2023: Igbo Presidency Possible -Farouk Adamu Aliyu, APC chieftain and former Reps minority leader
Says, I support the zoning of the presidency to the South, but...
Honourable Farouk Adamu Aliyu was a former Minority Leader in the House of Representatives and chieftain of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC. The former lawmaker who as the leader of the opposition played a crucial role in frustrating the third-term bid of former president Olusegun Obasanjo in the run-up to the 2007 presidential election spoke to Akani Alaka on the performance of the APC administration, secession agitations in various parts of the country, the ban on open grazing by the Southern governors, restructuring as well as future of his party among other issues.
The President Muhammadu Buhari-led APC administration recently celebrated its sixth year in office. As a passionate member of APC and supporter of the president, how well would you say the government has performed in fulfilling its promises to Nigerians before it was elected?
Well, this thing could be subjective. In the party and the government, we believe that we have done well considering where we are coming from. There are achievements in certain areas, there are improvements and there are challenges. Of course, if you look at the security situation in the country, we have a lot of challenges, but there are improvements also – improvements in the northeast, challenges in other parts of the country. If you look at infrastructure also, the government has not done badly. So many infrastructure projects are ongoing and if you look at it, the government is following up to see that proper things are done. I think we have done well.
But some other people will disagree, especially on the issue of security- the expectation was that the president as a former General of the Nigerian Army will use his experience to tackle the security problems when he was elected, but that has not been the case with banditry spreading to every area of the country.
I told you, it is subjective. It is true that before 2015 we have bombs all over the place- Abuja, Kano, Bauchi, Gombe – all over the place. Now, that is gone and we hardly see suicide bombings and that’s also an achievement. But then, whether the general security situation in the country is good? No, because like I told you, we have challenges – the banditry, kidnappings and so on in the North and other parts of the country. And it has nothing to do with the fact that the president is a former military man and can handle it like that. There are so many issues. First, the antecedents of the military itself. What they have been used to, the lack of equipment when we came in and the paucity of funds as well. So, the military has been underfunded, underequipped over the years. Even, it is not as if this government has given them all that they required. Yes, the government has given them something. Then, there is the attitude of the Nigerian public who feel security is the duty of the government alone. Like the issue of banditry- my Fulani brothers that are all over the place doing this thing- but people don’t even want to come out and give information. So, these are cumulative issues. And some of these things are also political because you could see that there are challenges in the Southeastern part of the country where you have the ESN/IPOB or the South-west where you have the Afenifere and the secessionist movements. These have added to the insecurity situation of this country. And those have nothing to do with this government or the president but us, as a people. People have forgotten how we started as a country. We fought a civil war. So many people were killed, and the destruction of lives and property back then. Now, people who were not around when it happened are trying to bring it back. In the South-west part of the country, when they talk about Oodua Nation, the South-east also, the Biafra, ESN – to me, it is political. So, cumulatively, these are things that are worrying the government. So, if all of us sit back and say it is the problem of the government, who is the government? We, the people of this country are the government. Those in authority are holding the powers in trust on our behalf. So, it is a collective thing – whether Jonathan’s government or this government, the government is government and if we see anything that is wrong, whatever contributions that we can give, we should, not saying if the government does not do this, we are not going to do it.
What would then be your reaction to those saying the agitations to break up the country are getting louder because of the way the president is running his government? In the South–east, for instance, there is the complaint of marginalization, that the appointments by the president are skewed to a certain part of the country…
The issue of Biafra did not start with this government; there has been MASSOB if you remember. So, if anybody is now trying to say it is because of the skewed appointments that they are doing this – that cannot be true. And we are in a political dispensation – when former President Jonathan was in power, the Southeastern part of this country has so many appointments in government, but still, there was MASSOB, Nnamdi Kanu were there, they were still agitating. And since we are practising democracy, whatever this government is doing and you feel it is not right, in the political dispensation you should vote the government out, don’t go through brigandage, maiming, destroying the country. If you feel APC as a government is not doing the right thing, vote us out, not through agitations, killing people, not through calling certain ethnic nationality a parasite and so on. So, to me, the secessionist movements have nothing to do with appointments. Now, if you talk about that, what do you say about the Oodua people? The vice president is from that part of the country. So, it is simply not true. But some politicians are behind these things. For the South-east part of the country, the Igbo presidency is possible, but certainly not through blackmail or intimidation. If they think they can intimidate us to give them the presidency, it will not work. But it can happen through dialogue and inclusiveness also of their people because if the Southeastern part of the country decides not to join the party that will win the election, how do you think the other part of the country will risk giving them the presidency? But now, you can see that we have two governors in that part of the country and more might come. So, if the elite in that part of the country must start believing in Nigeria, that no section of this country should dominate and that leadership has got nothing to do with ethnicity, religion or where you come from. There can be a good leader from any part of the country. So, the people should understand that the agitations have nothing to do with appointments, but for selfish political reasons.
Aside from the issues of marginalization in appointments, some people have also argued that the agitations for secession can be stopped if the country is restructured …
When you say ‘restructuring’ – that word is fluid because restructuring means different things to different people. Now, you want to restructure what? That’s why sometimes, I don’t understand what restructuring means. We have a constitution now- whether good or bad and there are certain criteria for the constitution to be amended. Former President Obasanjo tried to convene the Constituent Assembly for people to come, sit and talk about how to restructure the country. But eventually, Obasanjo didn’t do it, Yar’Adua couldn’t, Jonathan couldn’t do it and I don’t think this government is going to do it as well if you don’t follow the right way. And the right way is, for you to change a dot in the constitution, you need two-third of the State Houses of Assembly and members of the National Assembly sitting. So, these are the processes. But are there parts of the constitution that we need to look at? Yes. So, if you want restructuring- you want the revenue sharing formula to be changed, self-governance, whatever you want, it has to be done in a civil way – and the civil way is the constitutional amendment. But if certain people feel that they will keep calling for restructuring until they cow people into doing it, they should know that no matter how the president or anybody wants to restructure this country, it has to be done constitutionally. And my advice now is going forward, 2023, any party that needs this country to be restructured should campaign along those lines and come out precisely that we want this thing to be changed, we want this to be amended and so on and put it to the public that when you vote us into power, these are the things that we want to do. It’s not when the government is in place already that you will start asking for things that might not happen. We need to dialogue among ourselves. Dialoguing is lobbying, let there be a one-point agenda from members of the National Assembly from the South-west that started the whole talk about restructuring in the country. Let them come and talk about nothing but restructuring. Let them also look across the country, talk to the other members, convince them on why there should be restructuring and let there be give and take. So, let it be through negotiation. And no matter how much you want this country to be restructured, you cannot do it alone. You need contributions from other parts of the country. So, why don’t we do it through dialogue? Why do we need to bring a Sunday Igboho to come out and be driving some people out of that part of the country? Or why do the people in the North ask the Igbo to leave? Or why do the people in the South-east ask the Fulani to leave? These are the kinds of things that overheat the polity.
But your party promised to restructure Nigeria when it was campaigning for office before the 2015 elections. It also set up a committee headed by Governor Nasir-el-Rufai which produced a document on how Nigeria can be restructured after it was elected into office.
Yes.
So, why is APC not going ahead with its plans and promise?
Even if the party wants it to be done, you still have to do it through the members of the National Assembly. And in the wisdom of the National Assembly, they set up a constitutional amendment committee that went round the country. And APC has made recommendations that this is what we want to happen. So, it is up to the members of the National Assembly. We cannot force them. What we want to do as restructuring, we have put it up to the members of the National Assembly. So, it is up to them. Anybody that wants that to be done should also lobby them.
I spoke to one of your members who said the major problem against the fulfilment of the promise of restructuring by APC is the president; that the president himself does not believe in restructuring…
I think probably that question should be put to the president. But to me, I honestly don’t understand the real meaning of restructuring, because when you say restructuring, what is it? Are you saying we should restructure the revenue formula? Or like the South-east wants, more states? Or to restructure in sharing of revenue, making sure that there is no open grazing? So, many things.
People are talking about devolution of powers, giving more powers to the states, more revenue to the states, allowing states to control the resources in their territories…
Exactly, but those things need constitutional amendments and there are processes on how the constitution can be amended. All these jamborees of calling people to come around and sit are just talk shops. Let there be deliberate efforts – like from the people from the South-west who are the architects of restructuring. Let them make it mandatory for their members now, before 2023 – that look, we will do nothing but to restructure this country.
As part of the means of tackling the security problems, people are talking of giving more powers to the states, like allowing the establishment of state police, would you support this?
To me, the issue of state police is good and bad. It is good because even as it is now, we have vigilantes in various states which are controlled by the states. But when you move to state police, the agitation is too much, but maybe one day, we will be given to that where, as a government and people, the states need to help. But in a dispensation where politicians – some of us are always misbehaving – if probably one governor is fighting another governor, there could be a crisis. If probably one ethnic group is fighting the other, there could be a crisis. If you have one central policing, where to some extent they are controlled by the centre, you can easily control that. Look, in 2023, it will not be Buhari, but another person and that person will also be confronted with how to take care of the country and should be entrusted to take care of the country. That is my opinion because I feel that politicians have still not learnt their lessons enough to be allowed to have police at the state level.
Where do you stand on the issue of grazing reserve and ranching because that is another grouse some Nigerians have about President Buhari. As somebody from Jigawa, where do you stand on the ban on open grazing by the Southern governors and the controversies over the president’s directive that the grazing routes should be revived?
I think what they (Southern governors) have done is illegal. The constitution of this country guarantees free movement. You can live in any part of this country and these grazing routes have been there but because of globalization, population, now these routes have been encroached upon. You see, the only reason why the Fulanis move is for the pasture. Like now, during the rainy season, they don’t need to move anywhere because they can feed their animals here. But as the years go round, they need to take their animals to where they can graze. I agree that if any Fulani herder is caught with a weapon, he should be dealt with. If he is caught encroaching into someone else’s farm, he should be sanctioned. But what I cannot agree with is for any state to say the Fulanis cannot bring their animals to graze in the open. When I say in the ‘open’ – there are lands that are for nobody, but the government – government reserves. And these grazing areas are there all over the country. This is the same country that established nomadic education. That was not set up by this government. Nigerian government set it up because they know that there are Fulani herders that move, there are fishermen that move- which means it is part of our culture. You cannot stop it. And why make a law that you know cannot be obeyed? I’m telling you, no law can stop Fulanis from moving around in this country. No law, I can tell you, because you will see a family with 1,000 herds of cattle and the only way they can feed them is by taking them to where the pasture is green. And in the Southern part of the country, that is where you have the green pasture, they will go there. But like I said, there must be law and order on where they follow – which route. But if you are telling me now that as a Nigerian state, you will deprive any other person of passage, that is unacceptable. We, the Fulani people will not accept not being given free passage to any part of this country. I agree that if any Fulani man encroaches on any farmland, he should be punished appropriately –but not by killing the person. And if any Fulani man is caught killing anybody, he should also be dealt with in the same way. If you kill, you should be killed. But you should not just be killed because you are coming with your cows to graze in any part of the country.
But the argument is that Nigeria is more populated, the grazing routes have been taken over mostly by farmers and that under the Land Use Act, the states are now in control of land within their boundaries, the Federal Government cannot go there to map out grazing routes and that, even the law on grazing routes apply only to some parts of Northern Nigeria…
I honestly don’t know whether there are no grazing routes in the Southern part of this country. But as a country, when we have a constitution, it is binding on everybody and everywhere. As I told you earlier, why make a law that cannot be obeyed? Nobody can stop the Fulani herders from moving with their cows from one part of the country to the other. Nobody.
Are you saying the anti-open grazing laws that the states are making will not work, will not be obeyed?
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You can put the law. The law has been there like in Benue and has it stopped the Fulanis from going there? No, it will not stop them because the cattle routes are there. So, if the government of any state is trying to take over those routes, they should make alternative routes. They cannot tell me that all the lands have been taken over by the population. Unfortunately, we still don’t see ourselves as one people- that’s the problem. The problem is ethnicity and religion. The Fulanis are Muslims, so, some Christians don’t want them. The fishermen are Christians, some Muslims don’t want them. That’s all. Look, like in Benue, the Fulanis have existed for many years. There are Fulani generations that know nowhere, but Benue. The Benue governor that was the champion of this law knows that it cannot be implemented. It is absolutely impossible.
But in Benue, they have been arresting and prosecuting violators of the law...
That’s what I’m saying. You can keep arresting them. Someday, you will have nowhere to keep the animals. Someday, the prison will be full. I think the main reason for the law is the conflicts – conflicts between the farmers and the herders. The herders are going into the farmlands to destroy them. Now, why are they doing that? Because the grazing routes have been taken over. And unless you are saying that we are no more one country – that other persons from one section of the country should not move to the other.
Nobody is saying people should not move, but cows – the law talks about restricting the movement of cows, not people…
Cows must move. Cows don’t go on their own, persons take them. Cows will move from Jigawa to Bayelsa, nobody will stop that – that I can tell you. Nobody in this country can stop cows from moving all over the country. But the states should ensure that any Fulani herder that is caught encroaching should be dealt with decisively. Any herder that is seen carrying any type of gun, including Dane gun, should be arrested and tried. But you cannot stop any Nigerian from moving either with pigs, chickens, cows to any part of the country.
What is your reaction to the outrage that greeted the assertion by the president that he is going to treat the agitators for secession, especially in the South-east in the language that they understand and the fallouts?
The President was correctly interpreted – let me also reecho it – whether Boko Haram, ESN, IPOB, MASSOB, – any secessionist movement, they will be spoken to in the language that they understand – simple. And what is that language? It is left for you to interpret. If that language is peace, they will be treated peacefully. If that language is violence, they will be treated violently. So it is subject to whatever interpretation you give it. The President never said, ‘we are going to go violent.’ But if anybody thinks it means violence, that is for them. And these are faceless people. Now, because of that comment, they are coming up to show themselves that ‘why are you reminding us of what happened during the civil war?’ The president never spoke about the war but will be ‘spoken to in the language that they understand’ and I am re-echoing that. We, as a government, will speak to them in the language that they understand. Now, let me give you further interpretation – in the Southeastern part of this country, police stations have been razed, prisons have been forced open, policemen have been killed. Those people that burn police stations, kill policemen, we will violently go after them. So, if that’s what they interpreted it to be, yes. We, as a government will no longer allow anybody to go and engineer a breakdown of law and order. The policemen paid to protect you and me were killed on the streets or their police stations were razed and the government will just sit and be looking because somebody will say he is being threatened? No, we as a government will go after them, arrest them and prosecute them.
What about those who said the president should have adopted a reconciliatory approach, try to reach out to people like Nnamdi Kanu and so on?
How more reconciliatory do you want when Nnamdi Kanu was given bail for an offence that ordinarily was not bail-able? We are in this country when Senator Ali Ndume took (Abdulrasheed) Maina on bail and Maina escaped, jumped bail. Ali Ndume was put in prison. Senator Abaribe who took Nnamdi Kanu on bail was never even brought to the police station – all in trying to do reconciliation. Let the people of the South-east don’t feel they are not part of the country. So, if all these overtures are made to them and they still keep calling for secession, burning police stations, killing members of the armed forces, we can’t compromise with those kinds of people. And we thank God that we have seen the Ohanaeze Ndigbo say that they believe in one Nigeria. The governors of the South-east have come out to say they believe in one Nigeria. So, that is a step forward. It is the kind of things that we want to be seeing from them.
As a former minority leader of the House of Representatives, how would you rate this Ahmed Lawan and Femi Gbajabiamila-led National Assembly, some people have described them as the lackeys of the president, but how would you rate them in terms of vibrancy and serving the interests of the Nigerian people?
Some of the things that they are doing, I think it is too much really. Even if they want to do the president’s bidding, they don’t have to rub it in on our faces. They don’t have to make us believe that the executive and the legislature are the same. They ought not to be the same. They are supposed to check the executive. So, in that regard, I don’t think they are doing well by at least making the pronouncement. But whether they are doing their work, they are. Sadly, the opposition is not vibrant, unlike when we were in opposition. So many times we staged walkouts when we were in opposition, coming out to address the press. But these people, anything the government brings, it passes without them saying anything. So, you also don’t blame the leadership if they find it easy to move with the opposition. So, I can understand that PDP members are not used to being in opposition.
But they claim that the Buhari administration has embarked on a clampdown on voices of dissent and APC is not willing to allow the opposition to drive it out of power the way it came into power…
No, no, no. But I spoke to you about Senator Abaribe who is the minority leader. He took Nnamdi Kanu on bail and Kanu absconded and he was not charged. He is a member of the opposition, nobody harassed him. So, you can see that it is not true. This government is not after anybody that is against it. Remember the EndSARS? You know how many weeks they were allowed to demonstrate until such a time when they started going overboard- burning police stations, opening prisons in Benin, when they were stealing, when some people either hijacked them or whatever. No government would allow that kind of thing without reacting. So, this government is extremely civil, there is no crackdown on any opposition voice in the country.
Let’s talk about your party, the APC. There are fears that after Buhari, the party may collapse and may not be able to return to power in 2023. Do you share the same fears?
APC is not about Buhari. Buhari and his people in the defunct CPC were part of the merger and the party was not formed because of Buhari. The party was formed because we as fragmented opposition at that time realized that we cannot defeat the PDP unless we come together. And that’s why we came together and we defeated them. And even as I am speaking to you today, we have a senator of PDP crossing to APC. We have governors from PDP – one from the South-east, one from the South-south. We have many of the big guns from the PDP joining us. APC will not disintegrate after President Buhari. In fact, we shall win the election in 2023 because we have done so many things to show that we are still better than the previous government of PDP.
Many will disagree with you that your government is better than the government of PDP...
It’s subjective like I told you.
One of the things that people said may derail the APC in 2023 is the zoning of the presidential ticket. Where do you stand on the zoning controversy? Where do you want the 2023 presidential candidate of your party to be zoned to?
My personal opinion is different from the party’s opinion. Personally, because of the way this country is made up- the perception, now you have President Buhari as the president of Nigeria, are the Northerners doing better than the people of the South? No. When Jonathan was the president of Nigeria, were the Southerners doing better than the people of the North? No. But the perception in this country is North, South, Muslims, Christians – so my personal opinion is that APC should allow somebody from the Southern part of the country to be the candidate or the presidential flag bearer for peace and semblance of equity – a Muslim, Fulani man, Buhari has done eight years. It is only fair that probably a Christian, a Southerner to become the president or anybody from the Southern part of the country- whether a Christian or Muslim. There was one time the president of Uganda- I think- appointed 68 ministers and he was asked, ‘why do you have such a high number of ministers?’ And he said ‘if every Ugandan will be a minister and there will be peace, so be it.’ So, that means if the perception of Nigerians is that of the North and South and that’s what will bring peace, so be it. So, to me, let it go to South. But there is the party – whatever the party decides because the party is going to look at many things – electability, where the opposition will pick its candidate -because that is also key and one of the things that the party will also look at. So, irrespective of what my feelings are, the party will also have to retain power and it will make political calculations, not necessarily perception calculations.
There are also fears that if the coming national convention of the APC is not well-managed, the party may find itself in crisis, which it may not recover from, do you also share such fears?
There is no politics without controversies. We cannot run away from it. It will happen. There will be a crisis, I’m assuring you because there will be different blocs that might be happy or not happy. You cannot satisfy everybody. Of course, some people might be angry and leave the party, we are prepared for that. But mark you, the other party too will have its crisis, so we will also harvest from there. So, it is vice versa. Ideologically, there is no difference between PDP and APC. But it has to do with leadership – who is our leader? Buhari. Who is the leader of the PDP? Secondus – as of now. That’s the difference. And that’s why you see people moving across parties because it is about self-interest and self-preservation first, not the interest of the polity. But some of us would rather remain in one place- whether good or bad.
You are remaining in one place, but what are you aspiring for now?
When I left the House of Representatives, I attempted to be a governor in 2007, I didn’t get the ticket. In 2011, I got the ticket of CPC in my state in Jigawa, I lost. We formed APC, I wanted to become Deputy National Chairman of APC, I lost. Now, we are talking, who knows – I might be the next national chairman of APC- If it is zoned to my area, I might go for it, but as of today, the party has not zoned which part of the country the chairman will come from and so on. But I intend to go for any position that is zoned to my area.
