Chief Abu King Shuluwa, a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in Benue State and chairman, Tiv Elders' Stakeholders' Forum, is unarguably the most vocal opposition to President Goodluck Jonathan's bid for re-election in 2015. He tells HENRY IYORKASE that come rain or sunshine, the North, which constitutes two-third of the Nigerian population, would fight tooth and nail to ensure that it captures power in 2015. He also talks on the agitation for Apa State, among other salient national issues. Excerpts:
Recently, some sections of the North endorsed President Goodluck Jonathan for a second term. Does this signify the desire of the people?
I happen to read from the newspapers, even though from your question, you did not specifically mention names, but I read that the former Senate President, Senator Ameh Ebute, was taken to the Villa by Chief Edwin Clark and he endorsed Jonathan on behalf of the North Central. Then Senator Wash Pam and General Lawrence Onoja also went to see Jonathan and endorsed him on behalf of the North Central.
It is rather absurd that these gentlemen will go and endorse Jonathan without consultation. Definitely, they are not representing the interest of the North Central and more so, they are not representing the interest of the Benue people and worst of it all, they are not representing the interest of the Tiv people. They are not competent to speak on behalf of North Central.
As the clamour for which of the geo-political zone produces the occupant of Aso Rock come 2015 continues, what is the permutation of the North in the ongoing struggle?
I have said this time and again that definitely, come 2015, the Presidency of this country will come to the North. We are not negotiating that position at all; it is non-negotiable, because in 1998 when we decided that former President Olusegun Obasanjo should become president, the decision was that after eight years tenure of the South, the Presidency should return to the North.
I happened to be very close to those people who were there because I was one of the founding fathers of the PDP and I know, because when a 15-member delegation went to Otta, I was there. Of course, the position came to the North, after Obasanjo had served eight years but the most unfortunate thing was that when Umaru Musa Yar'Adua died, and because the constitution provides that when the president dies, the vice-president takes over, Jonathan took over. Some of us were against his contesting in 2011.
He took over to finish up the first tenure of Yar'Adua and so he could have simply withdrawn to allow a Northerner complete the remaining four years. Perhaps, he could have come out in 2015, it would have been much better, but he did not. What Jonathan is trying to do now is to go into history as the longest serving president of this country. He wants to serve longer than Gowon, he wants to serve longer than Babangida, he wants to serve longer than Obasanjo. No! We will not allow that happen.
In case your efforts to wrest power from Jonathan or the South-South fail, what happens next?
How should it fail? Politics is a game of number and we are more aware, the awareness now is more than before. We have seen exactly what has happened. We have heard the utterances of the South- South people, we have heard the utterances of people who wants Jonathan at all cost; people like Clark, people like Mujaheed Asari-Dokubo who are even threatening war if Jonathan did not return as president in 2015. We are not afraid of war, but the battlefield will never be in the North.
The battlefield will be in the South- South, if they are calling for war. But I don't think we are interested in warfare, what we are interested in is democracy. Politics is a game of number and it is the game of who is better to convince people.
We are in a better position this time to convince the people. We are in a better position to say that no, we cannot sell Jonathan; we are in the position in the North to say enough is enough; we are in a better position to say Jonathan has failed this country and therefore, we cannot allow him to continue. Again, consider that in 2011, all the governors were in one accord. Where are they today? It is an indicator that all will not be well with him should he go ahead with the idea of a come-back in 2015.
Now that the North is not speaking with one voice, how will it be possible for the region to win the Presidency in 2015?
The North was not speaking with one voice in 2011. Today, if anybody tells you the North is not speaking with one voice, that person doesn't know what the North is; that person doesn't know exactly what the North is going through. There is absolute poverty in the North and this poverty has been created by the Southern Presidents, Obasanjo and Jonathan and we are all aware.
Let me give you an example, if you see any beautiful car being driven in Abuja today, it belongs to or is being driven by an Ijaw man, if you see any better position which is being held by any Nigerian today, it is occupied by an Ijaw man, if you see any contract, federal contract which is given to anybody, that person is an Ijaw man.
That is why the militant leaders get billions of naira contracts for the purported aim of protecting the oil pipelines. Yet we have the military, the police and the militants are in the better position of protecting those pipelines? And you give them those billions of naira in the name of protecting pipelines when that money can buy equipment for the Navy, Army and the Police. So, when the time comes, we as grassroots people will go to the grassroots and tell the people, don't vote for Jonathan. That is all.
Clark and Asari-Dukubo had at several fora threatened fire if Jonathan is not given a free hand to contest. How would you view the consequences of their utterances?
These people cannot stop Nigeria from being one. The issue is that Nigerians other than this two people are ready for any fight to make sure that Nigeria remains one. I said it before; both Edwin Clark and Asari- Dukubo do not know Nigeria. If they know Nigeria, they will not be talking like that, they will not be calling for warfare, because for anything today, the Igbo man would not want his area to be a battlefield; the Yoruba man would not want his area to be a battlefield and definitely, the battlefield cannot be in the North.
Then we will shift the battlefield to the creeks; we will push Edwin Clark and Asari-Dukubo to the creeks to re-main there and then Nigeria will continue. So, we in the North are not afraid of these people. Unfortunately, Clark and Asari- Dokubo are not knowledgeable about Nigeria; they don't know what Nigeria is. What they are doing is just sycophancy; they are looking for money. Jonathan should give them money, but we are not looking for that kind of money.
In the part of Nigeria where I come from, that is North Central, Benue and Tiv; we have not benefited anything from Jonathan. Nothing! And this is the only government that the Tiv people have got nothing from; this is the only government that has discriminated against the Tiv people.
There is no committee that Jonathan has ever put a Tiv man, none. All the committees, all major appointments, all major employments, all major contracts, we have never seen any major contract in Tiv land.
How many Tiv people are occupying chairmen of federal boards today? The highest position we have in Jonathan's administration today is a junior minister. There is no contract there; the man cannot give any Tiv man or Benue man a contract. He cannot even employ anybody.
What is the democratic benefit we are gaining from the government of Jonathan? Nothing! His government is the worst for the Tiv. I am speaking as the chairman of the Tiv Elders and Stakeholders' Forum and we are saying the Tiv people, where I belong, will do everything, door to door to make sure that Jonathan does not get any vote from Tiv land. Except they will go and sit in Abuja and write those votes but if it is going to the grassroots and campaigning for one man one vote, Jonathan should forget it, he is not going to get it from the Tiv people.
You once predicted that Nigeria will disintegrate in 2014, do you still hold on to that notion?
The idea is that of Clark and Asari-Dukubo or some cliques in the South-South; that is what they are looking for because they have oil. They want to use the issue of amalgamation, create crisis in Nigeria to turn round to say that we can no longer be part of Nigeria. And I said this because I wanted Nigerians to watch 2014.
It's coming; in 2014 Nigeria will be 100 years old and that clause is still there. The entire crisis that we are seeing is heading towards that assertion that if care is not taken, some people particularly, the oil-producing states, will start declaring themselves independent states or republics. But that will be resisted, just as we resisted the State of Biafra. Any attempt to disintegrate this country will be resisted by all and sundry; all well meaning Nigerians, even if it means taking arms against whoever, we will do so.
Nigeria will clock 100 years in 2014, what lessons have we learnt as one indivisible entity?
We are better off in the past years than today. There is no democracy in this country today. There was democracy before and yet we thought there was no democracy. Elections were properly conducted.
There is more corruption today than before. Hospitals have become mere clinics, no drugs; schools are worse off, citizens do not have shelters over their heads, the roads are going from bad to worse, infrastructure is zero and yet we make noise. In those days when we didn't have the money, the roads were there, the hospitals were still there; you could go to a hospital and get treated; education was better.
I went to school where I was not paying school fees, except three pounds. I had uniforms, I had books, everything was free, today you pay school fees. Hundred years of Nigeria, there is no water, I am living by the river side; River Benue, and no power. Benue is still a rural state after a 100 years? Take a ride from here to Gboko to Katsina-Ala, look at the roads, roads are better off in those days than today.
Individually, we are better off because people have stolen money for their own personal use and are building houses for their own use, they are doing things for their own use and not in the interest of the nation any longer.
If you go to Bauchi, you can never see a house belonging to Tafawa Balewa, the first Prime Minister; you will never see a house belonging to the Sarduna, show me which is Joseph Tarka's house; the house in Gboko was built by the Tiv people for him. Where is Tarka's house in Makurdi? Show me Aper Aku's house in Makurdi, show me Aper Aku's house in Abuja. Go to Gboko and let them show you Aper Aku's house, our first civilian governor.
As one of the founding members of the PDP, what steps are being taken by the founding fathers of the party to confront the crises which are threatening its existence?
I am not in the position to do that. I am a founding member, I am not a member of the executive council of the PDP at the national level, I am not a member of the Board of Trustees; I am just but a floor member. I don't have the power; the PDP is in the hands of the executive: the President, the governors and the chairmen.
More so those who are running the affairs of this party were not members of the PDP from the word go. They all decamped from other parties into the PDP. They are afraid of the executive because members of the executives are the ones paying the piper and he who pays the piper dictates the tune. So, the executives are the ones financing the PDP, so the PDP is in their hand which is different from what we used to have in the defunct Social democratic Party, SDP and National Republican Convention, NRC, where the parties in our hands.
We were all joiners; we give mandate to the governor, you don't have any right to control the party at all because we were running the party. I remember I was the sole administrator of the Social Democratic Party, SDP, here in Benue State and the governor could not tell me what to do.
We put him there as a party, therefore, he must follow the manifesto of the party not the party following what he is doing. The current crises that have engulfed the PDP, you should expect it; everybody wants to be part of where the cake is being baked and where you have a cake being baked, everybody wants to have a share of it and definitely you would have crisis.
Recently, Governor Gabriel Suswam publicly announced the withdrawal of his membership of the Northern States Governors' Forum. What is your take on the issue?
As a person, he has the right to do what he has done. I am sure he is not withdrawing Benue State from Northern Nigeria; I think that was not his statement. The Forum is for Northern governors only and so he has the right to withdraw but I don't think Suswam is withdrawing Benue from the North which is impossible; it can never happen because Benue belongs to the North and we are still part of the North.
So, for him to withdraw from the Forum, fine, he is a governor. His withdrawal to me is personal. If he had said I want to withdraw Benue State from the North that is where we would have questioned him and let him know that we didn't give him that mandate. But as a governor, he said no.
When we were giving him our mandate, we didn't ask him to belong to any of the forums; we didn't say belong to the Nigerian Governors' Forum or the Northern States Governors' Forum. So, as far as I am concerned, he has the right to do so. It is personal to him.
How do you view the implication of such action?
The implication is personal to him; whatever is the implication, it is personal to him, whether good or bad.
You have signified interest in contesting the senatorial seat. The incumbent governor also has his eyes on that same slot. How do you view this, as both of you are from the same axis?
Let me correct one impression: I have never signified interest for a senatorial seat in Zone A. People are calling on me to do so but I have not. I have not told anybody I want to contest. Since I joined politics, there is only one seat I have been contesting: the governorship.
Four times I have contested for governorship and four times I have failed to get the position. If people in their wisdom feel that I should come out to contest, it doesn't mean that I have signified interest to contest as you have just said. I have not made my mind as to what to do. On the other hand, Suswam has the right to contest if he wants to contest any position at all.
Suswam contested for House of Representatives, he got it; eight years later, he came back, he wanted to be governor and contested, he was given. If having contested the position for the whole Benue and won and he now wants to go and contest for a position of a senator of Zone A comprising of seven local governments, so be it.
It is his own wish, if he wants to go and contest for the chairmanship of Logo and his people want him, fine. If he wants to contest as a councillor in his own ward, after all my friend, late Ajene, former Deputy Governor, went back and contested for councillorship in his ward and won and he was a councillor.
The governorship of Benue ahead of 2015 is beginning to generate ripples as the three senatorial zones that make up the state are laying claim to the seat. How do you see to these agitations?
There is nothing wrong in any group of people or section wanting to be governor. There is nothing wrong whether you are in Zones A, B or C. If you want to become governor, come out and tell us, give us your manifesto, and tell us why you want to be governor.
We will judge you according to what you are. What I do not support is where some people will sit somewhere in Otukpo and say this time, the Tivs have had their turn, therefore we should have it now in Zone C. And when it gets to Zone C, they will say no it should be Idoma not Igede, not even Agatu man. Let us be very fair.
We shouldn't concentrate on sharing the governorship position only, but we should consider sharing all appointments, be it in the military, be it in the customs, immigration, or federal boards.
Let us share them according to the senatorial zones. I have never heard somebody in Zone C saying look, these appointments, these boards appointments must be shared according to Zones A, B and C. When Zones A and B are suffering marginalization from Jonathan, Zone C is deeply enjoying. Is that fair? Is that justice? It is not.
National Mirror