What is your feeling about the state of affairs in the country today?
All of us are witnesses to the economic and social predicament we are into in this country right now. And the unfortunate thing is that the government in power promised us heaven and earth in 2015 when we elected it into power. They deviated from the manifesto they presented to Nigerians. We have not seen any of their promises come to pass. Instead of addressing the manifesto they presented to Nigerians, what has now become their number one agenda is care of cows. It appears they put cows before the lives of citizens of this great nation.
And if you look at it, in other countries, let me not mention Canada, United States, European countries or other developed ones like China; let me use Ghana here as an example, I think the living standard of the people, generation of employment and so on; things that will alleviate the suffering of the masses, are the priorities of government.
Here in this country, since 2015, what we have had is retrogression from the progress we made between the time of former Presidents Umaru Yar’Adua, Goodluck Jonathan and Olusegun Obasanjo.
Our youths are hopeless; boys are into hard drugs; young girls are into prostitution here and there. If you walk in the streets of Lagos; Allen Avenue, Surulere, Festac and the likes, you will see hopelessness all over the faces of our young ones.
The government says it is trying its best. Isn’t it?
It is doing basically nothing. They are telling us lies and that is not good. If you are leading a people, you give them the true situation of things, because the people would eventually get to know a lot of things. But the government of the day is feeding us with lies. There is insecurity in the land, but they would tell you everything has been taken care of; that they are on top of the situation. And people are being killed, kidnapped and maimed on a daily basis. What do we need from government more than to protect and secure lives and provide leadership? All these are not there.
Former President Obasanjo recently wrote an open letter to President Muhammadu Buhari and there have been a lot of reactions from the people in the country. What is your reaction?
I think the letter former President Obasanjo wrote was in order. He is an elder statesman and I think there a piece of advice there for the president. If the government is serious and ready to tackle the insecurity situation in the country, it should embrace the letter and the advice and work on it without wasting time, because as he said, the international community is worried.
He said there was a lot of anger in the land and we could not continue that way. So, I am in support of the letter written by the former president and my advice to the incumbent president is that he should study the letter and make sure it is not treated with levity.
What other suggestions do you have in mind to move the country forward?
Obasanjo proffered a lot of suggestions to the dilemma confronting Nigeria’s security. He proffered solution to the problem of social life too. If social life is not guaranteed, it can only bring insecurity.
What I am trying to say is that Obasanjo has proffered a lot of solutions to the problems. He said there should be a coming together of Nigerians from different social strata; traditional rulers, political leaders and others. I am in support of that.
A similar conference had been held during the time of Jonathan. There were issues addressed by that conference. What happens to that? They need to study the report of that constitutional conference.
Let us begin to ask the basic questions. First, are we still ready to operate as Nigerians? Do we still want to answer Nigeria? Under this present government, I don’t think that the incumbent president wants us to answer Nigeria, going by the lopsided nature of his appointments. He is not reflecting any federal character. All the security architecture of the country is located in one region; this does not reflect the federal character principle. During the time of the late Yar’Adua, there was adherence to federal character principle in all decision on appointments. It was the same thing under Obasanjo and Jonathan.
But now, it is like if you are not a Hausa-Fulani, there is nothing for you. So, do we still want to be called Nigeria as a country?
The Igbo are being highly marginalized. We have virtually nothing. When you speak, they would tell you the Igbo fought a war and were defeated. Nobody defeated us; it was politics.
If this nation is standing on a tripod; Yoruba, Hausa-Fulani and Igbo, then, why have we been neglected in the area of leadership positions? I can’t remember when an Igbo man became the Inspector General of Police. I can’t remember when an Igbo man became Chief of Army Staff, Chief of Naval Staff or Chief of Air Staff. So, the question is: Are we still part of this arrangement called Nigeria? These are part of the questions that should be on the table, because all indices have shown that this arrangement called Nigeria may not work any longer. If it is going to work, the federal character principle must be reflected in every appointment. It is a rule that has been in practice for a very long time. It is only this government that came in and on its own changed everything.
And we thought he meant well and was prepared to let the nation move forward. But all of a sudden, what we see is a kind of abracadabra.
So, they want to change Nigeria’s social system and that is by using Fulani herdsmen to attack Nigerians in their various capacities. And the irony of all these things is that the attacks are being orchestrated. They are being covered by the government in power. You can remember when they said all Nigerians should submit their guns. They said whatever gun you had, whatever license you had, you should go and return them. Yet, we have the Fulani herdsmen openly using firearms all over the country, attacking and killing people in their various homes and nothing is happening; no investigation, no arrest, no prosecution. No single Fulani herdsman was arrested and prosecuted in any court of law since the attacks began.
Some arrests were said to have been made. Are you saying that they were arrested but not prosecuted?
What happened to them? If you arrested anybody, the public needs to know what happened to them afterwards. It is one thing to make arrests, it is another to prosecute; it is another thing to get jailed or punished for the offence. But if it were what involved a Yoruba man or an Igbo man, the whole world would hear about it; the person would be prosecuted and jailed. But once it involves a Fulani man, no, he is untouchable.
The touchy aspect of this situation right now is that I am beginning to ask questions: Why is this disturbing influx of illegal aliens into this country? Most of the perpetrators of these crimes are not Nigerians. We discover that these people are from Chad, Mali, Niger Republic, Burkina Faso and Sudan. The borders are open to them; they come in their thousands. If Nigeria is serious about fighting terrorism, why would you open your borders to miscreants? We are not talking about opening your borders to professors, doctors, architects and lawyers to come in. But we are opening the borders to miscreants; people who have nothing to offer; aliens. They are not coming in with any documents. They are just hooligans, trooping into the country unchecked, simply because they are from Niger Republic or Chad.
What are they coming in to do?
You ask what they have come to do? We should ask the authority. Don’t we have people at the borders? The immigration, the police and others; what are they doing?
What do you think can happen, if Buhari doesn’t subscribe to the suggestion that there should be a summit like it has been suggested by Obasanjo and others?
Well, it is very clear. When rain wants to fall, the sky gets cloudy; it says rain wants to fall. That is how we know. When the sun wants to come out, the skies brighten up; they are illuminated. Isn’t that true? That is how we know. Now that we have seen that the Nigerian state is under a very serious threat of insecurity; people’s lives and properties are no longer safe; the police, the military and all the security apparatus are telling us lies. They are not up to the task; they cannot do anything. Yet, they don’t want to tell us they cannot do anything.
A few days ago, the Army chief said they didn’t have enough military equipment to fight insurgency. Yet, billions of dollars had been earmarked for security few years ago. They have not told Nigerians what these monies were used for; the equipment these monies were used to purchase. They have told us they cannot do it. So, you expect nothing but anarchy.
People cannot travel from Lagos to the East or Lagos to Abuja; they would be kidnapped. Is that the kind of society we want? Is that a society well policed? We have the Department of State Service (DSS), we have the police, we have all manner of security agencies. What are they doing? If people that are traveling can be kidnapped on the highway easily, robbed, raped and kept in captivity for weeks, then, what are we talking about?
This nation can afford securing land and building houses for everybody. At least, everybody will be sure of having a two-bedroom flat to him or herself and, maybe, pay a peanut; this nation can afford it. We are now talking about how to settle cows in various locations of the nation. Is cow more important than men? And cow rearing is private business. We are Nigerians. Are cows Nigerians? Why is cow more important? Why can’t they use that energy they are using to fight for cows and ranches to fight for how to accommodate and build houses for Nigerians? They should use same to see to how to equip our hospitals, put our roads in order, get our railway working like you find in developed countries of the world.
Our schools are in total mess. People are using schools to make money and not to teach people. Let government spend so much time and energy on renovating our schools and before you graduate, you must be sure of getting a job. There must be synergy between the Ministry of Education and that of Labour and Productivity. That is how it works.