Presidency: Nigeria’s fate’ll be determined by electorate in 2015 –Tafawa Balewa

[Mirror]

Says 'APC is full of failed PDP politicians' Dr. Abduljhalil Tafawa Balewa is the son of Nigeria's First Republic Prime Minister, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa. The medical doctor cum politician with vast medical practice in the United Sates of America before returning to Nigeria has a PhD in Nuclear Chemistry. In this interview, he speaks on the Goodluck Jonathan administration, 2015 presidency and the North's agitation for power shift, security challenge, crisis in the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and the challenge posed by the opposition. AYODELE OJO reports.

You are the son of the Nigerian Prime Minister in the First Republic, were you too young to appraise your father's administration when he was in power?

Unfortunately, I was taken out of Nigeria while I was only two years old.

Why are you not taking after your father, politically?

Well, I think everybody is born a politician. When you are a baby, you need to negotiate with your mother as to when to cry, when to suck breast and all of that.

Do you hold any position in the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP?

In Nigeria, no. But in the United States' chapter of the PDP, yes. But I currently sit on the boards of a number of parastatals and the governing board of some universities. But these are things that are not money-making. I just like doing them for the progress of my country. I have the conviction that we need to move this country forward. This is still the best country we can have. It is ours and it is the only one we can have. And when we get to God, we need to let Him know that we did our best for this country while on earth. I think we should be proud of this country. We don't have any other country except this.

What is your assessment of the Goodluck Jonathan government?

I think this government has done wonderfully well. One thing that this government is doing or has been doing but the polity in Nigeria has not realised is planting whole lots of things that will benefit the citizenry over a long period of time. The presidential system of government we have now is such that the first four years will take time before you build a foundation. And the next four years, you start building on that.

You will remember that in the last four years, we have quite a number of challenges because the elected President Umar Musa Yar'Adua was sick for a long time while President Goodluck Jonathan was never given a chance until much later.

Since he came, we have had better transportation system. The Lagos-Ibadan axis is perhaps the most important because it opens up Nigeria to other parts of the country. The President just fashioned out a ground-breaking rehabilitation of that road. The same goes for Ogbomosho-Ilorin, Okene-Benin roads.

In the rail sub-sector, there has been massive rehabilitation of the Lagos-Ibadan rail line as well as the Makurdi- Port Harcourt rail line. These infrastructure that have lasted us so long were handed over to us by colonialists and it is about time we start building new ones that can meet the present-day challenges.

In terms of energy, you will agree with me that in recent time, there has been significant improvement in power supply and it doesn't just go off like it used to be in the past. We have been able to reach 4,000 megawatts and before the end of the year, we might be able to reach about 7,000 megawatts. This might help us in industrialising our environment. Also, this President has succeeded in keeping the whole nation. I am not saying that everything this government is doing is optimal.

Those who are criticising this government are those who were in government before. And it seems the way to become relevant in Nigeria is that just leave government so that you can criticise it. These were the people who were in government and nothing worked. They fleeced the government and there was no transparency, nothing worked. Now these set of people are the ones criticising government.

What would you say about the state of insecurity in the North-East?

There is no river without a source. A lot of bad decisions, dry decisions have gone into our politics. Whereas in the olden days, politicians used to tell the people what they are going to do; I am going to build bridges, construct roads and all of that. All those ones have now gone overboard. Now it is a case of which religion or ethnicity you represent and all of that.

There are lots of educated young men in the North-East that have not been able to have either job or employment. Programmes such as SURE-P, YOUWIN are however taking up all these unemployed youths and empowering them. But for a very long time, a lot of these politicians have access to these young people and were using them as political hooligans and just jettisoned them after elections.

These young men then internalised all they have helped perpetrated during elections and that was why when the unrest first started, you can see that they were attacking government establishments and installations because those were the people who used and abandoned them. Unfortunately, this was related to the fact that they were not particularly educated and this was linked to the fact that they were fighting western education. That of course is not true because the question is: how many illiterates can man time bombs?

How many illiterates can have the military know-how to attack military formations? What this government is doing now is to continue to empower the youths because there is nobody that will have food in his stomach and be taking part in unrest. So when you think of it, you will see that this unrest has many factors to it. Many of our youths lack access to opportunities, lack of jobs.

The devil always finds jobs for idle hands. We need to start engaging these idle hands.

To what extent do you think the amnesty initiative for Boko Haram is working considering the huge resources being spent on security?

To say the amnesty programme is not working is erroneous. Last year, the government spent close to N1 trillion on security votes. But that is terrible because so much of that could have gone into education, healthcare reforms among others. Our monitoring and evaluation skills have to be sharpened so that we are not just going to be pouring water into basket. We should be able to monitor how the money goes out.

The money being spent on security no doubt could have been used to confront most of the developmental challenges confronting us but we must also appreciate that there is a dearth and a vacuum left for this present administration by previous governments where things are not running right.

This is what this government is correcting. As you can see, the bloodshed appeared to have simmered in the last couple of months. A lot of dialogue has been going on with these young people. There are many young men within this militant faction who are even ignorant of what Boko Haram insurgency is all about. Everybody is being affected by their actions.

There is agitation among some Northerners for power shift to the North in 2015. What is your take on that?

Democracy is about education. There is a shop in the US known as Syms. The motto is: an educated mind is our best customer. It is okay to agitate that power must shift to the North or to the South but it is the voters that is important here. If you are able to convince the citizenry and they agree with you, they will vote for you. In democracy, the position is not the traditional feudal system. It is not a God-given right whereby when you get there, you will stay there until you die.

This is about politics. It is about trying to convince the citizenry on how best your programmes and thoughts are. Not everybody will be a millionaire. Not everyone could be a billionaire either. But God has done it in a way that in this kind of democracy, everybody needs to work harder.

Like the Latin says: When you work hard, you will get to the stars. And that is what this capitalist democracy preaches. It is not about right. What the constitution of the PDP says is that if the party wins presidential election, other positions will be zoned to people of other geo-political zones. And constitutionally, President Goodluck Jonathan as a citizen of Nigeria has every right to run for a second term.

Against the background of his performance, does Jonathan deserve a second term and will you vote for him?

You can count on me. I will vote for him There has never been any Nigerian President since independence until now, that has done so well in appointing women that constitute like half of our population to ministries and embassies across the world. Terrorism as many people seem not to notice often take a long time before it could be calmed down.

Take a look at Iraq, Syria, the Philippines of old and even Ireland where you can say there was a long ethnic crises and you will see that Nigeria's case is improving. Of course Nigeria is in dire need of peace and that is not only in the North- East but also the South as well. Today, Nigerian currency is getting stable and stronger and the foreign reserve is rising. I think the President should be given kudos. I will vote for him.

So, you see nothing wrong in the agitation of the Northern leaders for the presidency in 2015?

In democracy, there is freedom of speech. It is expected of any regional political party or group to state what they want. There is nothing wrong with that. I mean there is nothing wrong with somebody standing up here in Lagos and insisting that the next governor of the state comes from Ikeja. So, I really don't see any reason why we should lay more emphasis on that.

Does it means the Northern Elders' Forum agitating for power shift to the North is not speaking for the entire North?

I haven't said that. What I'm saying is that the Elders' Forum has actually been speaking for its members. Nigeria is a country of many ethnicities and that is why when you read our newspapers, every ethnic group thinks they are marginalised because we have over 240 ethnic groups or so.

We need to be able to encourage like President Kennedy in 1962 published a book, "America: a country of immigrants". It can be said that Nigeria is a country of ethnicities. I mean we can have a group of youths coming up tomorrow to say our national food should be yam. I mean that is their suggestion.

So, you mean the Northern leaders are only expressing their freedom of expression?

Absolutely. One thing I can confidently tell you is that, the voters would be the ones to determine Nigeria's fate in 2015.

What is your assessment of voters in the North?

Well, I can tell you that an average Northerner is more political savvy than you think. You can imagine cattle herders coming from Maiduguri or Kano, they will have their radios plastered to their ears. They will listen to VOA, BBC among others. They are current about what is going on in the world than you think.

And unlike the South where people appear to be so immersed in commerce and other things, an average Northerner is politically savvy and they need to be convinced what your intentions are, because they have sharp imaginations. But I'm not saying the Southerners are not. But it is instructive that what we should be talking about is Nigeria and not whether Northerner or Southerner. Maybe because I have lived as an alien in other parts of the world, I really don't like this idea of configuring ones psyche to be a Northerner or Southerner.

With your support for President Jonathan for a re-election, will you be advising the North to wait till 2019?

No, I won't. In democracy, every election deserves to be fought with all vigour. And let the best president wins. Somebody like me is a core Northerner but at the same time, I have root in the South. It is high time we did away with this North and South dichotomy. If any man or woman who is qualified to contest wishes to, so be it. This is a Federal Republic. And it is high time we started seeing ourselves as a republic. When you go outside this country, they are not going to be referring to you as a Northerner or Southerner but as a Nigerian. So, why don't we start seeing ourselves as Nigerians?

How convinced are you that if election is to be conducted today, President Jonathan will win? And what are the indices you think will make him win?

I will reiterate that it takes time to build what has collapsed. Our political system has collapsed very poorly in the past. President Jonathan and his government are trying to rebuild it.

One of the sources of rancour in Northern Nigeria before now is the issue of Almajiri, but today, the Almajiri education has been repackaged in such a way that these children are exposed to both Western and Islamic education. We have never had a situation like this where the President would be directly involved in negotiation with ASUU. For me, that is a plus for the President. The SURE-P is there.

The YOUWIN is there and you will continue to see these gains accumulated and become bigger by 2015. Even though the gains are there now. Somebody you love, there is nothing he would do that you will dislike. And that is the reason this President will win. If you look at the All Progressives Congress, APC, this government has the wherewithal to stop it but did not. That is the beauty of our democracy. And APC is full of failed PDP politicians. Also, APC is a bunch of regional parties that still have these regional identities to themselves.

The chances of them being able to metamorphose into clean party before 2015 are slim. And do we really need a party that has not really defined itself to come and lead this country to the right direction? I respect a lot of older gentlemen in the APC like Gen. Muhammdu Buhari (rtd) and Chief Bisi Akande. But you don't rub into the mud, something that you aspire to attain. Journalists' writings and newspaper publications are read all over the world. They are there on the internet. What do you think others will think of us when you say Nigerian President behaves like kindergarten?

What do you think they will think of us? They are fathers to us. They are people that are supposed to lead us. But what will you say when you have elder statesmen who are touting words that are indescribable? I really think we need to be guarded on what we say.

But the likes of Bola Tinubu, Buhari and Akande have never been in PDP, so why will you say APC is full of failed PDP politicians?

Well, not entirely. You see we have people who contested in PDP but failed to win and they simply moved into other parties that dissolved into APC. Tinubu is a good politician but he is a politician that is encased in the politics of the South-West. His stretch outside the region is quite limited. And that is what I mean by the fact that they are regional political parties now trying to balloon into national outlook. Their life history is like water, chemical and oil. Their chances of being able to mix together are quite slim.

Political observers are saying that the PDP umbrella is already in tatters because apart from the opposition attacks, the war of attrition going on in the party is fierce. How do you reconcile this?

I will give you an analogy. When you lick a candy and you bite your tongue or a part of your body is not functioning well, you don't take it out because you will still need it; so you will cure it. If there are strifes within a party, which is an internal wrangling, you find a way of settling it. We will sort it out. But a tattered family, I beg to differ.

I believe this government has brought a lot to bear on the country and any Nigerian who have blood flowing in his or her vein, should give it the deserved support. I am a card-carrying member of the PDP and I believe that PDP is the only real national party in Nigeria.

The other regional parties that recently came together under the platform of APC; I think it is good that we have an opposition party but I think they are going to be primordial. No structure, nothing. It is a learning process though. But they are not there yet. As time goes on, I think they can as well grow.

Are you not worried with the crisis in Rivers State? People say the President has mismanaged it?

How can the President be accused of mismanaging it? It is not a national crisis. It is a Rivers State crisis. But frankly speaking, everywhere in Nigeria, our culture is that whatever we call head, you don't walk on it. There is a President and a governor in the same family. The President is like the elder brother to the governor, Rotimi Amaechi. There should be conference of ideas whereby the older brother should be able to talk to his younger brother and advise him.

The crisis in Rivers State is not peculiar to Nigeria. It is just that every individual have different methods of managing crisis. I believe very soon, the issues would be resolved.

National Mirror

[Folami David]

Well that is very true so let's all just wait till then...Then we will know how far and what's up or what's next. I can't wait tho!