A former Minister of Petroleum,
Professor Tam David-West,
yesterday said the presidential
candidate of the All
Progressives Congress (APC),
General Mohammadu Buhari (retd), “is not too old to govern
Nigeria”, saying leadership is
not by age or degree but by
endowment. Delivering a public lecture on
the topic: “Corruption and
Insecurity: Model for Nigeria”, at
the 60th anniversary of the Kuti
Hall, University of Ibadan, he
said though Buhari would be 73 years in 2015, he is still not
as old as the Liberian President,
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and
Zimbabwean President, Robert
Mugabe. “They say Buhari is too old. He
will be 73 next year. He is very
young. Mugabe is 90 years this
year. Mugabe has been
president since 1987. The
President of Liberia is older than Buhari. Leadership is not by age
or degree. It depends on
endowment. “Our president (Goodluck
Jonathan) has Ph.D. Is he a
better leader than Balewa
(Tafawa Balewa, the first Prime
Minister of Nigeria)? Jimmy
Carter of America has two Ph.D degrees, a Ph.D in Nuclear
Physics and a Ph.D Chemistry.
Was he a better leader in
America? I believe in Buhari
because I worked with him. I
believe in him because I know he is honest. I know that he has
zero tolerance for corruption,”
he stated. On the allegations that Buhari is
an Islamic fundamentalist,
David-West commented: “I am
an Anglican fundamentalist. I
am a Christian fundamentalist
and I am proud to be that. A fundamentalist is different from
an extremist. A fundamentalist
believes exactly in his religion. I
believe the Bible is sacred. If
you’re an Islamic
fundamentalist, it means that Quran is sacred. It is different
from being an extremist. “I have said this and nobody
challenged me; three of Buhari’s
cooks are Christians. I have
published it many times. His
second security officer is a
Christian, his second driver is a Christian. His cook in the office is
a Christian. Idiagbon’s (Tunde
Idiagbon) wife was a born
again Christian. You can preach
better sermon with your life
than with your lips. We should show example by how we live.” David-West, who served as
Minister of Petroleum from 1984
to 1985 when Buhari was the
Military Head of State, also
recommended that any corrupt
public officer should be sentenced to life imprisonment
or be stripped naked and
paraded in public. He added
that Buhari has zero-tolerance
for corruption, describing him
as the change that Nigeria needs in the next political
dispensation. “We can stop corruption. It is
very easy. It is a moral issue. If
the leaders have the moral will
to change, if the parents have
the moral will of dos and don’ts
in the family, the children must be brought up with some
strong ethical values in the
family, which they will carry to
outside world. “Corruption is everywhere but
we can stop corruption in
Nigeria if we stand up for it. If
the leader is not corrupt, the
people around him will not be
corrupt. If the head of the fish is rotten, the body is also rotten.
There is no leader that stands
up against corruption that will
have corrupt people around
him because they know they
would not go away with it. So, they cannot shift the blame.”

For david north, yes buhari is nt too old but for a young Nigerian like me buhari is too old n even close to his grave... Let the fresh blood finish his sencond term bfor we will now find freshest blood come 2019. GEJ till 2019!!!