From Vision to Reality: A Critical Review of Abiola Samuel’s AFAS General Secretary’s Manifesto

Oluwatayo Ogundare

In the words of Jack Welsh, an American business expert: “great leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion,” explains the fundamentals of a good leader as someone who not only has a vision but also works towards achieving the full completion. Every student leader on campus presents a vision when aspiring for political positions during elections. However, it is not uncommon to observe that a lot of these student leaders often hit roadblocks while attempting to transform their vision into reality. They often cite issues of financial constraints, time limitation, the issue of jurisdiction between the management and the executives, lack of students’ participation, among others. But the reality remains the same: if sufficient groundwork had been conducted before drafting the plan, key observations would have emerged. Hence, if one sees a leader who stands out among these, one should give such a person a pat on the back.

Abiola Samuel Peace, a 300-level student of the Department of Theater Arts and erstwhile AFAS General Secretary, highlighted four (4) plans in his manifesto: THE DAWN INITIATIVE which includes: D- Digital Training Initiative, A- Accessible & Up to Date AFAS E-library, W- Writing (project and research writing), and N- Newsletter to AFASites through the Association mail. Of all the plans listed above, he left none unturned in making sure everything was successfully implemented.

The Digital Training Initiative is a plan designed to equip AFASites with “some necessary skills like proper editing, formatting, and use of PowerPoint presentation in their academics.” The training is expected to be a virtual class organised in the first semester, and to cover Google PowerPoint, Google documents and Microsoft Excel, especially for freshers.

When asked about the update, he mentioned that it has been done in the first semester, providing proofs that revealed the existence of the group with over 280 members, and a screenshot of some trainees who waited till the end of the session. Although he encountered setbacks with one of the trainers, the session could be tagged as successful. “We invited Alade Christianah, a digital skill tutor, and Ola Samuel who had a crashed system and was unable to treat his part,” he said. In addition, he explained how participants reached out after the training session to express their satisfaction and also to retrieve their gifts.

In another of his plans, Abiola promised AFASites to establish an “accessible & Up to Date AFAS E-library with the AFAS E-mail, and this will contain past questions from the last three sessions.” He also maintained that he “would reach out to General Secretaries and Course Reps in all departments to get the latest materials and past questions for the E-library.”

When quizzed on this, he explained that the AFAS E-library has been created and there are already materials and past questions in the drive. “There was an E-library but it was not created by the association. Hence, I created the AFAS E-library with the association’s mail account to allow for continuity and future reference. I worked in conjunction with the AFAS Assistant General Secretary, because we have the same plan listed in our manifestos. I planned to reach out to the general secretaries and course reps but many of them were not responsive. This made me reach out to students themselves to get past questions,” he explained.

He, however, acknowledged that the work is still in progress and not yet perfect, given that some departments have few or no past questions in the drive. He also mentioned that he has yet to update the first-semester examination questions, which he promised to do through the office of the AGS during this interview.

Furthermore, Samuel also promised to “organize an intensive physical training on projects and research writing in the second semester for finalists and 300-level students to arm them with the needed skills in writing their final year projects.” This, he did in the lecture room 35 with an equal number of students across levels and departments who witnessed the training.”

It almost did not happen but thank God and to my President. Picking the date for the training was not so easy because there were a lot of things on the ground to settle. We had minor issues, and we also had to cater for refreshments as well,” he narrated.

The last of his plans, which is “Newsletter to AFASites through the association mail, aimed at keeping AFASites abreast of happenings with the executives and to further bridge the gap between AFASites and the executives,” was sent on a monthly basis to AFASites who registered their mails till the point he resigned from office.

“Basically, I felt like we can’t fully have an association where everyone is carried along at the same time. So I had to explore every means available — both physical and Online— to reach AFASites. I felt like this newsletter is another means and a good initiative as well,” he said.

At this point, one might think Abiola’s tenure was exceptional, considering how most of his fellow executives, both in the faculty and beyond, failed to execute their plans, often citing financial constraints and the emergence of unforeseen circumstances—circumstances that, in reality, should have been anticipated and either avoided or addressed. It’s high time aspiring student leaders started getting intentional about their plans as this can never be overemphasized. It’s not until they formulate white elephant projects or go overboard to promise students the second-coming of Goliath before they can capture the students’ votes. Students should always look inward, like Abiola, towards those they represent, recognize their grievances, and work towards addressing some of their issues.