From Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja
Ahead of the 2019 general election, the National Chairman of the Zenith Labour Party (ZLP), Dan Nwanyanwu has said political parties should worry more about the role of security agents, especially the police, during elections in the country.
Early last year, there were talks of some political parties coming together to form a Third Force, that will rival the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), why do you think that initiative failed?
It is because of the environment, the political barometer. The environment in Nigeria today will not allow that.
How do you mean?
There are inbuilt institutional potholes that will not let you have that Third Force and one of them is funds. The funds are not in the hands of those that would have given effective Third Force.
This year after the presidential election, the president will either be (Muhammadu) Buhari or Atiku(Abubakar) that is factual. Not that (Kingsley) Moghalu is not good. He is fantastic, not that Oby (Ezekwesili) is not good; not that the others are not good. They may be better than the two but the conclusion of the matter is that their time has not come. It is based on the political barometer in Nigeria.
This election is going to be the last we are going to have the likes of Buhari, Atiku and co runing for presidency in terms of their ages, capacity, background, disposition.
In the Osun and Ekiti States governorship elections, there were allegations of collusion between security agents and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to intimidate the entire opposition in favour of the APC; going into the presidential election which is just about a month away, are you not worried that same thing may happen?
The Osun and Ekiti State governorship elections leave a very bitter taste in the mouth. Osun was good, until it was declared inconclusive. It was that second attempt that the security agents hijacked the process and stole the mandate of the people. This is one mandate, I know will be recovered; ditto Ekiti and it is the same security, the same police. I told my colleagues last year, that we should be worried about the security agents, particularly the police. Let us shift a little bit from INEC and confront the IGP. My party did not sign the peace accord; though we were not around, but we made our observation clear, that the IG of Police must give assurance that he will not do things that will lead to break down of law and order at the polling units and luckily he was removed. And a new IGP appointed.
Now, the former IGP, Ibrahim Idris should be having a sober reflection of his last role in the police in the past five years. He will look up to heaven and ask God, ‘did I do well or tell God that he did well.’ I think he has a lot of apologies to make. And he has a lot of confession to make. His tenure extension did not come about because Nigerians resisted it and it was going to cause problem and that was why a new person was appointed and it is left for the new person to learn from the inglorious tenure of Idris by doing exactly what he told Nigerians immediately after being decorated.
Do you think President Buhari will keep to his word that the 2019 elections will be free and fair?
I don’t want to anticipate him. But it is INEC that conducts elections. It is left for Professor Mahmood Yakubu to do the right thing and go or do the wrong thing and be on the wrong side of history. But Professor Mahmood I know will not want to tarnish his name over a pot of porridge.
As stakeholders, we have a lot to do in checkmating the system. If we follow this process carefully and everybody manning his own, you may not have issues after the election. We have governorship elections that people did not petition against, because the process was transparent. It happened in Ondo and Anambra. Let INEC does its own. Let security agents be at the polling units just to keep law and order, Nigerians will vote peacefully and we will elect a new president.
You said the presidential election would be won either by the PDP or APC candidate. , which of the two candidates is your party supporting?
It is too early to say now. In the last meeting we had before the festive holiday, a committee was set up, to set out criteria that anybody we want to support must fall into. Part of what we told them is to look at the peculiarity of the factors from each geopolitical zones. For example, I came back from the South East after 21days; what is there now is that the Igbo are saying we will not wait more four years (after 2023); that whoever needs their support must come and put it in writing. It will be made public that after four years he will not run again. For the APC candidate that one is sacrosanct, for the PDP candidate it is left for him to go and sign four years.
Some traditional rulers called me and said those of you in Abuja, it is enough, Igbo will no longer be taken as sacrificial lambs, to be used as guinea pigs, and after four years we must come together and contest. Nobody has stopped them from contesting anyway, but there is this zoning system in Nigeria. Power has gone back to the North after four years, it will return to the South.
If Igbo will not come out to claim their right to contest and seek support from other geopolitical zones in 2023; after four years, it will be seen that they have given out their turn.
After eight years, the South-West would have been out of power for six years plus eight years plus eight years. The South -South would have been out of power for six years plus eight years. When it returns to the South again, you cannot tell them not to run. They will tell the Igbo, it was your turn, but you allowed them to take it.
So, after this current four years Igbo must unite and make arguments across the country that a person from that geopolitical zone should be allowed to be president. We the Igbo will now look at that Nigerian with stone in his heart that will say ‘no, Igbo, you cannot be president.’ Then that will be clear to us; so that was the argument and it made sense to me. That is not to say if it returns after four years, others will not want to contest, but it will be a case of equity.
In that case don’t you think it will make more sense for the South -East to rally behind Atiku, who prior to his emergence as the PDP candidate has been saying that if it was possible for him to sign a written document he will, that he will be there for just four years?
He has not signed it. They demanded it from him in the South-East but he has not done so.