What Is Our Demand Condition? -By Kehinde Oluwatosin Babatunde

Kehinde Oluwatosin Babatunde

One of the elements of the Porter’s diamond model is the demand condition in home country. The Porter’s diamond model is a management tool that allows business strategists to understand their competitive position in a global market.

Porter’s Diamond Model, also known as the Porter’s Diamond theory of National Advantage or Porter’s double diamond model was given this name because all factors that are important in global business competition resemble the points of a diamond.

The demand condition in home country influences the quality of production of organizations in ways that allows them to transmute such excellence into a global market. An instance is South Korea whose citizens high demand for excellence in technology has helped the electronic industry to achieve top notch success which has translated into National competitive advantage for the country and by extension global success ( That is why almost every home in Nigeria possess at least one LG product).

Yesterday I was listening to perfect duet by Ed Sheeran and Beyoncé (you can take a listen if you haven’t), the song for me is one of the greatest classics to have greeted the music world, from the songwriting to the melodies, to the delivery, the cadence, of both arts, exudes undiluted excellence.

Having listened so well months back, I listened to it yesterday more with my intellectual mind than my music mind. Beyond the melodies in the song, I considered the depth of the lyrics and the transition between melodies and instead of me to see the music I saw civics and superiority of citizenship.

I asked myself if such songs will ever be popular in Nigeria. The fall in education and civics have ensured we have turned out as a people without the smallest capacity for cognition only reading tweets as the only source of knowledge, but rather than admit and cry for help we shamefully scream “Street ti take over.” The arts who performed perfect duet are citizens of the first world – Britain and America respectively, armed with enough civic sentient to respect the knowledge, intellect and the perspective of the citizens of their respective nations to present a classic of a song to them.

Anything below that, the citizens will not accept it. It’s a tradition of excellence established since the days of Stevie Wonder, Dolly Parton and the Beatles, anything below the standards set by these aforementioned arts is gibberish.

The citizens of these nations have been socialized to understand that good enough will never change the world, hence excellence is required in all spheres of life. The same energy with which the American demand excellence from her political leaders the same vigour she demands from her musicians.

The Porter’s diamond model poses a question to the Nigerian which is what is our demand condition? As a people what demand do we place on our leaders, musicians, spiritual leaders? The capacity to place demand for what we desire has been deeply altered by years of fake starts and false starts.

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Every time I see my people wax nostalgia about lyrics of ‘Mo ti mu were yo, Ibadi e yo ninu bum shot, it’s a codeine diet, legbe-legbe shaku-shaku, Zangalo is a goal, won tigba penalty lo throwing , Soko and Manya’ I do not see the artiste, rather i see the failure of civic education of the citizens, I do not blame the artiste, they are singing what the public desire, that is why the truism “A Nation deserves the leadership she gets” remains a very practical one.

The difference between the music celebrated in Nigeria and that of the western world isn’t in the colour but rather in the superiority of civics: The capacity to demand for that which is logical, reasonable and timeless.

Is it not an indictment to us as a people and even to our fabled claim of being the giant of Africa that one of our most popular songs is ‘ I dey kill mosquito well well’ a song by an artiste who have mastered the art of staggering his songs with an intermittent pause of ‘hayin-hayin-hayin’.

. Everything that is wrong with Nigeria is first of all wrong with the people, for a society is a reflection of her people. The lessons porter’s diamond teaches us is the demand for excellence, as no one can give a people what they don’t desire or envision.

Kehinde Oluwatosin Babatunde is a prolific writer and public speaker based in Lagos.
E-mail : Kehindeobabatunde@gmail.com