Olakunle Olafioye
Dr John Kennedy Osuala, Presidential candidate of Rebuild Nigeria Party, RBNP, has shed more light on why some presidential candidates under the Coalition of United Political Parties, CUPP, failed to honour the Memorandum of Understanding they earlier deposed to, which mandated them to drop their ambition in support of a presidential candidate picked by the coalition for the presidential election.
He maintained that Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, whom he claimed was anointed by the party chairmen of the coalition was in total breach of the agreement on how the consensus presidential candidate should emerge, saying that he will not be accountable to CUPP should he win the election.
In this interview, Osuala also spoke on the implications of lack of consensus among the Igbo ahead of this year’s election and why he believes money won’t play a major role in the general election.
The presidential election is few days away. How would you assess the final build up to the poll?
In terms of violence and all that, we can say it is peaceful so far; it is not as violent as it used to be in yesteryears. So, we can give the actors a pass mark in terms of security, in terms of fairness, and for the fact that political thuggery and other election-related violence have been reduced to the barest minimum.
The presidential candidates of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC and that of the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, are considered as front runners for the election, do you see yourself or any other candidate springing surprises at the poll as a dark horse?
Let me start by saying that eminent people in Nigeria, for instance, Cardinal Onaiyekan, the Catholic Archbishop of Metropolitan of Abuja, has once said that Nigeria has two undesirable presidential candidates. They, by the reason of their financial capacity and all that, may be seen as frontrunners. But the fact remains that Nigerians are bitter at heart that the same people that failed for 16 years, who have also failed them in the last four years, and that between them there is no one to choose. The people are not happy. A party like Rebuild Nigeria Party with my humble self as the presidential candidate, we have the potential to spring surprises at the poll unknown to them because we have gone underground all over the country, not making too much noise in the media, but we are reaching out to people: one-on-one, person-to-person, house-to-house because we’re convinced that we have something to offer to the country. For instance, some are hanging on to the refrain of ‘tested and trusted’ but that is not the main thing. If we don’t industrialize Nigeria it will remain a perpetually underdeveloped country. We have a programme to, in the first instance, establish 774 factories in all local government areas. The second is to establish 8,812 factories in every ward in Nigeria. We are taking this from an existing policy by the Bank of Industry, that one community, one industry. Our intention is to make Nigeria the manufacturing capital of the world. The two candidates are not thinking in this direction. If we are able to get it right with industrialization, unemployment will become a thing of the past. School leavers will get place to work; and there will be multiplier effect. This person is saying restructuring, it is okay, but that won’t bring jobs. The major issue, which is how we can industrialize the nation, has not been addressed by the two candidates.
Talking about industrialization, don’t you think Nigeria still lacks the infrastructure needed to drive industrialization?
We will create the infrastructure. For instance, we have established contacts with some foreign companies. An example of such companies, is Peacock Energy UK Limited. We plan to bring them into Nigeria because they have given us the guarantee that within one year, they will ensure full supply of electricity in a state like Abia and they have the capacity to replicate that in the entire 36 states. We have also liaised with companies in Germany and other countries that can come in when we are elected. They will provide alternative energy. These things are possible to be done. But they are not addressing it; rather they are addressing things that are peripheral. Whatever money that is needed to be spent, will be spent. Some of these companies will even use their money because it is going to be business for them. It is achievable because other countries have done it in the past. This is one major programme we intend to do. The major parties do not have industrialization as part of their programme. This is a key factor that will move Nigeria forward.
The CUPP has thrown its weight behind the candidate of PDP. Surprisingly, however, some of you who earlier promised to support whoever CUPP agreed to support have refused to back down. Why did you choose to contest the presidential election?
There’s a manoeuvre. The initial agreement was that all the presidential candidates would come for a debate and look at those with the best programme. But the PDP manoeuvred the coalition, went behind and got the support of the coalition. We don’t have coalition with the party; it is the candidates that you have coalition with.
But the national chairmen went behind and signed an agreement without the knowledge of the candidates. So, there is no way it can work, even as it is, if the adopted candidate emerges as the president of the nation, he will have no responsibility to the coalition because he didn’t sign any agreement with them, it’s the national chairmen that signed the agreement. So, somebody like me, I looked at it and I discovered that there is a lacuna in that arrangement. Even if you want to go into coalition, it should be after the election. You may be surprised that there could be run off election at the end of the day.
It is when it gets to that stage that you can decide to team up with a party to defeat another party. But you have not done the election, so you don’t know the strength of the party. How sure are you that PDP will even come second at the poll? If a party that was in power for 16 years could lose to a party that was just coming out, you can be so sure that the same party can make a major impact in another election. They may be coasting along on old glory, but they are not as strong as they used to be. So that coalition was dead on arrival.
You made allusion to the possibility of a run off election. Are there indications pointing to that?
Yes, it is possible considering the way things are going because the 84 million Nigerians that are not members of APC and PDP are not happy with the so-called frontrunners. You will be surprised that by the time the result is out, they will be shocked. That is the time we can be talking about coalition. The important thing is that Rebuild Nigeria Party will spring surprises at the poll.
The Igbo have shown great interest in ruling the nation. But despite having a handful of Igbo candidates contesting the exalted office, Igbo leaders will rather throw their weight behind Atiku or Buhari. What would you say is the problem?
Those people masquerading as leaders are only leading themselves. Go to their communities, you will discover that they don’t even dialogue with their people, they don’t engage their people. They only come together in an organization and do what they like. That’s why you see the Secretary supporting Buhari while the President will be supporting Atiku. That shows they don’t have any consensus, they don’t have any focus; they are only for themselves. As a matter of fact, they are not representing the Igbo. Why are they fronting for two people while there are many credible people in the race? We are not bothered about them because they are the same set of people who made Jonathan to fail. They were given hundreds of millions of naira, but they couldn’t spend a naira out of the money and Jonathan failed woefully. Whether they are holding meetings or not, do not bother people like us. They are not the main people the people of Southeast rely on.
What is the implication of lack of consensus among the so-called Igbo leaders?
Very shortly now they will start to complain about marginalization. It is their lack of focus, lack organization and lack of purpose that lead to what they termed marginalisation. Come to think of it, during Obasanjo’s era they held key positions, but those key positions they held then didn’t translate to anything for their people. They blame every other person without blaming themselves. I have been making this argument for years. During Abacha era, Abacha said you were made a minister so that they could serve their people while serving their country. But when they are made ministers some of them would not go home, they only remained in Abuja. They didn’t go home to interact with their people and when they got out power they began to complain about marginalisation. They are only deceiving their people and making the people not to get what they ought to get in Nigeria.
There is insinuation that money could be a major factor in the election. Are you prepared to match other contestants money-for-money or are you only hoping that miracle will happen?
I am relying on grassroots mobilizations and door-to-door campaign. We are not relying on money. I want to tell you that the guidelines which INEC has put in place have been streamlined in such a way that money may not play the type of role it played in Ekiti and Osun states.
Those who attended INEC training will tell you this. People will not even be allowed to eat very close to where the election will take place. You will not even be allowed to come with your phones so that you don’t take pictures and all that. INEC is organized technically from all the lectures they have given. Money will only play the role as it did for Jonathan. You will give some people N400 million, but they won’t spend a dime. At the end of the day, those who give them the money will fail because no money is getting to the people. You can ask the people, this is the dullest political campaign ever.
What may count as an advantage for them is when people begin to assume you have money, but the money don’t get down to anybody. When the people go to vote you won’t follow them to be there. We will continue to reach out to the people. So many people who are dissatisfied are now calling from the Southwest, Southeast from the North, so many of them. They have made it clear that they want new leadership in this country. We are set to redeem the country.