The whole world, not just the Catholic or the Christian faithful, welcomed the announcement of the new Pope with joy and possibly expectation. The euphoria that surrounded this announcement as captured by the media, cut across race and religion. It was the joy of a world searching for a true, non-partisan, non-sectarian leadership. In a world that is surfeit with sectional leaders, finding one who puts humanity first, who has the moral power – call it soft power – needed to rein in the excesses of Superpowers has become near impossible. In this era of nationalism, with every nation going back to its tent, the need for someone who sees beyond real and artificial boundaries has never been more urgent. The hope, that Pope Leo X1V will fit the bill, fills the world with expectation. It is an expectation borne out of desperation in a way. It is also an expectation derived from the antecedents of Pope Francis, his predecessor, who truly wanted to listen to lowly, forgotten voices around the world. Would the new Pope continue from where the old one stopped? That indeed is the question. More than the question, it is the hope. The fact that he was allegedly very close to his predecessor helps to raise that hope. The reality though is that every Pope charts his own course as the Holy Spirit leads. The reality is that there will be dissent in the near future, strong dissent along doctrinal lines even among the powerful Cardinals despite this earlier, outward show of allegiance and loyalty. Only time would tell how long before the fangs come out. No one knows how long before his approval ratings drop. That there was no white smoke on the first day showed his was not an automatic choice. It was a consensus. Time will tell how deep the reservations of dissenting Cardinals are.

Robert Prevost, now Pope Leo X1V, is an American. The first American Pope. As if by premonition – or mischief - the American President, had, barely a week earlier, ‘showed up’ in papal robes on his social media to the angst of Catholic faithful and indeed all who revere the Pope. The man who always boasts that he could do anything, or be anyone, probably saw the adulation the world poured on the late Pope Francis and wanted some of that adulation as well. After all, this is a man who loves to be adored. It could also be a diversionary tactic given that his first hundred days in office came up about the time Pope Francis died. The difference between him and Pope Francis could not have been more stark however. One wants to build bridges. The other wants to build walls. One wants to fraternize with the poor and voiceless. The other wants to bully and subdue whoever comes across as weak. One could not have imagined himself as the other in their widest of dreams except of course, as a joke. And this was a joke. Except that the joke was on President Trump really because the Americans, including those who voted massively for him barely six months ago, were not amused. They showed their disillusionment by giving him the lowest approval rating of the first hundred days of any American President in recent history. It must rankle given his personality. People say it was a self-inflicted wound because of what the tariff had done to the US economy. If so, it was the self-inflicted wound of someone who likes to listen to his own voice. It was also a cut to an oversized ego.

We don’t have approval ratings back home which has turned out to be very convenient for our leaders. They are shielded from the immediacy of public reaction to their policies. Of course, we have the media and the social media approximating public opinion. But they are not the same as cold statistics that reveal people’s dissent or approval. So politicians can go on and on pointing at roads and bridges and even payment of salaries as sterling achievements. They can preen about the huge sums that have been budgeted – and spent - on education, agriculture, health and general welfare. But they are merely winking in the dark hoping the people are hoodwinked. They are not. Only there are no approval ratings to show it.

This current government is just about half-way. It is only fair that we review what it promised in its Renewed Hope Agenda. It was for us to hope in a safer country; to hope in a united country; to hope in a decisive cessation to past rot; to hope in a country that works for everyone. The issues on the front burner at election two years ago, centered around poverty, insecurity, inflation, unemployment and corruption. Today, two years down the line, all I can say is that this government is damn lucky that we don’t have a national Public Opinion Poll which captures and expresses the mood of the people because the verdict might not be flattering. There will be a lot of articles in the next couple of weeks about improved security and improved economy in general as spin doctors and government officials try to put on a bold face. Some of their claims may be true in the larger sense given what was inherited, but the life of an average Nigerian has been largely untouched except in the negative sense. He who feels it knows it and what they feel – and thus know - is a depleting purse leading to more Nigerians dropping below the poverty line. An Opinion Poll would also have shown that Nigerians are not amused by the antics of cross-carpeting politicians at this stage. It is diversionary at best because it addresses nothing of what Nigerians are experiencing.

Some twenty years ago, legend had President Tinubu as a good politician, a daring social activist and a visionary. He was credited with having a good eye for talent and an instinct for good governance. Today, were there to be a poll on his strengths so far in office, he would probably only be credited with being an astute politician. Politics, and the second term agenda, seem to influence a lot of his decisions and thus blunt his other strengths. As for the second term, the President said clearly that we should not vote for him if the power situation does not improve drastically. Well, I think he has his answer because the power situation has brought more misery and impoverishment to the average home.

Moving forward, the Nigerian situation demands more of governance and less of politics. But I will not hold my breath that anything will change in the next twelve months at least.

· Adetiba is a veteran journalist and public affairs analyst