One of the reasons Shekarau and Bafarawa gave for leaving the All Progressives Congress (APC) was that they were not being carried along by the leadership of the party. What is your take on this?
Well, I want to differ on this observation. They didn’t specifically mention names of individuals.
But they mentioned General Buhari and Tinubu as those running the party without carrying them along?
Well, they accused the leadership of the party on several issues such as not making enough consultations on political issues as they affect their states. To a certain extent, any right thinking person will want to believe that there were certain steps taken by the party that ought to have been done differently. One, when the party leadership started visiting the seven PDP governors, some of us saw some mistake of style in the way and manner they carried out those assignments. In the first place, let me say that some people, about three of us, did a lot of groundwork on the seven governors. Unfortunately, the party only succeeded in securing five out of the seven governors. It was when the ground was properly prepared that the party leadership came in and they did not even carry those of us who did the ground work along properly. If they had carried some of us along in this assignment we could have advised them to adopt a style that will bring about harmony rather than disharmony. But it didn’t happen.
Let me say that in this kind of situation one could have expected the party leadership, even if they would not seek for advice of the leadership of the three merging parties in those states, to, at least, inform them that they are coming on a particular date to see the governors. If they refuse to go with them, at least, they could have exonerated themselves. But they didn’t do that. Even though they didn’t do that, my expectations was that after seeing the governors, they could have still called the party leaders in those states and briefed them on what happened. This was not done and it caused a lot of bad blood. However, despite all these, if people are in politics for service and if they are in politics because of their people and their country, it doesn’t matter what happened to them. Their eyes should be on the goal, not on who will lead or what is there for them as benefits. If these are the principles and if they had followed them, there wouldn’t have been any disagreement and there wouldn’t have been any problem. But, unfortunately, these are not the kind of politics that some of us are brought up to imbibe and this is why we are having problems.
Bafarawa is no longer in APC and Shekarau has also left for the PDP. What does this portend for your party?
Well, it’s very bad. We need everybody in this party. Even if it’s one vote that is lost, it’s a minus for us, let alone people who had been political leaders, governors of states and presidential candidates. They must have a large family; they must have big support in the states they governed, and they must have national support, because when they ran as presidential candidates they acquired some campaign coordinators in various states of the federation. For me, it’s a big loss but that does not mean that because they felt they were wronged they have to leave.
For Bafarawa, I wouldn’t want to go into the details of what he claimed or what I knew happened to him because if those things were to be revealed in the press a lot of people will shed tears and sympathized with him. In the case of Shekarau, I don’t think he has been fair to himself. Why did I say so? Shekarau claimed that he was not consulted. He claimed the leadership of APC was given to Kwankwaso. He was part of those who gave birth to the party, therefore, he should have been given the leadership of the party in Kano State. I want to disagree with him on these two key issues. Shekarau and others were the ones who worked on the constitution of the APC and when they were doing it, we had cause to warn them that the constitution they promulgated for the party was not workable and it’s self-serving. We warned them that what they wanted to achieve by writing themselves into the constitution was like digging a deep well, and if they fell into it, they wouldn’t be able to get out. But unfortunately, they went ahead and adopted that constitution and now it has consumed them.
In the second instance, if you are talking of leadership in Kano, Architect Kabiru Ibrahim Gaya was an older governor. He was there before Kwankwaso and Shekarau. When you come to the next stage Kwankwaso is far ahead of Shekarau. He was governor when Shekarau was a permanent secretary in the Government House of Kano State and he served Kwankwaso, delivering files to him and saying, ‘sir’. He can’t deny that. Kwankwaso was a deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives. He was a governor of Kano State before Shekarau, a former Defence Minister and an ambassador under Obasanjo’s administration. When we are talking of political leadership, obviously, when you pair Kwankwaso and Shekarau, definitely you can’t compare the two of them.
Whatever it is, it is not for Shekarau to say that because Governor Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State said that, even though he is a governor, Osoba is his leader in Ogun state. The governor did not say Osoba is the leader of APC in the state but that he is his leader. Of course, Osoba is his leader because he is old enough to be his father and he is his political mentor. In Yoruba culture, when Osoba comes, you know that Amosun, despite his position will still prostrate for him. But the governor is the leader of the party in that state. So if Shekarau agrees that the governor is the leader of the party he can’t eat his cake and have it back. The examples I gave clearly explain the reality on ground in Kano State.
The grey areas you warned Shekarau and others on are still in APC constitution. Do you not fear they are capable of consuming the party in future?
Yes, they are still there. I agreed with you partially that it’s capable of consuming APC, but the party still has a chance to address the situation. I want to say publicly that the constitution of APC should be revisited to make it workable. If they should allow it to go on with the way it is now it will consume the party because it is practically unworkable. Let me give you one simple example. In the APC constitution, there are four signatories to its account, namely: The national chairman, national secretary, national treasurer and national financial secretary. According to the APC constitution, all the four of them must sign before money is withdrawn. Is it possible to always get the four of them all the time? It is not possible. In most parties, it’s the duty of the financial secretary to bring money, to solicit for money and the treasurer keeps it. The signatories are the chairman, national secretary and the treasurer in all the parties in Nigeria and it is not necessary for the three of them to sign cheque; any two of them that are available can sign cheque. I’m just giving you the simplest example on why the party’s constitution cannot work. You can’t have a workable constitution with over 160 members in national working committee. See what is happening in the PDP, in the last one-and-half years they could not meet. This is not a practical constitution. So my suggestion is that they should revisit it to remove the bottlenecks and tender it at the next convention before election of the national officers of the party. Let it be formally adopted in such a way that we will now have a workable constitution for the party.
If you have to review the leadership structure of APC, will you agree that Buhari and Tinubu are truly the ones running the show?
No, no, no. That is not normal. Buhari and Tinubu’s influence in the party is not a constitutional one. It’s not in the party’s constitution, but it’s just being used to massage ego and that is why they are called leaders. What is important is the structure of the party as it is in the constitution – the national chairman and various bodies. The National Working Committee membership should be looked at and trimmed. Its membership should comprise not more than 60 people and about 20 of them should be able to sit down and take decision, especially now that it’s an opposition party. The CPC had a unique constitution and that was why it was difficult for PDP to take over the party.
Months back the APC succeeded in taking over the majority in the House of Representatives from the PDP following the mass defection of lawmakers to the party, but soon lost it. What happened?
Well, let me say that this is expected. It will happen and will continue to happen if the leadership of the party does not change style. What do I mean by style? The leadership of APC needs the number at the National Assembly. We need that number because the election of 2015 will be won according to the Electoral Act that will be promulgated. So, any party that wants to take advantage of it must have a reasonable number of members in the National Assembly to influence what will be in the Electoral Act. If this is the case, the APC leadership must change its style and be consultative from top to bottom. They should instruct all the governors of the party to consistently be in touch with the members of the National Assembly from their respective states so that they do not give room for any of them to defect. The leadership of the party should also set up a team of real politicians that will be talking with members of the National Assembly. After all, some of us, without being put together by the party had worked on the governors that came into the party and we are still working on members of the National Assembly. It should be taken like a religious duty so that we can keep a tab on the lawmakers. You know that some members of the National Assembly were given one million dollar each to defect. The way to stop that is when the governors and leadership of the party keep a tab on their members in the National Assembly and try to attract more. No sacrifice will be too much for the party to make sure it keeps its members intact and provide enabling environment for them to stay with regards to what is happening at their constituencies. What we need is to maintain the leadership of the National Assembly to have an atmosphere that is conducive to influence the 2015 Electoral Act that will be promulgated in the future. PDP is proactive, they know the danger of what I’m talking about and that is why they can make any sacrifice. It’s not only members of the National Assembly, a lot of people are being enticed by the PDP. Even me, if you hear the mind boggling amount that is being offered to me to defect to PDP, you will just collapse.
How then can your party stem the tide of defection to PDP?
Let them instruct their governors to be in talking terms with members of the National Assembly. It’s not about pride or ego. A governor or party leader can come down so low to call members of the National Assembly to know how things are going on there. They should do that because it’s the primary duty of the party but some of us are doing it on our own. We don’t have the authority but we are doing it to stabilize the situation, else you would have seen the worst of defections. Let me tell you that those who want to come to APC from the Senate are over 60 and in the House of Representatives we would have taken more than two third, but because we have not been proactive that is why this is happening to us. Let it be an eye opener, let our leaders put down their pride and talk to people, after all, politics is public relations. Seventy-five percent of politics is public relations, they should engage people.
Given all these, will you in fairness say APC can win 2015 election?
I said no sacrifice is too much to make sure we have majority in the National Assembly. I’m saying that because I know in every place, even in Bayelsa, when you find 10 people talking about PDP and other parties nine of them will be against PDP. How come that out of 10 people only one supports PDP and they still win election? What is wrong? It’s not support but it’s the law. We need to regulate the process of election and the use of security agencies to truncate political choice. These are the issues that leaders of APC should pay more attention to. We can take 90 percent of votes from Kano registered voters that are more than five million, we can also do same in Lagos and Port Harcourt. So what stops us from winning? The issue is not number of supporters but the process and this is what we have to work on and block. We must force the hand of INEC to a one day election, use of direct data capturing machine for registration and accreditation. Once this is done, it’s very easy to remove the president.
How do you plan to settle the crisis rocking APC in Borno where Shettima and Sheriff are at loggerheads?
This is a failure of leadership. Why is Sheriff fighting Shettima now? Every fight you see is local, so you have to use a local solution and local elders to settle them. Why is it that in this part of the country we have eroded our leadership capabilities? Our leaders cannot intervene when two brothers fight, when two friends fight or when political friends fight. Why should they go and bring Oyegun from Edo State to mediate between Kwankwaso and Shekarau? Why should they bring him to settle Wamakko and Bafarawa? What does he know about the culture of Kano and Sokoto? Why did Sheriff and Shettima go to Bola Tinubu in Lagos for mediation? You mean in Northern Nigeria there are no leaders? That is our failure and that is why things are happening to us the way they are happening. Any leader that is not strong enough to look at the subordinate in the face and say, ‘Mr. A you are right, Mr. B you are wrong and having identified this please forgive and continue to work together’ is not worth being a leader.
Do you think your party will be able to break the Bafarawa/Shekarau jinx in Kano and Sokoto in 2015 election?
Jonathan himself who lured them into the PDP knows he is only using them in case he is lucky to get 25 percent votes in those states. I’m sure he is working on this or at least to protect his votes. He is not using them to win any election because he knows he can’t win.
Source: Sunday Trust
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