obliged to be good stewards of the endowment of the people’s right and the wealth of the nation. It is a solemn obligation, an obligation in which you take an oath.”
Recalling his career in the military in which he rose to a four-star General and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff through hard work, Powell disclosed that even with that status he lacked the authority to unilaterally send a single soldier to the battle field without the orders of the Defence Secretary who is appointed by the President elected by the people.
“I was responsible for 3 million troops, the most powerful military command on the face of the earth, but the truth of the matter was I did not have the authority to move a single soldier to the battle field. I did not have the authority to commit military forces to battle. I was just a servant of a government that has been elected by the people. I could only give orders at the instance of the Secretary of Defence,” said Powell.
He described democracy as a culture which had been imbibed even by the military, adding that as head of the military, soldiers could defy his order if they knew it was illegal. Powell advised Nigerians to break loose from the past and focus on the future as the past can’t be changed. Speaking earlier, the Special Guest of Honour, President Yar’Adua, who was represented by Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan, noted that it takes time for democracies to take root, saying older democracies did not achieve success in one fell swoop.
He said: “Older democracies did not achieve their success in one fell swoop. It was one amendment after the other, year by year, decade after decade. Today some of them are centuries old. Democracy is the rule of the majority with an eye on protecting the minority. While we will continue to redress the flaws in our democracy step by step and amendment after amendment, we will do so with an eye on creating a perfect union. While we don’t have to wait for centuries to correct the observed imperfections in our democracy, it is a matter of great urgency and utmost patriotism that we must work earnestly to make sure votes count and those who get elected are the true representatives of the people.”
Touching on the report of the Justice Muhammed Uwais Electoral Reform Committee (ERC), the vice-president said the ball was in the court of the National Assembly and that the President lacked the power to impose laws on the people.
“An interesting thing is when the National Assembly puts a section of the Uwais report aside, nobody is mobilisng two million march against them, the fact is we will continue to call on Nigerians that there is no need to quarrel over the report because in a presidential democracy the President does not have power to impose laws on Nigerians. Everything ends with the National Assembly,” he said.
In his opening remarks, the Chairman of the occasion and former Head of State, General Yakubu Gowon, spoke against any form of extra constitutional change of government and stressed the need for the sustenance of democracy.

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