NewsIf We Don’t Restructure, Nigeria May Disintegrate – Ezeife

If We Don’t Restructure, Nigeria May Disintegrate – Ezeife

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August 02, (THEWILL) – A former Governor of Anambra State, Chukwuemeka Ezeife, speaks withAYO ESANon the monetisation of Nigerian politics and the desire for restructuring of the country, among other issues of national importance. Excerpts:

Recently, some governors from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) defected to the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC). How do you see such a development?

There is the fear of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), which is monitoring the people in power. Since conscience is dead in Nigeria, corruption has taken over. Every person in office appears to have something to hide. Many of them have soiled their hands with corruption.

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If you would recall, there was this announcement by the ruling All Progressives Congress, which made it clear to everybody that if you crossed over to the party, your sins would be forgiven. So people are crossing over to the APC in order to avoid trial for the offences they committed. If they contest for an elective position, they can be helped through rigging. That is what is going on.

In your time, elections were based mainly on parties and their manifestoes. How would you react to the current situation in which politics is monetised and elective positions are available only to the highest bidder?

During our time, money was used to buy Fanta, Coke and some other soft drinks for those who came to the rallies. What is happening now is due to the death of the human conscience. Even political parties have no conscience left in them. How do you ask a person contesting in the governorship election to pay N22million or more to buy papers to fill for primary election? Because of that, if you go out people will ask you for more money. But there is a magic to it. If voters want to be led properly, they will look for the right person and vote for him. Let them take money from anybody. I mean, if those seeking elective positions bring money, voters should not reject it. They should take it. In fact, If anybody says to you, ‘take this money and swear to an oath.’ Go on and swear to the oath. Oaths don’t kill. So take the money, but vote according to your conscience. What matter is that at the end of the day, you voted according to your conscience. If you do so, whatever oath you took would expire like drugs.

What is your advice to the electorate as we move towards 2023?

I take it that the vote on the issue of electronic transmission of results is not over. We the people are seeking a reversal of the vote because we don’t want the wrong people to take over the government anymore.

Nigeria is being ravaged by insecurity. As an elder statesman, what is your advice to the Federal Government?

Well, the only thing to tell the government is that they are dealing with human beings. Nigerians are human beings, not rats. A lot of things have gone wrong in this country. There is poverty everywhere and there is what I call maximum insecurity. A lot of people are dying every day. So, what I want to tell the Federal Government is to begin to think about Nigerians as human beings and not equate them with animals.

What is your take on the agitations by Nnamdi Kanu and Sunday Igboho for Biafra and Oduduwa Republics, respectively?

I think the Federal Government should be careful in handling both men. I think it is better to begin to dialogue on the issue rather than to punishing people. This is the time to engage in a dialogue with ethnic agitators. Nnamdi Kanu is no longer just Nnamdi Kanu. He is a leader of a very high percentage of south-eastern people. The same thing goes for Sunday Igboho. Let us convert these problems to a solution to our problems by having dialogue with those represented by Igboho and those represented by Nnamdi Kanu. Let us see how we can solve the problem without resorting to violence.

Are you saying that both agitators should be released unconditionally?

It depends on how their detention is handled. The Federal Government should make sure that they are well treated and allowed to say what is in their minds. Those of us from the South-East are prepared to go and talk with President Muhammadu Buhari and the government. Let us know what the people are agitating for. Why I am saying this is because if we look at what happened in Cotonou, the Yoruba there are in sympathy with Igboho.

The National Assembly recently voted against electronic transmission of election results. What is your take on this?

For a long time now, conscience has been dead in Nigeria and anybody who finds himself in an elective position thinks only of his personal interests, not the national interest. No senator from Anambra State voted at all. Instead, they abstained from the meeting. Some names were mentioned as voting against. So, it is obvious that some people are not interested in the welfare of Nigerians and in the progress of this country. To begin with, if you vote against electronic transmission of election results, you are voting for rigging. This may be because you think you know people in the North and you are voting along with them so that they can rig an election for you. But it shows that you don’t have the interest of the country at heart.

Many people believe that restructuring of the country may help in solving the problem of insecurity. Do you think they are right?

If we don’t restructure, Nigeria will disintegrate and there may not be a Nigeria any more. As I see it, 2023 may be really far away. There is really no problem with restructuring. The problem is that some people in the North are confusing restructuring with resource control. Yes, resource control is an aspect of restructuring, but nobody should think that if you restructure today, states and local government councils in the North will cease to receive oil revenue tomorrow. That cannot happen. We should plan in such a way as to make sure that every level of government is given support. Even with respect to oil revenue, we can decide that oil is nationalised. Oil exploration and gold mining could be nationalised. We can also decide on other valuable things that we can call national. And then those states in whose lands we found the nationalised products will be given a percentage from their assets much higher than the rest of the states. But other states will gain from it. So there will be no issue of ceasing to give oil revenue to any group because of restructuring.

Some people are saying that we should go back to the 1963 Constitution, which gave birth to strong regions with relative autonomy. Do you agree with that?

That is what restructuring means most of the times. Before the military coup of 1966, the World Bank made a statement. It said some parts of Nigeria were growing faster than the rest of the world. Now instead of that, Nigeria has become the poverty capital of the world. What is the difference between now that we are poverty capital of the world and the 1960s when we were growing faster than the rest of the world? The difference is the structure, the political arrangement of Nigeria. We had regions with a true federal structure. Today, we have 36 states plus the Federal Capital Territory and the Federal Government is not federal. It is run like a unitary structure.

In those days when we had regions, no regional prime minister collected money for the development of his region and frittered it away on personal things. No, that couldn’t happen because every member of the region was interested in how money was spent. That was also due to the fact that the money was sourced from them. We also had close traditions in each region, mostly the same kind of religion, culture and social arrangement. Therefore, they understood themselves more as they compete with the other regions.

Unfortunately today anybody can go to the Federal Government to collect money and spend the money the way he deems fit and nobody will complain. The thing to look at is why Nigeria was growing faster than the rest of the world before the 1966 coup and why Nigeria is the poverty capital of the world today. This is what we mean by restructuring and going back to the structure we had when things were working well. Indeed, those structures made things to work very well.

Do you believe in the zoning policy? What do you think of the recent demand by the governors of the 17 southern states for a southern president in 2023?

I don’t know whether there is any document on that. Since 1966, the North had dominated the leadership of this country. Along the line, they allowed a few southerners to rule the country. I remembered that sometime in the past, the chairman of the power sharing committee of my party we discussed the issue of power rotation. We did it for the states, but we had some difficulty with some states where there was a dominant tribe.

As for a federal structure, if you want Nigeria as one country, you must allow the various geo-political zones to supply leaders for the country. If for example, 2023 comes and South-East do everything they have to do, including lobbying the South-West and the South-South, yet at the end you say because they are Igbo they will not get the presidency, obviously, any intelligent Igbo person will see that the rest of Nigeria have denied the Igbo the right to citizenship.

Do you think there should be an Igbo president by 2023?

It is obvious and if it doesn’t happen, it means you have rejected the people in that part of the country as citizens of Nigeria.

About the Author

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AYO ESAN, has been actively reporting and analyzing political events for different newspapers for over 18 years. He has also successfully covered national and state elections in Nigeria since the inception of this democracy in 1999.

Ayo Esan, THEWILLhttps://thewillnews.com
AYO ESAN, has been actively reporting and analyzing political events for different newspapers for over 18 years. He has also successfully covered national and state elections in Nigeria since the inception of this democracy in 1999.

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