We saw the rally in Sokoto today and one wonders how you were able to achieve such a huge turn out after leaving office for so long?
You see, that you people think that everybody who qualifies for governorship is fit to be a politician. We are in categories. This year I will be 60 and I have been in politics for 38 years which means I started politics at the age of 22 as a local government councilor in 1976, so if even I recall 38 years ago, people in politics were not in politics for the sake of money, they were in politics for the purpose of helping the common man unlike now when majority of Nigerians politicians take politics to be like small scale industry. I am in politics to help people, to make life of everybody in my constituency enjoyable. So leaving office for the past eight years, I just left office, I am still in politics. Since I left office, I have never made any attempt to leave Sokoto, I have decided to live in Sokoto, not even Abuja, Kaduna or Lagos; I decided to remain in Sokoto upon all the intimidation, upon all the harassment.
Do you think the PDP has what it takes to wrestle power from APC in Sokoto?Of course yes. If there is anything that is as simple as ABCD, it is that PDP is going to win Sokoto because the battle line is not on PDP but on personality. Our people don’t care about APC or PDP, our people are looking at who are the leaders between APC and PDP, even APGA, so fortunately they know who are leaders of APC; fortunately for Sokoto people, they know who are the leaders of PDP. This struggle for power is between Bafarawa and Wamakko and Wamakko is my junior, he is my student in politics, so the secret of winning Sokoto between me and Wamakko. Thank God that he was my deputy and I served eight years as a governor and now he has served eight years as a governor, so the people are going to judge our performance. The people will just judge whose performance is better. We are bringing two candidates for the election, so the people are going to judge who is a better government considering the amount of money I received for eight years and the money he received for eight years. the legacy that I left is still in the minds of Sokoto State people. When you talk of APC gubernatorial candidate, nobody knows him. You may say he is the Speaker, yes, he is in Abuja but here in Sokoto he is only representing two out of two local governments, so 21 local governments don’t even know who is APC gubernatorial candidate but my own candidate, he was once a Senator, he contested in 1999 and won election with seven local governments put together and he contested in opposition party, the PDP while I was in ANPP. He was the only person who won senatorial seat at that time. Then let us talk about the Speaker, in 2003 I was the person that brought him to limelight, I gave him ticket under ANPP and he won election to the House of Representatives; so there is no way you can compare Wali’s CV with that of the Tambuwal and there is no how you can compare my own CV with Wamakko, so virtually, the battle is over.
What of having a deep war chest to match the resources of the incumbent Governor and party?
Do you know that this allocation you are talking about is history? Right now there is strike; he cannot even pay salaries to all the teachers in tertiary institutions in the state. For the past two months, there has been no work in all the tertiary institutions. Whatever he receives from federation account, if he puts it into this election, we are going to collect the money, we will chop the money, even if he gives me, I will collect but that is not going to stop us from chasing him out of the government house.
From what you have said of the present Governor it appears he was not your good student in politics as he appears to have deviated from the foundation you said you laid for him?
If he followed my administration’s policy, today, no one can beat him but he abandoned all our policies that we started and started his own. Can you believe now that I have uncompleted projects since I left office, roads, hospitals, schools, he abandoned the projects. Till today where you can count 30 kilometers of road which Wamakko did for Sokoto State? I constructed over 1000 kilometers; I can mention my own but if you go and meet him, he cannot mention his own. I can say I started construction of roads from Sokoto to Iseloka local government, almost 150 kilometers; Gwarisanmanbini, almost 100 kilometers Tanganza-Bale-Silanmi, Sokoto Silanmi, Kwarigewarinyo, Tambuwal, Tade, Tirita, Shaghari. Let him say which one he did.
Many of former governors are jostling for political appointments of to go to the Senate, but you seem not to be looking in the same direction with them, why?
We professional politicians, we want to project young politicians to grow; we are not saying that we are going to take all. Everything has its own limits. I have been saying it, that there is no way I can be a governor for eight years and then come back so low and take one third of it to become a senator. I cannot be a governor for eight years and go back to the classroom. What I mean by classroom is raising my hand to speak until the Senate President recognises me, and when he says sit down, I will sit down, so it is an insult.
Maybe they have a motive to go to the senate thinking they have immunity, immediately they go there, they will start asking to be in the committee for EFCC so that the EFCC will not get them; otherwise why are they going to the senate when thousands of young ones who can perform better than them. These are the people killing the country, they don’t like the country and I am disappointed with Nigerians who are promoting and supporting these people. Whatever idea you have, why not push it to the younger ones to implement when they get there than to be fighting for power at 70.
The President sermonised so much against rising incidences of political violence, how can you eschew violence starting from your state?
This violence is caused by leaders. If leaders ask their followers to behave well, nothing will stop them from behaving well. But beyond that, sometimes it is injustice. If you beat me, I didn’t retaliate and I report the matter o the police and police abandon my complaint and I come back in the morning again or evening and I am then being abused and slapped, then I will retaliate and that is what causes violence. But if we can apply justice to everybody, I don’t think there will be violence, not only in Sokoto but all over the country. When there is justice there is peace, when there is no justice, there is no peace.
APC at the national level is putting up a serious challenge and so many people think it would not be an easy ride as before, are you giving the party any chance in the presidential election?
Well APC is like Omo; when you put water in a half bucket of water and you put Omo, when you stir it, within one minute it will fill the bucket, after 10 to 15 minutes the water will go down and the foam is no more. APC has no single state in Nigeria; the APC states are ACN, PDP or APGA states.
Look at all of them from Buhari down, he is not promoting the party, he is promoting his interest and his personal ambition. Look at all the governors who joined APC, every one of them wants to become a senator, so all they want is their personal interest, not the interest of the people. You say he is not performing and you want to push him away.
The only thing is that if he is not doing well, let us give him benefit of doubt; by the time we elect him in 2015, he has another four years, the experience he is going to have where he made mistake in the past four years, he is going to correct it. He made all the states in the federation to have federal universities, 10 universities, four in the south and six in the north, is that not performance? People are condemning this man that he is not doing this and that; even if you have a child who is not performing well are you going to expel him from the school and then he becomes a drop out? Let him repeat, when you give him a repeat, he may come out with first class.
Like this insecurity, it is for everybody, it is not a one man show, it is the duty of everybody to give his own contribution; it is not just the army to kill people, everybody has his own input to bring it under control. Everybody is saying he is too gentle, is he going to take a gun to Chibok? What we should do is to pray for our leaders not to abuse them. Nobody gives power but God and He doesn’t make mistake and God has His own reason for giving power to Jonathan and whoever is fighting God’s decision is fighting God.
Many people believe that Buhari has what it takes to fight corruption do you align with such views?
Not at all. You see this corruption people are talking about, when Buhari was head of state, he was a military dictator, not a democrat’ then, when he came you cannot even explain yourself, people were arrested, various people and they were sentenced to 200 and 300 years; it is madness. There is no way you can apply military dictatorship to democratic leadership and when Buhari was head of state, what was the population of this country? Maybe 60 or 70 million, now we have doubled to 170 million. You cannot compare a leader, military dictator almost 30 years ago with the time we are and you say Buhari will fight corruption. Maybe what Jonathan is doing to fight corruption in a modern way different from fighting corruption by jailing people. Why not find out what he stole, recover it and allow him to go, then people will see that at least you are serious . When you are talking of fighting corruption, you are not talking of development, infrastructure and others. This man said he has built 10 universities, is it a small achievement? When you will have millions of people to be graduated and educated? The easiest way to fight corruption is by educating people so that they will not steal, they will have a job to do. If someone wants to arrest 300 people and says he is fighting corruption and someone who builds universities and provides jobs, which one is better? Compare.
Source: Thisday
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