Anthony Sani, a former general secretary of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), in this interview by KUNLE ODEREMI speaks on a number of national issues including the ongoing discourse on the need for power shift to the south in 2023. Excerpts:
Conversations about 2023 elections appear to have subsumed most fundamental issues and challenges confronting the vast majority of the citizens in the country. Do you find the trend healthy?
The very idea of discussing politics of 2023 immediately following the inauguration of the government is not good for the growth of our multiparty democracy. This is precisely because such practices tend to supplant politics of identity on the altar of performance. That is what accounts for the agitations for politics of rotation which at once is an admission of failure of leadership to deliver fair, just and equitable distribution of access to state resources of appointments, employment, projects and major contracts. As a result, citizens are hoodwinked into believing that access to national resources should be turn-by-turn-with all the attendant implications. That accounts for why performance of political parties and their candidates do not seem to play any major positive roles in our multiparty democracy. But in multiparty democracy, the citizens can change the direction of the politics for performance by making judicious use of their democratic rights and ensuring that their votes count so that the ensuing leaders would be accountable.
Power is never conceded by choice but often obtained through struggles. Fortunately, we are now practicing democracy which is majority rule where votes determine the emergence of leaders. The citizens comprise mostly of the youths who may not have the money but have the number with which to use the social media of ICT and mobilize people to achieve their given democratic end.
Cost of living has become extremely unbearable to the ordinary citizens, with the elite pretending as if all is well. Is that what the common man deserves for giving politicians the opportunity to govern the country?
The high cost of living transcends national boundaries. It is due to the pandemic which caused lock downs and stifled economic activities since last year. It is not an exclusive preserve of Nigeria. Like other countries, Nigeria has tried in its efforts to stem the effects on vulnerable Nigerians. We must credit the regime for its efforts to mitigate and contain the spread of COVID-19 as well as the stimulus efforts. The sad news has been the hike in insecurity posed by gunmen, bandits, kidnappers which the recent arrival of the six A-29 Tucano jets will help the Air Force to take the fight to the affected forests across the country. The good news about multiparty democracy is that when the voters make mistakes in their choice during elections, they suffer the consequences of their judgment until next round of the elections when they have the opportunity to exercise their franchise and choose leaders of their choice.
Life has become miserable for most Nigerians, with killings, destruction, kidnapping, abduction and other forms of insecurity across the country. Is that what the critical mass of the people bargained for with the economic elite and the political class?
We should not be talking as if the politicians and the elites are not Nigerians but are from the moon. Our leaders and the elite are Nigerians who derive their values and world view from societal values. We are the ones who glorify unexplained riches and encourage practice of cash-for-peerage. We tend to encourage plutocracy and kleptocracy over democracy, and in blithe disregard for the consequences. Whatever happens in the system is caused by Nigerians who are capable of taking their destiny into their hands.
The rich claim they are also crying under the yoke of what many now describe as a dysfunctional Nigerian State. If they could make such assertion, doesn’t it imply there’s no sense in insisting on retaining the present structure, form of government and fiscal arrangement?
When some people submit that the current structure is the bane of our socioeconomic development, I begin to wonder their sense of history. Such people feign ignorance of the fact that this country has experienced several geopolitical configurations from three to four regions after which the country was divided into 12, 19, 30 and now 36 states.
This country has passed through confederate arrangement with weak center under parliamentary system which was truncated and supplanted by unitary system under military dictatorship with strong center. The intervening military regimes and the presidential system of government have operated federalism as compromise between confederation and unitarism which has the central government balanced by appropriate state level power.
We have tempered with the revenue sharing formula which now gives the center 52 percent and States 48 percent out of which 13 percent is for derivation. The economic models have also seen some changes. The American constitution is few pages with only about 29 amendments or so in 245 years. Britain does not operate a written constitution while Nigeria has a whole book called the constitution that is observed more in the breach. The Presidential system works in America, the parliamentary is doing fine in Britain and Israel while a combination of the two does well in France. The unitary system and state capitalism are working in China.
That is why I say those clamoring for new structure are dearth in fact of history, else they would know that our challenges are due to collapse of our national ideals and moral values that include sense of community and humanity. We need cultural renaissance on the ways we do things. The way to achieving is for politics, economics and morality to intersect.
Consider the cost of government with that of America which has only 25 ministers or so. Britain has, I think 17, while France has 15. Nigeria has a crowd called government. In America, the VP is the Senate President, but in Nigeria the Senate president is like alternate government with all the attendant cost. Nigeria has 21 Supreme Court justices while America which is bigger has 9 justices for life. What has presidential system got to do with that kind of arrangement? It is our way of doing things and not the structure, form of government and economic model that is the bane of our socioeconomic development.
With the hindsight of the major strides the country recorded during the First Republic under Ahmadu Bello, Obafemi Awolowo, Nnamdi Azikiwe and other architects of modern Nigeria in terms of infrastructure, human capacity building and industrialization, are we not convinced that the present predicament of the country is self-inflicted, as Nigeria has been going through a vicious circle for more than four decades now?
I am not aware of any regime that has been applauded by Nigerians. The first republic was toppled on charges of corruption and feckless performance. So, when some people hanker for return to 1963 constitution, I wonder whether they remember what happened to the first republic.
I think most Nigerians do not know that the good things of life like order, justice, liberty, common decency and prosperity for all are never natural order of things but are attained through ceaseless hard work by both leaders and the led. Most Nigerians also do not know why the country is corralled among the developing nations, and not among the developed nations. As a result, they are unable to make clear distinction between power of government and claims made on its behalf.
There is no country without challenges. More so in the era of COVID-19 which has put citizens of most countries on edge. Take for instance, America which is 245 years old has lost over 8,000 American lives from January this year to date. During the three days of celebrations of their independence which fell on July 4, 2021, 150 Americans died through mass shootings alone. That is security challenge for America. Yet one never heard Americans say the country has failed, and so should split. Rather, they engage themselves on how best to overcome the challenges posed by mass shooting.
The North, South divide is far more pronounced now because of the systemic failure and inept leadership, coupled with ethno-religious inclinations. How would you put all these issues into perspective?
The insecurity across the country is mostly driven by economic factors and considerations of poverty and unemployment that come with ignorance. Those who take advantage of the situations and inflame our worst instinct by promoting cleavages of the nation along ethnic and religious lines are not more than elbow-throwing grievance groups clamoring for government preferment. They feign ignorance of the trite that urbanization and inter-ethnic marriages have brought about relative pluralism that is supplanting particularism with its strong historical ties to places. That is to say, ethnic nationalism cannot prevail for long. See how millions of southerners settle in the North and invest in billions. If the North was that blistering as alleged they would not leave their precincts and settle in the North.
The view in certain circles in the North and the South is that power must shift from the North to the South to save the country from likely severe haemorrhage in 2023. Are you not convinced about their position, given the spare of frightening challenges facing the country?
While I have no objection to a Southerner becoming a president in 2023 democratically, I do not believe threats, intimidation and playing up victim and blackmail should be allowed into our democratic practice. This is because multiparty democracy is a contest of ideas and reasons driven by rule of law, and not a bullfight. Political parties should design their winning game plans and canvass for the needed electoral mandate to be president. Political parties can bring about unity of this country by breaking barriers and building bridges across the aisles more so, that the constitution does not allow a region’s vote alone to produce the president. No region has the minimum number of 24 states which the candidate must have in addition to majority votes but also must garner at least 25percent of the votes. The North has only 19 states and the South has only 17 states. Which means only the two regions’ vote can produce the President. Our challenges are due to the fact that we do not play politics the way it should played through democracy premised on triple foundation of justice, liberty and common decency. We do so disregarding the fact that those who seek to redefine democracy away from its elements of justice, liberty and common decency can as well reinvent the wheel or redefine the truth. If democracy were played properly, politics of identity that has supplanted of real issues of real concern to the people would not arise and the colour of the cat provided it catches the rat would not matter.
and then