Erstwhile Senator and Minister of Works during the Olusegun Obasanjo administration, Adeseye Ogunlewe, is the Pro-Chancellor of the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB), Ogun State. In this interview with Assistant Editor, South West, MUYIWA OLALEYE, he speaks on President Muhammadu Buhari’s anti-corruption agenda and what led to PDP’s loss of power in the last general election, among other issues.
How would you evaluate the political situation in Nigeria?
The political situation in Nigeria is still on course. Comparing the performance of President Muhammadu Buhari to that of his predecessor, there is no much difference. The only thing I can say is that he (Buhari) is experienced and above average. This also has been buttressed by the comments of the international community, such as America and the European Union (EU) in eulogising his integrity and his incorruptible attitude. And on that basis, I think I would admire him and I wish him the best of luck. He is the best person for Nigeria at this time; and God will lead him through.
Some of the steps taken by Buhari have been commended by people and even the international community. But other steps, some are saying, are not good enough.
Some have been complaining about the appointments made so far by the president. What is your take on these?
You know that the earlier appointments he made were not constitutional; they were discretional appointments. There are two types of appointments: discretional appointments and constitutional appointments. Those early ones were the people that he believed he could work with, and it was at his discretion.
He would have assessed them, known their qualities and their transparency level.
So, he wanted to bring people who were not tainted at all on board. All those other people who we were imagining that he should have picked, you may not know the level of information that he had on them.
He picked the people he thought he could work with, and it was at his discretion. Anybody that is talking about federal character does not love this country at this time. The persons you were looking at that he could pick under the guise of federal character may be the most corrupt persons in the system.
Let them fault the character of the persons he had picked. What is the quality of the people he has picked? They are Nigerians. Let us talk about their quality and let us see what they can offer. That is my own.
Wherever you come from does not matter to me. It is what we can offer to the nation at this period that matters to me because things are not good for this country at this time. We need exceptional people, people that know what to do to handle affairs now.
What is your comment on the probes embarked upon by the president?
Looking at the way he has been handling the probe issue, I feel he is in order. On the issue of corruption, I think he has established a committee now. What he needs do is to get a very strong lawyer as the Attorney-General because that is the person that can drive the anti- corruption crusade for him. He also needs a strong Minister of Finance, who is going to be a liaison between the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the banks. This is because if you steal money, you keep it in banks, and if he doesn’t have a Minister of Finance that has credibility, the tendency is for the minister to be corrupted because there is no way you can be corrupted without the participation of the banks – maybe CBN or the banks – because you can’t keep the money at home.
Much of this corruption is perfected through banks. So, you need a very strong Attorney-General that is integrity-proven. Then he needs a Minister of Finance that also knows what he is looking for and he must pick people with credibility. My take is simple; the constitution as it is presently constituted and amended is enough to fight corruption.
There is the Code of Conduct and that is what everybody is running away from, and they are creating EFCC (Economic and Financial Crimes Commission), they are creating ICPC (Independent Corruption Practices and other related offences Commission). They are leaving the main thrust of anti-corruption, which is our constitution. The Code of Conduct for public officers is there. That is one.
You must declare your assets before you assume office. At the end of your tenure, you must also declare your assets. Has that been done? If there is difference between the one you filed before and what you have acquired now, you have to explain where you got them from and the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT) is there. That is where he must work on to make sure that he acts strictly. He does not need to go to the National Assembly and pass new law. What he has to do is to strengthen the CCT with the best judges and have them as many as possible in each state. Everybody that has been in public office should be given a Code of Conduct Form to fill now and let it be made public.
Do you support that the probe be extended to those before former President Goodluck Jonathan?
Yes, of course. He should start the probe from 1999. But if he says he is going to probe Jonathan, I think it is going to be deficient because he would focus only on one person. What of those that had stolen before? It must cover the period from 1999 till now. What I am saying is, include those who had served before. The definition of public officer is in the constitution. It talks about public officer; it doesn’t say that public officer that serves in this regime. No, you will be going against the spirit of the constitution. It is every public officer. Every public officer that served from 1999 must be able to declare his/her assets and defend them, including past presidents. Before you became president, what did you have? After leaving office, what do you have? Explain the source of the difference.
Would that not amount to an onslaught on officials of previous Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)-led governments?
There was no PDP government. PDP headed just the presidency. What about the states? Were they all PDP? What about the National Assembly? What about the local governments? We are talking about public officers; it doesn’t mention political parties. Those who work in universities and in colleges of education are public officers. People that work in Ministry of Aviation are public officers. Everybody that is still serving as civil servant is a public officer. So, it has nothing to do with party. The majority of people that have stolen government money are not politicians. Where did they get it from? So, if politicians steal, it means you are excluding the civil servants. It is everybody, retired or serving. You must declare your assets, go to court and let it be stamped. If you make a mistake, you go to jail, and then everybody would be afraid of stealing.
You go to banks; you ask all banks to provide the profile of anybody that has this level of amount in his account; where did he get it from? Overseas, it is a criminal offence for you to own foreign account. It is there in Schedule 25 sub-section 3 of the 1999 Constitution, as amended. Public officers are not supposed to open or maintain foreign account. If you insist, people will start to beg. It is Jonathan’s fault; he caught some people that had foreign accounts, and they went to beg him, he left them. Are they not chasing him now?
As a stakeholder in PDP, what would you say actually led to the defeat of the party in the last election?
You know that there were laid down rules and regulations in PDP concerning zoning arrangement. It is zoning which was the basis or the platform on which the PDP started; that there must be zoning. They created the six geo-political zones and said there must be rotation of presidency. They even put it in the constitution, in Section 14.
At some point, the Northerners believed that they were being shortchanged. It didn’t start now. It started when President Umaru Yar’Adua died. They believed the unfinished tenure of the late Yar’Adua must be run by a Northerner, which was the platform on which the PDP was formed. But the PDP messed up the thing by not allowing the rotation principle to operate and we faced the consequence and we saw the defeat.
There are people who believed we could win. Even in 2011, if you read the results, Buhari, from just the North, got 12 million votes. At that time, I was a member of the Presidential Campaign Council. The Northerners were edgy and were afraid to even go out and campaign because all the people made up their minds that they were going to win that election with Buhari. You could see the aftermath of Jonathan’s victory in 2011. The number of people they killed. The number of houses they burnt in Kano and Bauchi was unbelievable because they felt cheated. They felt it was another opportunity for them to take over, and I don’t blame them because they believed in rotation and it was their turn.
If they didn’t concede to the South West under Obasanjo, how would it have been possible for Obasanjo to be president of Nigeria? They conceded and they voted and we didn’t even vote for him. They are good people, honestly, because they believe in sharing things and they shared it and stood by us in the South West to the extent that even when Obasanjo wanted to go for the second term and our people said no, but they stood their ground that the man must be there for two terms.
