Leadership Should Inspire Citizens To Dream Bigger, Not Smaller -By Isaac Asabor

The duty of leadership extends far beyond governing a nation. True leadership shapes aspirations. It instills hope, expands possibilities, and encourages citizens to believe that tomorrow can be greater than today. Great leaders do not merely manage the present; they paint compelling pictures of the future. They challenge people to think beyond survival, beyond limitations, and beyond what seems immediately attainable.

That is why the words of those who occupy the highest offices in a country matter. Their public statements are not ordinary conversations. They are signals that influence national thinking, especially among young people searching for direction in uncertain times.

While recalling that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s fondness for “agbado” and “ewa” has become part of Nigeria’s political vocabulary, the First Lady Senator Oluremi Tinubu recent advice to unemployed Nigerians, particularly women, urging them to consider businesses such as selling akara, roasting corn, and making kuli-kuli because they require relatively little capital is been trailed by backlashes, particularly on the social media space. 

There is absolutely nothing wrong with these foods or with the honest businesses built around them. Millions of Nigerians earn decent livelihoods from them, and they deserve respect for their hard work and resilience.

Yet the larger issue is not about food or small businesses. It is about vision. Leadership should inspire citizens to dream bigger, not smaller. When leaders consistently point citizens toward subsistence enterprises rather than speaking boldly about innovation, industrialization, technology, manufacturing, research, entrepreneurship, and global competitiveness, they risk unintentionally shrinking the horizon of national ambition.

Every Nigerian child who sits in a classroom should be encouraged to believe that education can unlock limitless possibilities. They should dream of becoming world-class engineers, medical researchers, software developers, architects, professors, entrepreneurs, inventors, diplomats, and captains of industry. Their ambitions should be fuelled by the words and policies of their leaders.

History teaches that transformational nations are built by leaders who challenge their people to reach beyond what appears possible. When the United States committed itself to landing a man on the moon, it inspired generations of scientists and engineers. When countries like Singapore, South Korea, and China set ambitious national development goals, they transformed themselves from struggling economies into global industrial powers. Their leaders consistently spoke the language of progress, innovation, excellence, and possibility. Nigeria deserves that kind of inspirational leadership.

Our young people are among the most talented and resilient anywhere in the world. Nigerian professionals excel across the globe whenever they are given opportunities. The challenge, therefore, is not a lack of talent but a shortage of opportunities and a deficit of inspiring national vision.

Government certainly has a role in encouraging entrepreneurship, including small-scale enterprises. Every thriving economy has successful micro, small, and medium-sized businesses. However, entrepreneurship should complement, not replace, a deliberate national strategy to create quality jobs, strengthen industries, improve education, expand infrastructure, and stimulate innovation.

The dream should never stop at survival. The dream should be to build companies that employ thousands, establish factories that manufacture for Africa, develop technologies that solve global problems, and create institutions that compete with the best in the world.

Leadership must constantly ask one fundamental question: “Are our words enlarging the dreams of our citizens or reducing them?”

Nations rise to the level of their collective aspirations. If citizens are encouraged to think only about surviving today, tomorrow will never be significantly different from yesterday. But when leaders challenge them to innovate, invent, create, compete, and excel, extraordinary things become possible.

Nigeria does not lack potential. It lacks enough leadership narratives that consistently encourage citizens to think beyond immediate survival and embrace long-term national greatness.

That is why our public discourse should increasingly focus on industrialization, scientific research, digital innovation, agricultural value chains, export competitiveness, renewable energy, artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing, and quality education. These are the conversations that ignite ambition and prepare nations for the future.

Leadership is ultimately about expanding possibilities. It is about convincing a child in a rural community that one day they can become a renowned surgeon, a globally respected engineer, a Nobel Prize-winning scientist, a successful manufacturer, or the founder of a multinational company.

That is the power of visionary leadership. Nigeria needs leaders whose words are as ambitious as the dreams of its people, leaders who remind every young Nigerian that while there is dignity in every honest job, there is also limitless dignity in daring to dream bigger. Because nations become great when their leaders inspire greatness. Leadership should never ask citizens to lower their dreams to fit the economy. Leadership should build an economy that is worthy of the dreams of its citizens.