Why none of Buhari, Atiku can develop Nigeria —Don

PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari said the All Progressives Congress (APC) government would continue to wage war against corruption, so that the post-oil economy of Nigeria would not be disastrous. What is your take on this?
We shall give our honest opinions on the issues. Both the Buhari/APC manifesto and the Atiku/PDP manifesto fall short of what many Nigerians desire now. Buhari said he would build on what he had already done; and what he has already done is not very satisfactory. There is a divine need to bring Nigerians together in peace, love and unity. Buhari doesn’t seem to be too eager to do that. That is the priority of Nigerians.

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When Nigerians are truly united and president views everybody as one, and his policies would be seen to be equitable, all those things will fall in place. Nigerians are capable people. Nigerians are good agriculturists. They are good sports people; they are good business people. We inter-marry. We are good industrialists. Nothing stops Nigeria from becoming a global economic power. It is the policies that proceed from Abuja that are hindering those objectives.

So, for Buhari to even start attempting to attain his objectives, he must totally reshuffle and not be seen any longer as a sectional fundamentalist leader. He has to discharge himself from that image first; then, you see those things working, even without him directly working for them. The object of government is a free-enterprise economy. It is just to guide; make and implement equitable laws, and not necessarily giving a deep intervention in the micro-economics of the society.

So, I agree with Buhari that he wants to do those things except that he cannot do them under the structure and ideology he is operating.

So, you believe he will fulfill his promises?

What I am saying is that he is coming from a background that doesn’t suggest sincerity. He wants to do this, he wants to do that, when all his security apparatus is inclined towards one side; when he is talking of 97 per cent and five per cent, etc., when there are killings all over and people are in internally-displaced camps; and the people are well known and they have not been returned; when he still views some people as second-class Nigerians, etc.

There is no economics that can fit into that ideological structure. So, he has to, first of all, purge himself of that image; he can do it. We support his war on corruption. My humble self will, even till tomorrow, support his war against corruption. But the war on corruption cannot be built upon an ideology of sectional fundamentalism.

It is believed that our political structure is broken and needs urgent fundamental reform. Do you think the APC-led government has the political will to amend our constitution?

Nigeria has been undergoing restructuring. The first post-colonial restructuring was the creation of the mid-west state. Then, there was restructuring into 12 states. The 12-state structure was to punish some people and to win a war.

And then, other military leaders came and created more states. These are all forms of restructuring; and Buhari was part of all of them. But that restructuring, especially the creation of 774 local government areas became totally disastrous to the polity, because these were drain pipes for the economy. You don’t put money into unproductive areas.

So, Buhari knows very well what restructuring is. And now, we are talking about restructuring in order to achieve true federalism, not to dismember the country. Therefore, he should embark on proper restructuring. That proper restructuring should be based on, first of all, instilling new political units based on linguistics and cultural affinity. The absence of that was why the previous restructuring did not work, because people who do not have anything in common were brought together. The relationships among the Ogoni, the Andoni and the Ijaw; the Ibibio, the Ogoja, the Efik and the Edo; and some others in the South-South are already a problem. So, why should you create such a structure that does not fit into peoples’ history and experience? Managing a situation in which you bring the Igala, the Idoma and the Tiv together is already a problem. Nature has already structured Nigeria. All you need is reflect those structures in administrative form and it becomes the structural pattern and administrative pattern. Then, political drawing will coincide with them and make for a cohesive country.

Buhari can do it, but because the present structure benefits some people, instead of being a statesman that will be remembered for Nigeria’s stability and justice, he chose to govern on behalf of, not even the members of the Talakawa, not even the Almaajiri, the Fulani people.

The Hausa have great potential that are is being exploited by Nigeria. It is not only the Igbo or Yoruba that have potential that are being suppressed. The entire North has something to give in a competitive emulation to make Nigeria a very powerful and strong African country. This is the only way to bring peace. This is the only way in which all these agitations for separation, Boko Haram and the rest will be considerably eliminated. But Buhari doesn’t have that political will. The reason is that he doesn’t see Nigeria as a secular state. And he seems to be living in the past. Anytime he changes his mind, you will see the greatest contribution that he will make to Nigeria. The first is this war on corruption; it is a legitimate war. We have been waiting for it. Corruption has destroyed Nigeria.

APC also believes that there is the challenge of youth restiveness, as a result of poverty and unemployment. Is the party sincerely fighting this problem?

No Nigerian needs to be told that there is youth restiveness or there is unemployment. But who is the author of unemployment and youth restiveness? That is what we are telling him; we have seen that he has come with the change mantra, but he is not changing things. He is going backwards. How do we attack youth restiveness? See what they are doing with trader moni. They also do school feeding. These things look very childish. How can you feed some schools and leave others? How can you distribute N10, 000? What needs to be done is a policy of free education for every citizen, so that the money the parents would have used to pay for the training of their children could be used to buy other things. You need to empower families through macro-economic means, instead of selective feeding. By school feeding, you are saying that people are hungry. Buhari does not make a policy that would be of benefit to every person simultaneously. He chooses and picks. That is the problem with the government.

People need food, but the only way you can give food is to take away the expenditure they make in other areas, create an enabling environment, make sure that books are available, teachers are in schools, and inspectors are there to monitor them.

In my childhood days, we were taken by force to school. Everybody, including village heads, was told to make sure that people of certain ages were in school.

So, what this administrative is relying upon is against economic laws. Everything they are saying appears at face value to be sincere, but the implementation shows insincerity.

The crisis in the power sector is one of the major causes of the present collapse of the industrial sector and the inability of the private sector to thrive. The Buhari-led government says that if is re-elected, it will expand electricity generation and distribution up to 40,000 megawatts in the next four years. Do you share the belief?

It is a shame that Nigeria will be talking of 40,000 megawatts when small Scandinavian countries, the size of any states in Nigeria, are already generating 200,000 megawatts. They don’t know what Nigeria is looking for. Nigeria today is a knowledge factory. The youth of today are not looking towards 40,000 megawatts, they are looking towards one million megawatts or, at least, half a million megawatts. They are looking for a 30 per cent annual growth in the economy, not 10 per cent or 15 per cent. They are looking for a government that has the capacity to trigger this mental and economic revolution and they (government) are in Abuja talking about 40,000 megawatts in the next four years. That is an insult to Nigerians.

Nigeria has the capacity, under proper leadership, to generate 100,000 megawatts in the next three years. It can be done. What we need is a mental revolution, attitudinal revolution which must come from down up. It must be institutional, that is, government creating an enabling environment for such institution. It must come from a policy outline. It must come from inspiration.

So, let them perish that idea of 40,000 megawatts; first, because they cannot do it. The APC government is very corrupt. Where will they find the money to do it when the money goes into local governments that don’t do anything? The money goes into bribing of officials. Where will they find the money for the 40,000 megawatts? It is not possible.

What do you say about the nation’s transportation system and the efforts of the government to revitalise it? Talk about the railways, waterways and air system. How do you think they should tackle the problem?

That, again, is where the APC-led government is wrong. That is an area they are not serious in developing. The best way to develop Nigeria, which is how other countries have developed, is to trigger the transport system. Port-Harcourt – Bonny – Opobo, which the Igbo have been using for thousands of years, is there, dormant. Buhari would not modernise Port Harcourt so that the Rivers people would be prosperous and there would be a spillover effect on the people inside Imo, Anambra   and so on. Then the spillover effect will reach the Middle-Belt and the North-East.

The best way to develop Nigeria faster is to modernise Port- Harcourt, join it with some railroads and link it with Obobo which will move up to Azumili, join Eleme Port, to Sabrina Port and join them to the main port, as well as give security. There should be a fundamental dredging and maintenance dredging. This would trigger the economic development of the entire East and it would be complemented with Agi Port in Bayelsa, the Baka deep sea port in Akwa-Ibom, the Bakassi and Calabar deep sea ports in Cross River State.

Then, you would see the economic development of the East trickling down to Delta State, up to Markurdi, Benue State, to the North-Central and then to the North-East.

But Buhari has abandoned that in the APC programme. There is nothing about the ports. Everything is coming from South, moving North. Nothing moves from North to Port Harcourt or to Lagos for export. Developing these Eastern ports would lessen the gridlock in Lagos, enabling the West to be free to contribute her legitimate quota in the development of Nigeria. It would also lessen the demographic pressure on the West. This means triggering the development of the East would lessen the pressure on the West and then would facilitate development in the North-West and North-East through a circumnavigation to North-Central, then to Middle-Belt and back to the North East.

Rather, they are creating youth restiveness by ensuring that certain areas are underdeveloped. Even the North is not being developed. Why is the North not being developed? Leaders from the core North or the Hausa/Fulani North have all the money from oil; more than 90 per cent of the money from oil. Why wouldn’t they bring the money to invest in their own place? Let them invest in the North so that it will be industrialised and start exporting. But because of selfishness and greed, they don’t see Nigeria as one. Yet, they accuse others of not seeing Nigeria as one. What we are trying to say is that Nigeria has a potential that has not been tapped. Every Nigerian tribe has a great potential that is not being tapped.

The former vice-president, Atiku Abubakar of the PDP said he would encourage Public/Private Participation (PPP), if he wins the 2019 general poll at the centre. What do you make of this? 

Did the South-East develop through PPP? Atiku is a multibillionaire. What has he invested in Eastern region through PPP? Some of them are there and with the connivance of the so-called Igbo leaders, with this PPP, in 16 years, they could not build the second Niger bridge. They could not build the Onitsha-Enugu highways; they could not build the Enugu – Port-Harcourt highway.

Look at the Enugu airport as it is. While Buhari’s programme cannot develop Nigeria, Atiku’sprogramme is even worse. Atiku has no plan for the industrialisation of Nigeria as well as encouragement of exportation. So, he cannot come now and talk of PPP. Atiku was part of the government that denied the East its due. So, he has nothing to offer to make Igbo leaders go and endorse him. Atiku is not sincere, whether in the area of PPP development, restructuring or the development of Nigeria.