Daily Independent (Lagos)
Sam Akpe
6 July 2009
(Page 2 of 3)
To prove that you are not corrupt?
To prove transparency, so that if anybody tries to measure my lifestyle as against my salary as a minister of planning, they would understand that there was something coming in which was not necessarily from the Nigerian government's treasury.
On assumption of office, how did you see the management of the national planning ministry under the immediate past administration?
In the immediate past administration, planning was going to take off on a reasonably good footing under Chief Philip Asiodu. At that point in time, if you recall, he was always with the President; he was his Chief Economic Adviser, Minister of Planning and chairman of the National Planning Commission. Now, for the first two years that he served as minister, if Obasanjo was anywhere, his minister of planning was beside him. They would discuss, have the same experience, share the same discussions and they would plan and move forward. Two years down the line, there was a falling out of Philip Asiodu; it could have been because of a personality thing. Once Asiodu left, essentially, (Olusegun) Obasanjo became National Planning Minister. Those who later headed it were no longer ministers, but what they call chairmen or Chief Economic Advisers. So, that kind of lowered the status until when I was appointment and I said: no, this is a central ministry; it is beyond the Chief Economic Adviser's office; it is a ministerial office. It is even a supra-ministerial office where, after the Presidency, you have the planning commission. Then below it, you have the line ministries.
What impact did Obasanjo's handling of that particular ministry have on the economy of the country?
I don't think there was really anything negative, just that the ministers had a lot of powers to decide to do things on their own without coming back to a coordinating point. So, the ministry of finance took the budget out of the planning ministry. Before then, it was planning and budget. The National Planning Commission would be in charge of capital projects and the capital budget. That was taken away and tucked into the Ministry of Finance. During Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala's time, she insisted that she wouldn't serve as a minister without having the budget office under her ministry. That was when they appointed the Director of Budget and made him both SA (Special Adviser) budget as well as Director, Budget. So, as the Director of Budget, he was under Okonjo-Iweala but as SA Budget, he was under Obasanjo. So you know what happened.
Budgeting under Obasanjo administration was never easy, why?
When we came in, in 1999, we met all the structures that had served military administrations and regimes. We had a civilian administration in place. Those structures needed to be replaced or dismantled. So the first challenge Obasanjo had was to dismantle them and it is not a switch that you could put on and off; it's a process. There wasn't, effectively, a proper budgeting process in place. The budgeting process we had had the legacy of the parliamentary system where the budget is prepared and send through parliament and there is no objection; you don't change one dime. You can reduce, but you cannot add, else it is a vote of no confidence and that could even kick the government out of the place. But we are operating an American system. Essentially, anytime the budget proposal comes out of the Presidency, once it comes to the congress of the U.S., it is essentially what they call 'dead on arrival'. They just discard it. They use the congressional budget office and research office (CBO) to base their own work. There must be some little differences but not much. And because of the type of economy the U.S. has, only about 15 per cent of that budget is debated. Eighty-five per cent of the budget of the US is transfers. The 15 per cent is what all this trouble comes to. And the U.S. has a two-year budget plan. When they are budgeting this year (2009), it is not against 2010; it is against 2011. So, they have a more sophisticated thing because information and data are available. But in Nigeria, no. Then, there is what they call the Federal Office of Statistics, which is just there. It really couldn't provide the necessary numbers, but by law and international convention, they should be giving us the numbers. Today, we have a fairly reasonable and working National Bureau for Statistics and their numbers are respected.
In all this, to what extent does the National Assembly exercise its powers over the budget?
The Constitution is very clear. That was what Obasanjo didn't want to let go of without a big fight. And that fight, to me, made the budget the most important law in the year. I think we are still in the process of developing, and the more open and accessible the information the better. We haven't reached the level of perfection yet. We still tend to budget more than what we really have. That means we are not cutting our coat according to our size. So, the tendency is that you have a very large budget and very low cash flow. At the end of the day, you have a large hole, which is what you call the deficit. Once you want to deal with the deficit, you run to the capital market. And how big is the capital market itself?
But over that period of time, one legacy is that he allowed the budget to develop; he allowed the process to endure and then here we are, 10 years down the line, we should be able to pick up a document, read it, understand the revenue framework, agree with it, not agree with it, make your comments on it, make your own input. There is still a problem of who decides the content of the budget, but the Constitution says it is the NASS that should decide and prescribe the manner in which the budget will be passed and operated.
What is the implication of being a minister under President Umaru Yar'Adua?
The fact that I came from the National Assembly, I came with some measure of confidence in the FEC. I was coming with the little of a senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. So I stepped into the office with a lot of confidence. Being in the NASS exposed me to a lot of things. In the House of Representatives, I was chairman of Finance Committee. In the Senate, I was vice chairman of several committees and I served in the Finance, Banking and Insurance committees, and some of the technical committees too. To that end, I had a fair idea of what was happening in the system. I was more or less current about issues. So, I came in with a lot of knowledge and ideas and exposure on what was happening in the system. And being a politician, I had access to information.
Were you a member of Yar'Adua's kitchen cabinet?
I don't know how you find that as kitchen cabinet. As far as I was concerned, I was a fairly prominent member of the Federal Executive Council and being Minister of Planning meant that I had the opportunity of sitting with the President on several occasions and demanding time, even on a monthly basis, to brief him on issues, programmes, prospects, ideas and views on issues.
You were obviously shocked when you were removed as minister.
No, I wasn't shocked to the extent that I had a fairly open mind. I didn't expect to be removed as a minister in view of, as far as I am concerned, my performance and my standing in the Federal Executive Council. But if other considerations beyond just hardwork, commitment and performance are being considered, it is not for me to assess. I've heard all sorts of reasons for my removal from cabinet; from local politics to personality issues between individuals, etc. As far as I am concerned, the President has the prerogative to work with whomever he wants. He can work with you for a day, four years or eight years. If at a point in time when he hired me to work for him as the National Planning Minister, he felt I'd served my own term, and he felt he wanted a change, he had the prerogative to say "thank you very much. At this point, I am making a change."
Have you ever tried to find out from the President why you were sacked?
I don't have access to find out why, and it would be out of place to question somebody who takes a decision. When decisions like this are taken, with my kind of exposure and experience, those kinds of decisions could be taken over a dining table, in a meeting or in an office. It could just be the whims and caprices of the sovereign. So you don't start questioning. The issue is: what did you do while you were there? I have my records, and I can say what I wanted to do and what is being done. And I could say I was always ahead of the pack. With that, I had a fulfilling experience in the Federal Executive Council.
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