LEE Kuan Yew, may blessings pour on the mention of his names, warned Kwame Nkrumah to change his tune the day after independence. In furtherance of the advice, LKY told Kwame Nkrumah that instead of singing Africa for Africans, he must now sing Come all ye faithful, bring your moneys and your talents and let’s build Ghana and Ghanaians for the glory of the world.

Paul Kagame asked one of his advisers to enumerate the lessons (Fashola’s Takeaways) that Rwanda could learn from LKY and his transformation of Singapore from a third world tropical no where to a first world where to be.

Lastly, the story goes, (and since Olusegun Obasanjo has denied the whole thing, we keep this as one of the factions of our country) or doesn’t go, that Olusegun Obasanjo heard about LKY and his transformation of Singapore at the end of his second term and wondered if he could have three times three terms, he could transform Nigeria from a third world to a first world.

You see it took LKY thirty years to not only transformed Singapore but also ensure that it remain transformed. It was not a miracle and LKY was not even sure if he believed in God. So, LKY and Singapore have fascinated African politicians from the 1960s. And rightly so. But African politicians have been fascinated by the wrong things in LKY and Singapore.

Lee Kuan Yew was not only the best in his educational career, he also insisted in as a political leader to work with the brightest and the best. As a leader he was fixated on results that would achieve order and justice. He was unashamedly partial to intellectual and moral superiority. He valued public good over personal interest and favoured reward according to physical or mental contribution. He preferred performance to promises and would rather have discipline than democracy.

In fact he even felt that some members of society should have two votes (instead of the mantra of one-man one vote) between the ages of 40 and 60 because they can make better use of their votes. Finally he admired Charles de Gaule of France, Winston Churchill of Britain, Deng Xiaoping of China and Nelson Mandela of South Africa.

For him, these were leaders with enormous emotional stability who did not allow their personal misfortunes or sufferings to affect their disciplined visionary leadership and judgement. At this point Alaba reels out some quotes about Singapore and LKY. Singapore has an airport like a movie set and home ownership for 95% of its citizens, science and maths scores higher than that of its colonizer, Great Britain.

It has the world’s busiest port, is the third largest oil refiner, the lowest cost of healthcare of any developed nation, and has become a major center of global manufacturing and services. For LKY Human beings are inherently vicious and have to be restrained from their viciousness. People can be disciplined. Law and order is essential but many do not recognise that without order laws cannot be applied. Order also demands that people act in a disciplined way, which is not ‘natural’.

LKY and Singapore succeeded because of “good education buttressed by strong values of self-responsibility.” African politicians are attracted to Lee Kuan Yew because they link what they considered his authoritarian attitude to the development of his country Singapore. They then come to the conclusion that if they too are authoritarian, they would develop their own countries. Wrong.

LKY surrounded himself with the brightest and the best talents of his country and even of immigrants. In such company, superior argument wins, not authoritarianism. African politicians use their colonial history of oppression and exploitation in the past to excuse their present failure to move their country forward.

While Lee Kuan Yew depended on meritocracy, many African leaders favoured kleptocracy and then use authoritarian power and state violence to cover up their pillage of their country’s resources. Instead of xenophobia (Ghana must go) and identity politics of African politicians, Lew Kuan Yew encouraged immigration and used such talent as came with it for the greater glory of Singapore. In the last 16 years of democracy, Nigeria has indulged in more factions than any novelist could invent.

Theirs is the continuing faction of budgets and extra-budgetary spending. But even more self-delusioning is the visions of greatness that were conjured up by such inanities as vision 2010 as if 2010 would never arrive. Then it was vision 2015 as if 2015 will never come. Finally there is vision 2020 as if the year 2020 will never make it to the world.

Will Buhari and the All Progressive Congress change these things for the better? This is needed because on the topic of change Lee Kuan Yew advises ‘make haste slowly’. Nobody likes to lose his ethnic, cultural, religious, or linguistic identity. On the other hand, you cannot have many distinct components and be one nation. If you want complete separateness you should not come to live in the host country. Trouble cannot wish Buhari good luck for obvious reasons. Rather Trouble wishes Buhari many Lee Kuan Yews!