Kenny Ashaka
Spokesman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP Presidential Campaign Council, Alhaji Umar Sani believes that for Nigerians to have a sense of belonging in the federalism that we practise, the people of the South East should be allowed to provide national leadership in 2023. However, he advocated the enactment of a law that would secure by written agreement the conditions that would subject the rotational model to national acceptance.
According to him, “once that is guaranteed, people will now feel a sense of belonging and would understand that the federation has not forgotten them; that even the smallest tribe can rise to become president not by accident of any nature.”
He also explained why the Northern region will not set up a regional security outfit like the Amotekun.
One topical issue now appears to be the national question; which section of the country should produce the president in 2023 especially now that some politicians from Lagos State are now drumming up support for the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu. And as you know, in a true federalism no part of the federation should be so dominant that the others have little opportunity to provide national leadership. In other words, true federalism guarantees equal opportunities and fair material treatment for all constituent polities. Now, the North has had its turn for eight years and is still clamouring to have it after Buhari while the South is saying it is their turn. Where does that leave us?
You see the problem we have is that there are two sides to a coin and a knife has two sharp edges. The question should have been which part of the country should hold a position. Then the justice of the matter can determine that. Unfortunately, democracy is a game of numbers; who has the number to meet their own expectation? So, if you zone the presidency to a particular side of the country and they don’t have the number, those who have the number will collaborate with those who have lesser number and then install whoever they want to install. Now, unless a law is enacted and that is left to the discretion of political parties, it will be difficult to attain such expectation because where my party, for instance, says we are leaving it for the Igbo and the APC says we are leaving it for the Yoruba, it now depends on those that have the number. If the candidate of the Yoruba is able to align properly with the North then they are able to get more numbers even where the Igbo are supposed to get it by arrangement within a party, they will not get it. So, it is a caustic dilemma that one cannot really comprehend. But in essence, we need a law which is supposed to be part of the constitution to guarantee rotational presidency. Once that is guaranteed, people will now feel a sense of belonging and would understand that the federation has not forgotten them; that even the smallest tribe can rise to become president not by accident of any nature. The Ijaws had it through Goodluck Jonathan but it was by accident. So, we do not want accidental president but the president Nigerians will vote for irrespective of tribe, creed or religion. But if you make a law to that effect, some may argue that you want to impose a president on the country. They will argue that the best candidate should be allowed to emerge. So, like I said, it is a very delicate situation. But I stand with the truth that those who have never done it should be allowed to bring up a candidate which people of the country can support if we must give them a sense of belonging.
Which section of the country would that be in that case?
That is the South East. If you specifically take a look, the South-South, South West, North West and North East have done it. Only the North Central and the South East have not done it and since the present president is from the North West, decency and fairness demand that the South East should be allowed to produce the next president, except, of course, if you want to say Nnamdi Azikiwe was a president. But by every standard, he was not a president. And unless again if we want to look at it from the point of view of military intervention, then we will say General Aguiyi Ironsi was a former Head of State. Otherwise, in terms of democracy and integration, I think it is the South East and the North Central that have not done it.
Let us talk about this plan by the National Assembly to amend section 308 of the constitution which deals with immunity. That section as it is only granted immunity to the Office of the President and the Vice-President, the governors and their deputies. But since 2016, members of the National Assembly have been pushing to have section 308 amended to include lawmakers, particularly the principal officers. Now, if you consider the fact that only in 2018 the president assented to the bill on powers and privileges for legislative houses, do you think the move by the National Assembly is necessary?
I do not believe that legislators should have immunity apart from the parliamentary immunity that they have. The parliamentary immunity is not one that is written but at least it is acknowledged worldwide and a standard legislative procedure. The one we borrowed and copied is the fact that when you are inside the National Assembly, you enjoy immunity. If you are travelling from your house for national assignment, you have immunity. If you are within the Chambers, you have immunity because you cannot be prosecuted for anything you do or say on the floor of the National Assembly. The truth, of course is that you cannot make laws for the people and then come and exempt yourself. In America where we copied this from, for instance, only the president enjoys immunity. Is it not then ironic that the lawmakers will exempt themselves from the law they made? How many people have been prosecuted either at the national or state levels since our legislators have been exchanging blows, throwing chairs and doing indecorous things in their chambers? It is because of the immunity they enjoy. One even died when there was a fight in the House of Representatives some years ago. Did they prosecute anybody? And Nigerians are not likely to take legislators to court. Perhaps, if there is any area of contention between Nigerians and legislators, it is only in the area of their jumbo package. You know Nigerians have always called for a review of their salaries and allowances. Apart from that, Nigerians have no problems with them. Nigerians know that they are the ones to do the oversight functions and put the executive on track. What they should do is to up their ante and work hard to succeed in the discharge of their legislative functions and stop bothering themselves about immunity or no immunity.
Let’s look at the argument of those putting forward this proposal. They are saying that there is the need not to distract the principal officers and pointed to what happened to some officers in the past when they were put in the dock. They are saying such officers should be granted immunity for the period they would be in office. Is that reason not plausible enough?
Yes, if they are granted immunity from prosecution, it is okay because the Senate President is the number three person in the country; but again, the law does not provide for that. But if that is the case, even the Chief Justice should enjoy that benefit because we also saw the Chief Justice of Nigeria in the dock. Justice Walter Onnoghen was in the dock. So, what is good for the goose is equally good for the gander. So if they are clamouring for that because they believe that the Senate President or any of their senior officers will be harassed by the executive, it doesn’t mean that every time there will be an executive that would be harassing them. At least during Obasanjo, Yar’Adua and Goodluck Jonathan, there was never any Senate President that was taken to court or harassed. Those who harass and take Senators to court know that is not correct and it is not in the best interest of the nation; but you know political interest overrides any other interest. Ordinarily, they are expected to be respected because of the powers in the office they hold. So, I believe it is not necessary.
There has been controversy surrounding the way INEC deregistered some of the political parties. You will recall 74 parties were deregistered, but we still have about 100 associations seeking considerations for registration as political parties. Some Nigerians are also saying more parties should be deregistered, so we can have between three and five political parties and that a situation where we parade about 92 parties, majority of which are redundant, dormant and almost dead in between election circles, does not augur well for the kind of democracy that we have. What do you think?
I think that registration of political parties should not be our immediate problem. I also think that deregistering political parties is not in our best interest. They should allow the political parties to evolve so that those leading should continue to be leading. You will realize that the dominant parties in America and UK are not the only political parties. There are smaller parties people do not know because they have not performed to the extent that they would be known. However, since we vote through ballot papers, the parties can be reduced so that the process will not be too cumbersome for our electoral umpires to handle. Since there are also conditions for de-registration, those parties that fall short of the conditions genuinely should be deregistered. My advice to INEC is that they are careful so that some of the deregistered parties don’t go and change names and come back to seek registration. They should look out for this class of parties. These small parties that cannot even win elections are the ones that may cause damages to the electoral process because imagine a small party that cannot even win a seat in a ward going to court and saying INEC omitted its name on the ballot. Yet some of them are agents of members of the big parties waiting to be used to cause problems in the electoral process. These are some of the parties siding with the big parties before elections. Some of them are bread and butter parties. That is why you will hear before the elections that 32 political parties are backing the candidate of the big parties. Some of them are registered by these big parties to serve as their buffer. Those that cannot meet the conditions set by INEC should be removed and stay removed.
I want to know your position on Amotekun, the Western Region Security Network. The states under the region have concluded the laws setting them up and will soon swing into action.
Well, there is a breakdown of law and order in Nigeria and once there is a breakdown of law and order and a particular set of people believe that they can rally round to defend themselves, I do not think that it is against any known law because the present security architecture in the country is incapable of protecting them. We have a lot of issues with the security architecture. We have problems with the number of security men to the population of the country. The total number of Police men in the country is not more than 300,000, policing about 200 million citizens. The number of officers and soldiers that we have in the country are about the same figure or even less. If you look at the number of personnel of the para-military arm, they are not enough to secure the country. You can imagine that rag-tag bandits are terrorizing Nigerians. We have the issue of herdsmen, kidnappings, robberies, Boko Haram and others. So, the whole country is in a militia war. Just recently in Kaduna, about 51 people were killed by bandits. The other time, it was over 30 people that were killed. You say the governors are the chief security officers of their states, but they control nothing and are helpless when their people are being attacked. The governors provide vehicles and logistics for the Police men operating in their states using the very resources of the people who are being killed. All they get after their people are being attacked are promises that are never kept by security agencies at the centre. They can as well deploy the resources being given to the federal security agencies to fund their men who know the nooks and crannies of their states. Does the failure of the federal security not call for an arrangement for their protection? So, I believe Amotekun is a self protective and preservative security outfit and I support them a hundred percent.
In that case, you are in support of Shege Ka Fasa in view of the killings in the North.
No. Shege Ka Fasa is not well intentioned. My problem with Shege Ka Fasa is even the name which means only a bastard will stop it. It is like a challenge being thrown at Amotekun. So, I do not subscribe to the idea of Shege Ka Fasa.
But the North can modify or rebrand it in view of the situation in that region. Why is the North still depending on the federal structure which has failed them? Why don’t they fine tune Shege Ka Fasa since some of the governors have negotiated with the bandits and failed?
I agree with you but the problem we are having is that the leader of the country is from the North and once they do that, it would appear a vote of no confidence on the president and the ability of the Federal Government to defend the North. So, it would send a wrong signal that even Northerners who voted for him have now come to realise that he is incapable of protecting them.
But the Northern Elders Forum has, outrightly, said the president has failed.
Yes, of course. They can say that, but it cannot be actualized. You can’t put that into action because if you put that into action it means you are saying Mr. Man, look you are a failure and we cannot tolerate failure and you are using public funds to come and do security outfit that will overshadow him.
Is it then better to sacrifice the lives of northerners who are being killed on daily basis on the altar of support for one of their own?
You see the problem we are having is that the North is no longer monolithic as people think and it is sharply divided. Now, the creation of a security outfit which is intended to protect the people may turn out to cause more harm than good because the people it is meant for may come out to oppose it and disregard it. So, it is in the best interest of the Northern governors to take the matter state by state as it comes. Take, for example, Zamfara State. The governor there is protecting his people and all those senseless killings bedeviling the state before are no longer there. So, if all the governors were behaving the way Zamfara governor did to secure their people, all these things would have become a thing of the past.