IT is very easy as a pundit in Nigeria, nay Africa, to get carried away with the ceremonies of self-worth, and be largely overwhelmed by the need to preen, sometimes put on angst for the consumption of those hungry for choice morsels to assuage genuine anger.

While the political class grapples with the administrative challenges of reversing decades and centuries of  historical neglect, it is all too easy to sit in pulpits and pontificate on the dramas being “played out all too often in many African states, to the great discomfort and disadvantage of the people”.

Unlike critics, presidents do not enjoy power without responsibility. In the political philosophy of democracy the Fourth Estate, the main vehicle in which a pundit must ride, rightly sees itself as the guardian of the public interest against the overweening ambitions of executive power but every now and again one must question the output as counterpoise to what could itself become diktat of the intellectual kind, if you know what I mean.

Over and over again, and especially in the last few days, my attention is drawn to pulpits of renowned pontiffs. One devoted an entire sermon to detailing the exhaustive and exhausting schedule of President Goodluck Jonathan since assuming the full powers of office earlier this year, but with all the wrong reasons in mind.

To this fellow, all the President, who pulled Nigeria from the brink of a constitutional crisis that drew street demonstrations and intense international comment, has achieved is travel around smiling and dressing like a traditional chief.

If that sounds like a flippant summary of what was a loquacious commentary then my summary is no less flippant than the original commentary on the President’s output since January.

Any fairly engaging look into the president’s itinerary since taking over full executive powers reveal a brutal schedule within and outside the nation.

There is in clear evidence, a President determined to return Nigeria to its place of honour among the nations of the world, while working all the levers at home on the issues of electoral reform, power and infrastructure, and at the same time rebuilding the national psyche famished from seasons of despair and near hopelessness. Not that this means anything to our pundits.

A most recent missile was trained at the President’s visit to South Africa, on the invitation of the South African president, and in African solidarity, as the soccer World Cup berthed on African soil for the first time. The President from all available records left Nigeria on Friday and returned on Saturday.

We learnt he travelled with only a hand full of aides and one member of the National Assembly, who was not even a senator. I was horrified to receive a text message that the President travelled to South Africa with 63 senators and 19 ministers in tow.

Sixty-three senators and 19 ministers, on a presidential aircraft with a sitting capacity of a little over 20? What a con! The text message also tried to compare with an order by President John Atta Mills of Ghana who allegedly banned his ministers from attending the World Cup.

In my assessment, President Jonathan did not need to impose a ban, since no minister travels without his permission. And interestingly, we learnt that Ghana’s president spent four nights in South Africa to the Nigerian president’s one night, and Ghana has not since gone up in flames!

Unfortunately in Nigeria undue attention is too often trained on the perks of office. We rarely stop to consider the almost inhuman demands that political office makes on the incumbent. The expectation to deliver heaven on earth, the long, long hours, the pressure of having to make decisions that affect the performance and fortunes of a multi-billion dollar institution and 140 million stakeholders, are enough to tax the genius and energy of the most blessed and talented individual.

We shouldn’t feel sorry for presidents of course. Those who seek office know the pitfalls. Praise and criticism come hand in glove with the institution. In a healthy democracy you can’t have one without the other. However, we should be fair to the occupants of the office.

The public responds to immediate stimuli in the increasingly fast moving consumer world where media is a commodity grappling for attention like the latest pop song. Here the audience needs instant gratification, and some of its servings are false, through and through.

To criticise President Jonathan for travelling too much, and faking numbers as an aid to punditry, is rather bizarre especially in light of what went before. Surely we are not doomed to lurch from the sublime to the ridiculous: from the gregarious, even imperial Chief Obasanjo to the hermit like and eventually invisible Mallam Yar’Adua.

Mr. Adegbulu, a political analyst, writes from Lagos.