•On 774,000 jobs: Keyamo insulted Nigerians

By Olalekan Bilesanmi

Senator Bala Na’Allah represents Kebbi South in the Senate. Before his election into the upper chamber, Na’Allah had spent two terms in the House of Representatives. He presently chairs the Airforce Committee of the Senate.

In this interview, the ranking member of the National Assembly speaks on the controversy generated by the faceoff between the House of Reps and the Minister of State for Labour, Mr Festus Keyamo, and comes to the conclusion that Keyamo insulted Nigerians. Na’Allah also speaks on other issues in the polity.

Excerpts:

The APC has moved from one crisis to another of recent. But leaders like you have not been talking. Why? Are you people scared?

There is nothing scaring anybody. I have always said there are politicians and only few of them can answer to being called democrats.

Most of them can be described as manipulators. So, when a game of this nature ensues, you expect the manipulators to be underground. You also expect democrats to insist on adherence to the party’s constitution and the constitution of Nigeria. But when we came on board, we said all of us were politicians and we collectively bear that appellation.

It is not a conspiracy of silence per se. If the organs of the party, whether APC or PDP, are working based on the constitution, we have no reason to get to where we are now. Of course, you would expect the manipulators to ensure that those organs do not function and it is their efforts to make sure that those organs do not function that brought us to where we presently find ourselves. But as leaders, you must be accommodating. If you make so much noise, you cause so much damage.

So, there are times you try to bring the manipulators into the arena of democrats so that they understand the issue of being democratic. And once they understand, it means, gradually, you can bring back to function the organs of party and, therefore, the party would come out stronger. I think this has been the attitude of most of the stakeholders of APC. The party has the misfortune of people coming together to work with a defined mission and objective for the governance of this country.

Along the line, political expedience, or whatever can be so described, dictated the influx of all sorts of characters into the party. Of course, you should expect that they, not being democrats, would inflict substantial damage to the party.

If you try as much as you can to go through the pain of building a house and somebody decided that he would throw stone to break your window and you say you would fight him, and he throws the next stone, he breaks your roof, and you may end up eventually not having a house. It is better to contain him within the circle of annoyance that he can express to break your window than to further provoke him to do more damage to your house.

This explains the attitude of some of us for keeping quiet. We would continue to have crisis in all the parties until we reach a situation where the focus of every politician is the development of his country, not himself. That is when we begin to have political party. We all know we don’t have it. Unfortunately, while the Bible and Quran tell us clearly, that only truth can heal us, and even after portraying us a religious country, we have people in strategic positions who believe that the option of falsehood can override the biblical and quranic saying that only the truth can heal.  Again, you have to contend with this.

It all depends on what defines the interest of a person and the interest of governance. Those of us who work tirelessly to bring APC into existence, to fight and bring this government into being, will not be interested in being derailed by action or inaction, commission or omission of those we know validly do not have the interest of the country at heart but have found their way into the party.

So, it is better, easier and more responsible for us to manage them and sustain the structure of the party with the belief that, given another chance, we will be able to redirect the ship of governance, devoid of this distraction, in the overall interest of Nigeria.

Terrorism, banditry and kidnapping among others have been on the rise in such a manner that many people believe government should change the Service Chiefs…

Let us be honest and sincere, from Nigeria’s independence to date, have you ever heard that any Service Chief voluntarily retired from service? The answer is no. I will tell you why. The imperfections in our system have made it almost impossible for people, even with the best of conscience, to take certain decisions as they relate to either staying in service or resign. The appointing authority is the President. He knows his reason for appointing them.

And having appointed them and he has not told them to go, can we, in all honesty, say any one of them has approached the President to say, “Mr. President, I am going?” For those calling for the resignation of the Service Chiefs, I think they are doing it out of gross misunderstanding of the workings of the system. We are in a democracy, operating a constitution that gives powers to the various organs of government and no organ of government is in doubt of what is expected of it under the constitution.

And based on my limited understanding of the provisions of the constitution, the internal security of the country solely rests on the police. The next question to ask is whether, as a country, we have developed the police to the level that it can guarantee internal security? The participation of the military becomes complementary and auxiliary.

If you blame the military for not bringing to an end the activities of Boko Haram and ISWAP, I can understand. But if you want to blame the military for their inability to curtail banditry, cattle rustling, kidnapping, I think you have misplaced understanding of the workings of our constitution. President Nixon said “if you dodge your responsibilities, you cannot avoid the consequence”. Every security agency would tell you that it doesn’t have sufficient funding to do the job. We cannot dispute that. As at my last research, 67.4% of Nigerians who own cars in the last 10 years have not paid for licence, have not done insurance and they want to ply roads that are secure and smooth.

My other research also shows that apart from civil servants and some few corporate entities, citizens are not interested in paying tax in Nigeria. So every service depends on the money coming from oil. Certainly, it will not be enough. And that is the reason for the lukewarm attitude of Nigerians to the fight against corruption. 34.7% of those who enroll in the police do so with the sole aim of becoming orderlies to governors, etc.

So, when you ask them to go and detect crime, they are not interested. Some of them are professionally attached to big men.  There is nowhere I have seen this thirst for policemen to be guards to politicians and public servants like Nigeria. One governor is escorted by 17 policemen. He doesn’t need it. But I have found solace in the biblical saying that only sinners run away when pursued by no one. If you are truly and sincerely elected by the people and you are doing what the people who elected you want, they have the capacity to protect you.

The suspended acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission is facing presidential probe for corruption. His ordeal is said to have been spearheaded by the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami.

Based on my limited knowledge about what happens around the world, human beings are not infallible. The worst you can do to a human being is to give him power that is not subjected to control. The circumstances under which Magu came in as acting Chairman of the EFCC and some of the operations that he did, whether justified or not, would put him in a position that he may need to compromise himself. The corruption we are fighting is being fought all over the world. It is the level of commitment that determines whether you are serious about it or not. Nobody who is honest and sincere will tell you that Buhari is not sincere about fighting corruption. But is our operational procedure in fighting corruption correct? My answer is, to certain extent, yes. But we have some pitfalls too.

Like?

The supervising ministry of the EFCC should be the Federal Ministry of Justice which ensures that the laws of Nigeria are enforced, obeyed and faithfully implemented. The effect will lift our anti-corruption fight to civilized standards.  If our fight meets up with civilized standards, you would have very little resistance to it. But where, for example, an agency says all that is needed to do is to write a petition before it takes action, that is the first misstep. Because that itself opens the gate for people who don’t like others to fictitiously write against them and, in the process, destroy certain people who ordinarily have no business whatsoever with corruption.

It is alleged that Magu is being witch-hunted allegedly by the Attorney General…

I don’t think that is the correct position. The Attorney General of the Federation has been there for five years. Magu has also been there for five years. So, if it is witch-hunt, why would it happen after five years of operation, why not immediately, one or two years after? Why must it take this long for the witch-hunt to start? What happened is the manifestation of the imperfection of the fight against corruption in five years that now stares both the ministry and the EFCC in the face and leads to this disagreement or whatever you call it.

It means there are certain things the EFCC was not doing correctly that have consequences but those consequences did not immediately manifest. It equally means there are certain things the Ministry of Justice might not be doing correctly that allowed the continuation of the imperfection in the EFCC which cumulatively now surfaced for everyone to see and for people to decide whether action needs to be taken or not.

This is my thinking and I hope I am wrong. But people who know what governance is all about would say the same thing that if the EFCC and the ministry had acted within the mandates given to them by the President, we would not have been where we are today. But as I said earlier, there is no single human being that is infallible. So, it is the infallibility of Magu that has surfaced and I think it would be wrong for anybody to say it is witch-hunt. There is nothing like witch-hunting. If you are accused of doing a wrong thing, come with your defence.

Based on what I read, it is said that Magu cannot account for certain things he recovered, if he is clean, what does it take to say “no, what you are saying isn’t correct, this is what I have recovered and this is it?” I think it would be simple as that. What is wrong in asking someone to account for the office he is holding on behalf of the people?

What is your take on the former acting Chairman of the Niger Delta Development Commission, Joy Nunieh, and Minister of Niger Delta, Senator Godswill Akpabio, saga?

Based on what I read in the dailies, my take is that Joy was relieved of her position based on what the minister referred to as insubordination. I have also seen on social media that there were allegations of sexual harassment but if you look at the two scenarios, she was not saying she was relieved of her duties because she didn’t succumb to the alleged sexual harassment by Akpabio. She was only talking about what allegedly happened between her and Akpabio while they were working together. This boils down to governance.

You cannot get to the level of a minister or acting Managing Director of the NDDC and you cannot rely on the machinery and structure of governance to resolve issues and what you have opted to do was to resolve on the pages of newspapers…that is not governance. Nobody who knows the seriousness of governance will tell you that the two parties are right.

Godswill Akpabio, during the House Committee on NDDC probe, said 60% of the commission’s contract goes to members of the National Assembly. How true can that be?

First of all, it will interest you to know that I am not a member of the committee on NDDC. I am happy the Reps Speaker has given him 48 hours to publish the names of the lawmakers who got NDDC contracts. I think it will be wise for us all to wait for him to publish the names. Let me tell you. You have to be in the committee to know what is happening. I have spent almost 13 years in the National Assembly. I have never been a member of the NDDC Committee. I have never been member of the Petroleum Committee. I have never been member of the Appropriation Committee. So I am remotely connected to the NDDC. I think it is only fair to wait for the minister’s list before we can come to any conclusion.

What if he decides not to publish the names?

No. He cannot. He knows the weight of what he is saying. He is a lawyer. He has been governor and he has been in the Senate. So, I think it is only fair to wait for him to make the names public. I do not want to believe he would make that kind of weighty allegation without proof.

Let us wait for him to come out with what he has. I think we all dance around this issue until we come back to the fact that person who made the allegation come up with the names of those collecting the contracts and I do not want to believe that he has no proof of the allegation especially as the Speaker has said he should provide the names of the members he alleged benefitted from NDDC contracts.

READ ALSO: ICYMI: MAGU VS MALAMI: Real reasons behind five years cold war

Minister of State for Labour, Mr. Festus Keyamo, had a stand-off with the Senate Committee on Labour over the 774,000 jobs such that the minister was reported to have walked out on the committee.

Each time anyone insults the National Assembly, I always have sympathy for such people. As at today, we have close 180 million Nigerians who, in their wisdom, they decided that they are going to be represented at the National Assembly. That is why it is called National Assembly, representing all the nook and crannies of this country. So, anytime you open your mouth to insult these people, you are insulting Nigerians, because they left whatever they were doing to elect these people to represent them. I saw on social media, because I was not around, about what happened between the House Committee and Keyamo. I think it is lack of decorum for Keyamo to have done what he did to that institution.

Not because I am from the institution but the reason being that Keyamo is a lawyer. He, more than any other person, should know the sovereignty of the constitution. If the constitution of a country decided to create an institution like the National Assembly, I was expecting that the least he could do was to respect the institution.

And don’t forget, as a minister, he has taken an oath to uphold, protect and defend the constitution. So, by what he did, can he validly say he has protected that institution created by the constitution? Perhaps I should say this. I have heard several arguments, even from lawyers alleging that the constitution of Nigeria is not a constitution of the people.

Is it?

Very so. I will tell you why it is so. If you say you want to make a constitution made by the people, is there any way or any law that places one citizen of Nigeria over the other? No. So, if you want to make a constitution, it means that all the 180 million of us must participate in making the constitution, is that possible? No. So, when this constitution was to come into being, there was a pronouncement by the military saying “we have given you this constitution”.

This constitution created the office of the President, Vice President, governors, senators, House of Representatives’ members, chairmen and councilors. Have you heard that any community that says “in total disobedience or disregard to this constitution, we are not going to elect our councilors, chairmen, and so it is up to the National Assembly and President?” At that stage, they have accepted the constitution, and therefore, it becomes the constitution of the people. And that is how constitutions come about all over the world.  I think this arises from gross misunderstanding of constitutional jurisprudence and, therefore, you can pardon them, including lawyers who feel that is how it is.

The Ango Abdulahi-led Northern Elders Forum is insisting that the presidency should be retained in the North in 2023 while others are calling for the South to produce the presidency…

The most dangerous thing is to hear that the leadership of my country can be negotiated based on where the President comes from. I will rather, as a democrat, say we need a competent person who can continue from where the current President stops.

This idea of this man must come from this or that place is not democratic. The fact that it has been like that for ages does not make it right. The right to choose the President belongs to the 180 million Nigerians. And no single person should arrogate that right to himself.

And no responsible democrat should take that right from the people. Let all candidates with capacity to run the affairs of Nigeria in 2023 present themselves to the people of Nigeria, under whatever party, then, Nigerians will take a decision based on their assessment of the candidates’ capabilities. As long as we continue to say presidency must come from this zone or that zone, I don’t think we can go far. The reason parties get involved is that, that it is the only way you can assure people that they will not be dominated based on their numbers. And we broke the jinx since the emergence of Goodluck Jonathan from the minority tribe as President, and I think we should continue along that line. The only hope I have is that the President comes from my party, irrespective of where the person comes from.

Meaning that, for example, in Kebbi State where you come from, the governor can come from the zone of the present governor in 2023?

No. What it means is that in 2023, the people of Kebbi will have the opportunity to look at the candidates that present themselves and decide who, in their thinking, can run the affairs of the state.

Will you run for governor in 2023?

Let’s wait for that time. The best I can say is that I might consider offering myself when the time comes. But we are only one year into four years. So, let us see how things go.

Vanguard