Despite the rising tide of insurgency in the Niger Delta and government’s subsequent response, Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Usani Usani, insists that the government and militants are not at war. He also talks on the harsh economic climate in the country and the clamour for restructuring by some individuals and groups in this interview with Special Correspondent, REUBEN BOJOR.
There has been resurgence of vandalism in the Niger Delta. Were you expecting this?
I was not expecting resurgence of vandalism, but I was not expecting calm anyhow. Why I was expecting the possibility was because the people had threatened that if former President Goodluck Jonathan did not win, they would make the country ungovernable.
Is the government winning the war, given the relative calmness?
The government is not at war with its citizens. And so if there is calm, we do not know what the people are planning to do next. But for government, we know that we mean well for the citizens of Niger Delta.
What about the agitation for the restructuring of Nigeria by some individuals and groups?
When you talk of restructuring, you need to know what components of statehood that you are agitating to be restructured. Is it in fiscal policy? Is it in security architecture? Is it in the structure of governance which talks about different forms of federalism, different forms of democracy? Which one? What is the content of that restructuring?
The agitators favour return to regionalism or true federalism.
What do you call regions now? If you talk of regions, are you talking about geo-political regions or developmental regions? This is because the Niger Delta, as it is now, is called developmental region, while the geo-political region within the space is implicative of both South East and South South.
Pro-Biafra agitators seem to be speaking the same language with Niger Delta militants.
Are you talking about the developmental region or the geo-political region?
Geo-political region.
Which means South South. Well, I am an indigene of South South. I don’t agitate for Biafra. And I have not defined a name for the country those who are agitating for separate country will be identified by. Therefore, it’s not a collective agenda. Indeed, if people have to agitate for whatever thing, there are categories of people that should talk for it.
Don’t you think it is the people’s mindset and not the system of government that matters?
Yes, that is very true. When criminals have a mindset, they will attack what is good. So if the mindset matters, it means government is not ready to be intimidated to continue in what it is doing. That is, it is the system that matters. That is what I want to tell you. You were saying it is not the system that matters. That is why I want to tell you the danger of mindset mattering instead of the system mattering. It is the system that matters because it is the system that shapes the attitudes of human beings. If the system is strong, the human beings must conform to it. And in this system that is determined to uproot corruption and make sure that merit prevails, if it doesn’t matter, then the alternative is that criminality did not matter. And that is why the people with that mindset are perpetrating it.
It also alleged that the fight against corruption is tailored against the members of the opposition and those from certain sections of the country.
When Jafar Isa was arrested, did you forever imagine that he would have been arrested? He was a close associate and confidant of the President. I also read on papers, just recently, that General Umar Mohammed has been arrested. Isa belongs to the All Progressives Congress (APC). He is very close to the President. As for General Mohammed, you may not know his role in this government. I am just giving you these instances for you to know that the fight is not selective. But do you know who General Mohammed is? You don’t know. That is why you say what you are saying. To hear that the Department of State Services (DSS) has arrested him should suggest to you that the President is ready to even arrest his own where it matters.
There are reports of Nigerians experiencing hardship on account of government’s unfriendly economic policies.
Why won’t there be hardship when they stole all the money? The cause is from reckless individuals in Nigeria. And the reckless individuals are still prevailing.
The fears are that with over 300 assets and billions of naira recovered, won’t the story go the way of the money and assets recovered from the late Sani Abacha?
I am not a native doctor to know how it will go. But one thing I know is that in this administration, on all the funds recovered, you cannot charge anyone on account of evidence that one kobo is lost.
Beside the N500 billion in the budget for the vulnerable, Nigerians are yet to see this administration’s blue-print on poverty reduction.
What is your sense of geo-political economy and the fiscal policy in the country that had pervaded for years? Nigeria is not a production economy; it is an exchange economy. In exchange, it means you are giving me something in exchange of something; goods for funds. So why are you talking about poverty? Is it not because you don’t have money to access the things you want? That’s the same way. At the macro level is the country, and the country does not have the money to purchase the things. So why won’t poverty be. That is what this administration is fighting now.
If the money had been finished, from where should we get the money to buy? Even in the militancy you were talking about, they are further destroying the economic infrastructure from where financial resources should be gained to further strengthen the economy. So can you have a bleeding cell multiplying? It will not. That a cell is bleeding means it is dying. It is only those who are alive that can grow. The economy is dead. We are only reviving and resuscitating it. So if anybody is telling you it is this administration that is causing it, tell me by what means.
The people’s take is that electoral promises have turned to excuses.
It is because our mentality is corrupt, just as our character is corrupt; otherwise, we would ask why it is happening that way. You have no salary and your wife expects you to buy a car for her. What will be your point of assessment of the sense of judgement of your wife? She is either mad or unreasonable. If you don’t earn income and your wife is saying go and build a house for me, would it be possible?
Are you telling Nigerians to be hopeful?
Of course. It is not only hope; we will see it manifesting very soon.
Some critical voices against the government are drowning, specifically that of Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State. What is the magic?
I have never heard his voice before. So if he is silenced, I won’t know. For me, it has always been unheard, so I do not know. It is because you used to hear him, that’s why you notice his silence. But for me, I have never heard him. I can’t predict if he is silent. You can tell me what he has been saying.
The governor is complaining of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) blocking his account. The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) caucus in the Senate is also threatening not to support the President because of his perceived highhandedness against its members. Won’t that affect the workings of the government?
Well, I am not a senator; so I will not be able to know the implications of that withdrawal of support from the Senate. On the other leg of the question, if that’s the reason behind what you say is happening, it means we are endorsing the fact that we should close our eyes to how our financial impropriety is promoted. So it is left for you now to carry out your judgment within the ambits of the law and a sane society.
You are a minister, doubling as chairman, Cross River State chapter of APC. Are you not concerned with the agitations against you manning two positions?
Well, nobody has brought such issue to me. Now that you have, we will talk about it. I am not state chairman of the party. I couldn’t have been a minister and the state chairman of our party at the same time. The constitution of our party indicates that you cannot hold the party office and public office at the same time. So I will not be too lawless to be the first person to violate the constitution of the party. So I am not the state chairman.
What they mean is that even as your deputy is in acting capacity, the party is motionless just as your silence is troubling.
So, should I go and wrest the authority from him?
The proper thing is for election to be conducted for new state executive members.
It is not in my place to do so. The party’s constitution is there to guide us. The party hierarchy is also there to direct. It is not my place to disrupt the authority of a constituted institution that should carry out its responsibilities.
Yours is the least on budgets for the ministries. Why is it so? Does it mean the East-West Road will not be completed?
Let us assume that we do four years and it is not completed. Let us assess it on the basis of six years before now when it was not completed and when the project started in 2006 – 10 years later. Let us assume we will not complete it before we leave. On whose side does the judgment lay?
As a pastor, what is your view on the Osun hijab crisis?
Well, in my opinion, worship is not something of competition. As far as it is not a law that compels me to worship in a particular manner, practise your own the way you want, I do mine the way I want. So if you say they approve that students of a particular religion should dress in a particular manner, as far as it doesn’t affect me, I have no business with it. I will go on with my own worship. So if I will go to dress in a particular manner as a response to how the others dressed, I am not practising true religion. But if I have the conviction that what I am doing is to sustain my faith, it means I would have satisfied my conscience that what I am doing is objective.
How have you been handling official and personal matters as a minister?
The very nature of this administration is a great challenge. Not that the challenge is too heavy for us to bear, but a challenge on confronting and letting the people understand the goodwill and intentions of this administration upon the citizenry, which have been demonstrated. First, salaries were owed before the administration came. This administration has given bail-out. As for the debts that were owed on account of subsidies since 2014, this administration started paying until that depleted the foreign reserves for further importation. How else will an administration demonstrate that it means well? Ordinarily, by the partisan attitude of Nigerians, this administration could be saying it has nothing to do with what happened before it came in. But this is the real practice of government that is a continuum. So, you can see that this government has a sacrificial attitude towards relieving Nigerians of the hardship.