Dr. Olisa Agbakoba, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and former President of Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), in this interview with Senior Correspondent, ONYEWUCHI OJINNAKA, speaks on the raging corruption war by the present administration and other issues.
What is your assessment of the ongoing war against corruption embarked upon by the present administration?
The war on corruption, though not well clarified in my view, is the most serious attempt to deal with people who have stolen public funds in this country. However, it can still be better institutionalised. I think this represents the most far-reaching concrete attempt to tackle corruption, and it should be applauded.
We have people who opposed it, not the common man. It is often the elite. So, I have classified those people who want business to continue as usual as the conspirators. I may say that I am an elite and that I suffer greatly from the impact of the tight foreign exchange restriction. Our law firm cannot remit funds. You cannot believe it; we owe like 500 pounds on subscriptions, but that is the sacrifice that I am ready to make because people have abused the system and what they want is business as usual.
I think it (anti-graft war) would summarise what this government is going to do; mark you, it has not done it. I make no judgement as to whether the government has succeeded. I am certainly making comment that if you compare where we are with the government of the past, what are we likely to say?
All through my public life, I have been a left of centre person and I make no apology about that. While I am happy to have money, I am not happy to have it to the exclusion of about 180 million Nigerians who are hungry. Why should I be a rich man when everybody around me is so poor? It makes no sense.
So, if these are crosses of equalising our natural resources which is what the government intends to do, then I would have to support it. But these conspirators you will find in both APC (All Progressives Congress) and PDP (Peoples Democratic Party), and I can assure you that if there is the possibility of PDP returning to power and there is a very strong likelihood that it would succeed, 70 per cent of politicians in APC will cross over to PDP.
That is how non-ideological our political parties have been. So when you have parties that are not driven by ideology but by their pockets, when they see that what this government intends to do is to shut them out from the usual largesse and patronage, they are not going to be happy. They are the ones that are making the president look bad. However, that is not to say that the president could not have done things better. For instance, the delay in appointing his cabinet ought to have been faster, and lack of clarification of what he is doing. I do not see why he has Femi Adesina and Garba Shehu as press secretaries which are not done anywhere else. Either Femi or Garba should be president’s secretary reporting the president’s diary and the other one is reporting government activities. The government said it has recovered a lot of loot running into about N10 trillion. Why are we, those of us that are informed, not having access to information that ought to be in public domain? The government has not communicated enough, and it is that failure to communicate that gives the impression that people are not clear where the president is going.
How do you mean by government not communicating enough?
In my view, the government has all of the attributes I have described, which is a people-driven government. So, if you ask Nigerians what they think about President (Muhammadu) Buhari, some would say the man is not doing anything; some would say he has integrity; some would say he is too slow. We should not have that communication gap if someone is saying what the government is trying to do. I was not a Buhari fan at all; so I am the last person to get behind him. Neither was I a (Goodluck) Jonathan fan; but I was close to him and I regret he missed opportunities because at the time I used to say to him, “You are behind”, but he did not understand it. I remember one Saturday I came from Ivory Coast and I told him – I can say it because that is the truth; one thing I am happy about is that not a single Nigerian politician has given me a dime, neither have I benefitted any penny from any government activity.
Some governors complain that they cannot pay the minimum wage of N18,000. Is it not a conspiracy to shortchange workers?
No, I think that is a different thing. The problem is that the governors cannot pay. It also strikes me as absurd that there is one national minimum wage because, I can tell you, in some parts of the North, food is very cheap. You cannot say you will pay everybody N18,000 as minimum wage and I found it absurd. In the national conference, I sat next to the deputy president of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and I thought he would support the devolution of labour as a national issue. It is for various governors discussing with their labour to decide what they can pay. Why should it be a national issue? Why should there be a national minimum wage? You pay what is relevant to local situations.
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo seems to still be wielding much influence in the political terrain of this country after leaving office over seven years ago.
This is the conspiracy of the elite. Whether they are traditional rulers, the media jumped there, you go and cover them, you make them look important. They come to churches and occupy the front pews. These are people who should actually be afraid to come out, but they are not afraid because they are adored and sanctified. The only man in religion who speaks the truth is Rev. Fr. Ejike Mbaka. All others were laying hands. How come the country is so poor? I do not know what the statistics are, but I think it is about 70 million people that are poor. All I hear are how pastors, chiefs, lay hands on people and part with our money and journalists promote them.
Those are parts of the conspiracy; they (journalists) will collect money and (frolic) with the political elite, the business elite, the traditional rulers, when we should be asking them to leave the seat. Obasanjo is so adored and glorified by the media, yet he has absolutely no value. His time is gone; he should go to Commonwealth Heads of Government (CHOG), African Union (AU) meetings and create a foundation like 90-year-old Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton who has the Global Initiative.
That is the area, not for him to be contesting political space. He has been president twice, what again? Have you seen what has come out with the scandalous money meant to fight Boko Haram? And it has not even started. We have not gone into how oil money was looted. That is why these people cannot leave; they are prepared to kill their friends and mothers to be there. That is the challenge. You do not understand that these people are the ones holding the country; they would not allow it to shift. You think they want national conference? They do not want a national conference; they want everything to be in confusion, so that they can continue. Why shouldn’t the governor of Anambra State be able to run his affairs without interference from Abuja? But it would not happen.