Daily Independent (Lagos)
Tunde Opeseitan
2 July 2009
(Page 2 of 2)
Nigeria used to be a force to be reckon with in international politics especially under former President Olusegun Obasanjo but this seem not to be the case anymore as world leaders now ignore the country. Do you think the current re-branding campaign of the Federal Government can change this?
With due respect to the proponents of the re-branding campaign of this government, I will say that re-branding Nigeria is not a function of what you do on CNN or in the papers. This is what Obasanjo did, which I believe was simply a waste of resources. I believe re-branding is what you do and not what you say. I was talking about President Obasanjo and his Heart of Africa Project. When I saw that thing on CNN, I was disappointed not only in him as the president but also in all those who were involved in that project. Nigeria can only be said to have been re-branded when we the citizens can hold our head high anywhere in the world. When our government begins to fight for us international. We need to get it right first at home before we can then get it right outside. Our leaders must awake up to their responsibilities and lead by example. The issue of corruption must be tackled with all the seriousness it deserved. It is difficult to sell a bad product; there must be something that will attract people to a product before they can buy it. In the case of Nigeria what is the selling point, what do we have that we want to show case to the rest of the world. Is it bad governance and corruption? So I believe that re-branding will not solve our problem, we must first of all change our attitude and reform our institutions.
The President has announced the terms and conditions for the unilateral amnesty he recently offered to militants in the Niger Delta, in spite of the fact that the militants have continue to blow up oil installations in the region. In you view do you think the offer of amnesty to the militants would solve the problems in the Niger-Delta?
Let me make one thing clear, those guys are neither militants in the way that we know militancy or are they people fighting for anybody's freedom; 99 present of those guys in the Niger Delta today are those I will call oil criminals. They are basically men and women that have found an opportunity in the under-development of that area to amass wealth illegally. They are busy doing illegal bunkering, illegal oil refining and sale of oil. That is what I see happening there. Yes, that area needs development and I think the simple solution is that the government must be ready to move in to that area and do interventionist programmes. Developmental programmes that touch the people, but unfortunately government intervention in that area of the country has not worked because of the greed of the leaders.
Institutions were set up in the past to develop the area and people from the Niger Delta manned these institutions. How come all those fund has not been seen in the environment. So the government must be ready to go in with developmental programmes that will impact on the lives of the people of the region. They must find the right people that can deliver and give them the work and they should be mobilize to do it. When everything that these jokers say they are fighting for is there then the people would rise up against them. So government must be sincere. Well amnesty is good if those guys are agitating for the betterment of the people. However, government must be forthright in coming out with workable condition and the people also must be ready to be seen in the light of what they want to be seen and not in the light of what they truly are. The oil majors the OIC they also need to relax a little and at the end of the day it will be for the good of everybody. They said that they are fighting for a higher derivation formula I have nothing against them having it. It is just like in Lagos State for instance if you are doing derivation formula whether it is for oil or VAT or any other kind of income the same principle should be applied. If you are giving them 13 percent derivation there is nothing stopping any other state from getting the same percentage from what ever income the government get from it boundary. So what is good for one person is good for the other. The same way they nationalized oil that you cannot just go and exploit they should also nationalized other minerals too. Today if you say you want to mine any of the solid minerals you will be given the license readily.
One major fallout of the crisis in the Niger Delta is the problem of kidnapping, in fact, the crime has spread all over the country, recently the Vice President said that the Federal Government is set to send a bill to the National Assembly for a law against the crime. Sir, don't we have laws in our books that can effectively take care of this problem?
We have existing laws in regard to kidnapping. However, maybe what they are trying to say is that the penalties are not sufficient to serve as deterrent to those involved in the crime. As I said earlier, those guys involved in kidnapping are criminal who have nothing to do with any economic or socio-economic agenda rather it has to do with a selfish interest. If it is because of the problem in the Niger Delta, how then can you explain the kidnapping that happen in Kaduna, Lagos and Imo states? The IGP recently said that kidnapping is all over the eastern part of the country and the question is whether that is because of oil too? So its need to be dealt with and dealt with fast. Because very soon we nobody will be safe, they only have to think that there is some money that they can get from you. They forget that very many of us go to somewhere to lease a car or get mortgage to buy a house. So based on that if they want to impose stronger penalty I have nothing against it or else none of us would be safe.
Sir, is the issue of the federal character policy still relevant to our present day realities considering the recent appointment of the Central Bank Governor, Lamido Sanusi, who is from the same state with the current Minister of Finance as well as that of the National Planning Ministry?
The greatest disservice that is being done and has been done and I pray that it would be stopped is the issue of Federal Character. Some people said that Nigeria is a geographical expression; that there are no people called Nigerian. The reason is that Nigerians everyday are being made to owe allegiance to their villages than to Nigeria. You want to fill a form they will ask for your name, surname, address, marital status, state of origin, local government of origin, tribe, religion in a nation that we say we are one. Until we remove those things, we cannot have a united nation. Let start with that I know that it is not going to remove the problems over night. We should forget about state of origin, let us ask where is you state of residence? Where are you living? We have seen two children of the same father being Governor in different states that is in the United States of America. Hillary Clinton did not live in New York until when she wanted to be a Senator. She knew that if you wanted to be a Senator in New York you only have to live there for one year. Obama did not come from Chicago but from Ohio where his grandparents came from, in fact his father was an immigrant and less than 50 years of his birth he is the President of America. So let us do away with the federal character and instead promote merit.
Who, in your view, should appoint the INEC Chairman, is it the President or the National Judicial Council (NJC)?
The man that appoints the INEC Chairman is not the important thing but who is the man being appointed that is the most important thing. If NJC appoints him and he gets there but he is a man that has no spine, has no integrity, has no morals and has no substance to himself, he will be worse than the present man there now. If he is a man of integrity and a man of a sound moral back bone and he know that no matter what happens he is not serving the person who appoint him but the Nigeria people. And he knows that it is his duties to ensure that elections are free and fair and that it is the people that truly win election that were returned. If the President appoints him he will still get there and do what he should do. Once he is appointed and he knows that they cannot just remove him anyhow, he would work for the interest of the nation.
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