…There is nobody above the law
.. faults accused judges on Amaechi, Onu,
…says they should have alerted the police about alleged bribery moves
In this interview, Engineer Babachir Lawal, Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF, explains the nature of the schedule of the work in his office. More importantly, he speaks to the issues of ‘cabal’, the charge by the First Lady, Madam Aisha Buhari, and the perception that some unknown factotum had taken over the government of her husband, the allegation against his office and the running of PINE – Presidential Initiative on the North East – as well as the anti-corruption fight of the Buhari government.

How would you say this administration has performed?

At the risk of giving myself a pass mark in a government that I’m serving in, I think our performance is good and I think it is close to 98% because we have done well, going by the condition of the country that we inherited.   When we were campaigning in 2014/2015, we didn’t really know the level of  the rot in the system but thank God we’ve gone in and we’ve known what is there in the system and we think that we have a handle on our problems and the resources that we need to bring us out of the quagmire we’ve found ourselves in.

What were the challenges?

Babachir David Lawal

The challenges were principally falling revenue, occasioned by the fall in fuel prices and the activities of the Niger Delta militants who were blowing up pipelines and export terminals.

The government before us was very lucky. That government ran the country at a time when  crude prices were around the $100 per barrel benchmark. But be that as it may, this government took the challenges head on and we believe that with the policies that we are putting in place – income diversification – in which we tend to produce all those agricultural things that we used to import and replace them with locally produced agricultural food products and export the excess to generate more forex.

We are also working hard on the mining sector because Nigeria is a  country rich in minerals.

Of course, the Boko Haram insurgency which  was consuming government resources is also on the decline and almost defeated and that will release more funds from government coffers into more productive ventures for the benefit of Nigerians.

Overall, we are on good course.

What about those who are of the view that this cabinet, as presently composed, is made up of old and recycled politicians?

As the SGF, who has, as part of his responsibilities, the coordination of government activities, to interact with all 37 ministers, the only thing I can say to you is that the President has made the right choice;  the ministers are competent professionals with a few politicians and even the few politicians are professionals in their own right.

I cannot imagine anybody assembling a  better cabinet.

Bearing in mind the comments of Madam Aisha Buhari that those who did not take part in the campaigns and who didn’t even understand the manifesto of the party are the ones running the country now?

There are 180million Nigerians.

We will not pretend to say that political parties have the best of these Nigerians to deliver the wishes of the people.

The political parties have good people but they are not necessarily the best.

I think the President was wise to reach out of the political system to look for experts and professionals to deliver dividends of democracy to Nigerians.

But even the  leadership of the Senate, much earlier, too, alluded to the hijacking of this administration by some people who are not supposed to run the country?

Whatever the word cabal means, let me tell you, in any organisation, there are people that are more dominant in any group – if you know the theory of groups – some are more dominant, some are more pushy, but, at the end of it all, the President delegates. He trusts all his principal officers and believes they will deliver on the mandate of their ministries and departments of government and those talking about cabal are just sour grapes.

Setting the records straight, who and who constitutes this cabal because you have also been fingered as one of those being referred to?

If they say a cabinet of 37ministers constitutes  the cabal, it’s okay because these are the key members of the government; the President appointed them, they are the ones that advise the President on the decisions that he needs to make; and, of course, I’m honoured to be a member of the cabal in this presidency.

One of the allegations against your office is that you’ve blocked some sensitive memos that could have helped in making governance better?

I’ve not heard of that before. But since you came to this office for this interview, you’ll see that there’s no file on my table; as  long as I’m in town, no file has spent a night on my table. No file  has come to my table and I’m sitting there without attending to it within  30  minutes.

Now your office plays a critical role in the appointment of critical public office holders, your office has been accused of lopsidedness in terms of  the appointments?

Appointments are not lopsided and when people raise these allegations they are talking about appointments in  favour of some people.

The politicians come here everyday soliciting for support, soliciting for patronage for their states.

When the President came in, by luck for us in the North East, his first set of appointments were from that zone.

Under this administration, the country has slipped into a recession. How come, because this is unprecedented?

I don’t know what you mean by unprecedented but economists and experts have confirmed repeatedly that we have been in recession since 2014.   Even former President Obasanjo recently said anybody blaming this administration for the recession is just being unfair and is not being sincere.

Yes, we are in a recession.

We announced it because we needed to tell Nigerians what the reality is.

But what about the blame agenda of this administration because the APC ought to come up with solutions and stop blaming the past administration?

If you don’t know where you’re coming from, you may not know where you’re going.

How could we have known, for example, that somebody can just drive to the CBN, park outside, and cart away $2.1billion of raw cash?

Could we have known, that somebody holding office in trust for the people will just embezzle N40billion?   Just look at the figures and the amount of monies we are talking about.

Should we keep quiet and tell Nigerians that there was no looting, and that  all is well?

We are in a recession because people that came before us decided to loot our common patrimony and put in private accounts for their wives and children.

Should we decide to play the ostrich?   Nigerians must be told the truth about what went down and majority of Nigerians are in  favour of what we are doing.

Agreed!  But the anti-corruption posture of this administration is being tagged as biased and selective?

Why are you focusing on negative perception of people who are the perpetrators of these crimes?

We need to talk about equity and clean hands and separate myths from realities….

(Cuts in) You are not talking about equity here.   We are talking about chasing thieves. It has nothing to do with equity.   We are chasing people who took away government money, our money, people who impoverished us, people who put us in this situation that you are now accusing this government of.

If the previous government had deployed the resources available  at  that time properly, a time when oil was sold for over $100 per barrel, over and above our quota and we didn’t see anything they did with the money, so we should keep quiet?   No!

The FG withdrew its forgery case against the Senate leadership.   What happened?

Issues concerning laws and courts are within the purview of the Minister of Justice and Attorney General; so he is better placed to answer to them.   I, as SGF, have nothing to do with the courts.

Let’s look at the arrests made regarding some judges.  They’ve cried out to say it is pure witch hunt? And they’ve also sited bribery attempts by members of this administration, Rt. Hon. Rotimi Amaechi and Chief Ogbonaiya Onu, Ministers of Transportation and Science and Technology respectively,  as reason for the harassment on their person and that it is because they are sitting on some sensitive cases involving this administration?

Are the judges politicians?

Why are we witch hunting them?

Are they politicians?

When government officials offer a judge, or anybody else bribe, I would expect what that person to do would be to immediately alert the police, that ‘somebody is here, offering me bribe’, especially a man in the position of a judge and chooses not to do so for any other reason, and then he is taken to court and then begins to talk about that, I think he is begging the issue.

Whatever happened to the separation of powers and…?

(Cuts in). So, separation of powers to you means that members of the judiciary and legislature are free to be corrupt? Don’t forget that the AGF, the police and all the agencies of government with the direct mandate to enforce law and order are in the executive. So should we fold our  hands and say because of separation of powers, judges are collecting bribe, or other members of other arms of government are collecting bribe, we should keep quiet because of separation of powers? The Constitution doesn’t say that – Go and read the Constitution.

Let’s look at the manner of arrest, some  Nigerians are not comfortable with what some have described as the Gestapo-style?   Some have said it is not befitting of the status of the judges?

There is nobody above the law.  Don’t use the word like status when people are accused of corruption.   What status does such a person have?   When somebody decides to abuse a position that God has given him, a position that government has graciously allowed him to occupy and serve the people, and he decides to use it to his own advantage, what status should you ascribe to me if I decide to be a thief?

Okay, what happens to some of the APC members that have been fingered on this case?

I can set up an appointment for you with the AGF or EFCC and then they can tell you all you need to know about cases in court and what they are doing and if they have sufficient evidence because it is not sufficient to get to court and say I am being witch hunted.   Even I would say that.   On the government’s anti-corruption fight, we are dealing with people who have stolen billions and these are people who are very good at propaganda. They are doing propaganda. And like the President said, corruption will fight back but these people are fighting back with blunt tools.

Your office is currently under investigation for an alleged diversion of N1.3billion meant for the IDPs?

Who is investigating?   The Senate?

These are also part of the issues of separation of powers that people abuse. I do know that I don’t have immunity to accuse you without proof but the members of the National Assembly can say anything on the floor and are immune to prosecution, but people are abusing it and, in this case, people are maliciously abusing and wickedly abusing their privileges in the National Assembly.

PINE, Presidential Initiative on the North East, was set up by President Jonathan – thank God for him.   It used to be run under the finance ministry, under the minister of state. When I took over, we were wondering who was running the North East programme until one day, the National Assembly members from the North East paid me a courtesy call, thinking that it was being run by my office.   I told them it wasn’t my office, so I telephoned the Vice President and asked, ‘Oga, who is running PINE’, he said ‘I think it is your office’.

When it got to budget period, I asked the minister of budget the same question about PINE;  no he said ‘it is your office or the NSA’s office’.

What I discovered was that there was a consultant, Senior Special Assistant to the former NSA who was in charge of PINE.

The man who was claiming to be leading the PINE was an adviser to the former NSA and such a person’s tenure lapses with  his principal’s.

So, I said  ‘you can no longer run PINE’. At that time in 2015, there was N2.5 billion for the programme.  The money was just thee doing nothing but paying consultants. I understand that at one time they were using it to buy pre-fabricated schools. The principle of PINE is this and there is a Permanent Secretary who runs PINE. There are 23 of such agencies in this office. We now said for people to return to their homes, we must guarantee that they are able to engage in productive work before they were pushed out, which means rebuild the schools that were burnt, rebuild the police stations and barracks so people can return  part of confidence-building. That’s just it.

The return of the CHIBOK girls….

Please I would like you to excuse me from answering that question because of its larger security implications so that we do not jeopardize the security of those still in captivity.

By 2019,  Nigerians would ask questions of this administration regarding the promises it made during the campaigns. Six million jobs are said to have been lost already in the last 17months, power, health, …..

I assure Nigerians that by the end of 2017, Nigeria will be in a boom economy, security would have been within the limits of human society with people feeling secure. This, not because we want to win election, but because we need to put Nigeria on the path to growth and whatever it takes for us to do that, we will do  because Nigeria needs to be prosperous.

THIS INTERVIEW WAS FIRST AIRED ON CHANNELS TELEVISION’S QUESTION TIME