* ‘How Buhari’s administration mistakes landed Nigeria in a mess’

* Says Ganduje did not visit him for reconciliation

• ‘But for unfinished business in Kano, I could have been President in 2007’

By Levinus Nwabughiogu, ABUJA

Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso is a grassroots politician. His support base across the country swarms with people  of all faith and classes. He’s bold and courageous. He has an enviable profile in politics and public service. First, he served in Kano State Civil Service for 17 years. Upon his departure, he joined partisan politics.

In 1992, he was elected into the House of Representatives where he became the Deputy Speaker. At the return of democracy in 1999, after a long military interregnum, he was elected the governor of Kano State. In 2003, he was appointed the Minister of Defense. In 2011, he was re-elected governor to serve a second term in Kano.

At the point of exiting office in 2015, Kwankwaso squared up with President Muhammadu Buhari for the All Progressives Congress, APC, presidential ticket. He was later elected senator to represent Kano Central. Kwankwaso was, up till 2015, a member of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP, when he left the party for APC.

In 2018, he returned to the PDP to contest the presidential ticket with former Vice President Abubakar Atiku among others. As the 2023 general elections inch close, he told Sunday Vanguard, in an exclusive interview, that he may run again. Kwankwaso also x-rayed the polity and the current government on many fronts and gave his thoughts, pointing out the many mistakes of the Buhari government. Excerpts:

The current Federal Government is six and a half years old. How do you x-ray its activities so far?

As you rightly pointed out, this government is now about six and a half years old. Somebody has also said that the President has 17 months to go. On the whole, I believe there are issues in all areas that are important to Nigerians, especially the issue of politics itself because that’s key.

READ ALSO: New Year Shocker: Ganduje drops hint of possible reconciliation with Kwankwaso, Shekarau, others

Once you get it wrong, many things are likely going to go that way. And I think the government and the party got it wrong right from the beginning in terms of inclusiveness, in terms of bringing everybody together as a nation, not virtually people of APC stock but everybody.

If you are elected, you are a President or Governor for everybody within that country or state whether somebody voted for, against you or even when somebody didn’t vote at all; it is now your responsibility to convince him to vote for you next time.

And even those who didn’t vote for you, you have the opportunity to convince them so that in the next election, even if you are not the one contesting, it is your responsibility as a leader to ensure that people are happy and comfortable to the extent that they will change their minds from party A to come to you in party B or party C. And I think that was the first step that was missed by the government and the APC.

I am sure you know that many of us were in PDP but, in 2015, we decided, for obvious reasons, to join the party and we provided the cutting edge for the government at that particular time to win election and I am sure you also remember that, immediately after the election, we found ourselves in the cold and, as politicians, we had to get away to maintain our relevance and ensure that the government and the party do the right thing.

Because of the issue of the party, that mistake, which is very fundamental in democracy, other things began to happen negatively, especially on the issues of the economy, security and many other sectors of the country. If you look at security, it is not just for the military or security agencies alone. It is for everybody. Everybody must have input for government to succeed.

Therefore, if you exclude some people at the highest level, the implication is that those around you will hold you responsible and many people will be excluded from the government. And information is key, even in the best military or security agencies in the world. If you don’t have high quality information or intelligence, no matter how big your gun or whatever equipment you are carrying is, you will hardly succeed.

That’s why it is always good to carry everybody along. So that if the people are comfortable and happy, they will always give information they see around them and that is key to those whose responsibility it is to use the information. And to us, security is not just about the military or security agencies alone. It, of course, involves so many other things, especially the issue food security.

If the society is hungry, you shouldn’t expect peace. People will do everything they can under the sun to make sure they have something to eat, including criminal activities. There also has to be education and security. Under any circumstance, your children must go to school and have employment opportunity, there has to be something to give them. If there is no job, it is a big problem.

Many people, like many of us in politics who are roadside economists, if we go to Abuja, we go round and we don’t see cranes working on construction sites, you begin to wonder what is happening. If you don’t see other areas of economic activities, then we know something is wrong. So, there are other areas that every responsible government must look at to ensure security of lives and property.

So, like I said, some steps were missed and that’s why we found ourselves generally in this mess because most people are finding it very difficult to eat. Maybe the leaders have heard it. Maybe they are not aware but that is the fact of the matter. So, there are challenges but there are issues one can argue.

The government was unlucky because, sometimes, in the life of a government or even an individual, you wake up someday and you find yourself in a very disadvantaged situation and it is not your making. Maybe you were even sleeping when it happened. You know, when we came to government in 2015, there were issues, especially the issue of oil price, then coronavirus.

They hit at the economy but I believe that even with those issues and more, government could have done much better. Government, in 2015, I am sure you remember, they couldn’t put together the Federal Executive Council until after about six months. And six months is a very long time in the life of any government that has four-year-term.

Four years, if you subtract six months, 48 months minus six months, that is 42 months left because there was no way under the democratic arrangement the President alone can function without FEC being constituted. So, there were issues really and that reminds me, in 2011, when I went back to Kano, I was sworn-in on a Sunday and, before the following

Sunday, I was able to inaugurate the state Assembly, select my Commissioners and took it to the state Assembly and they were able to screen and I had my first State Executive Council meeting within a week because time was not on anybody’s side.

It is a contract of four years. From the time you were sworn-in, four years to another May 29, whether you like it or not, you have to get out and people will judge you by what you have done; whether positive or negative. So, once you get that opportunity, it is up to you to decide whether your name should be written in gold in terms of performance.

When you talk about inclusiveness, the inkling I get is the 97% and 3% submission the President once made. Again, a section of the country, the South-East to be specific, feels completely marginalized. Is that what you mean?

One of the big problems of this government is the issue of communication. Government is not communicating well. The President or Governor must be able to communicate very well; even if you are doing the best thing in the world, if the people don’t know, they don’t know. People will judge you based on what they know.

Part of the advice I gave to the President in the beginning was to sit down with the leaders of thought from the six geopolitical zones so that he could listen to them, hear them and so on. And a good government at the state or federal level should at least, every week, the leader must talk to the people.

Not only talk to them, he must listen to them because it’s two-way traffic. He must know their worries, strengths and weaknesses, concerns and it is your responsibility to ensure that those concerns are addressed.

In addition, government should come with an agenda and that agenda should be clear to the people even before election and, once you are elected, you start implementing that agenda to the letter to the extent that, when you are leaving office, people will be very angry.

They will start thinking of you. But if you don’t come out to communicate with the people, even friends and supporters will start wondering what you are doing.

Did the government take the advice you gave then?

No, I don’t think so.

Did you feel disappointed?

No, it is not an issue of disappointment or otherwise. It’s an issue of their own result or performance. So, they still have one and a half years or 17 months as they put it. We look forward to seeing some changes especially on the issue of security.

You may think 17 months is a short period of time but to our brothers and sisters who are with bandits now, suffering in their hands, 17 months is a very long time. So, 17 months depends on where you are.

If you are in your comfort zone, 17 months is around the corner but for those who cannot eat, sick in hospital or cannot get a job, 17 months is a long time because, whatever course you read in the university or any other tertiary institution, more people will come out to add to the number of the unemployed on the streets. So, 17 months for me is a very long time.

2023 is almost here and there are two big parties jostling for positions, PDP and APC. What prospects do they have? Do you see APC retaining power at the centre in 2023 or PDP taking over power from APC?

You see, so many people are very much worried about the two parties. Each one has got its own disadvantages and, of course, advantages. If you look at PDP, it was in power for 16 years until 2015.

For the mere fact that an opposition party came and defeated it at the polls is enough to show you that there were some mistakes, and I am not sure if those mistakes were corrected, especially in terms of mobilization of the people because, if you are in opposition, there are certain things you have to do in terms of mobilizing the people to support the party and, even more importantly, when it comes to the candidature of the people within the party. I think that is key.

The same thing is applicable to APC. Whatever we told the people in 2015 which was against the PDP, many people believe that it is even worse now in APC and, because of government and probably lack of people who have adequate experience in the game, you could see that there are so many mistakes that people are making in the party; PDP believes that even when they made mistakes during their 16 years tenure, APC is making worse mistakes and, therefore, many people in PDP believe that they could win election using any candidate and that is not so.

You see, we succeeded in 2015 in bringing in some changes because, at least, we had Buhari who had a movement, supporters, not necessarily for APC, just for himself. And some of us who had our own supporters at that particular time, we came together, formed a formidable force which was good enough to bring change.

Many people don’t understand and also many people are in a hurry, some people’s politics hinge solely on getting tickets. They work so hard over time to get ticket and once that ticket is in their hands, they deposit it in the party headquarters in Abuja for the party to bring its members to vote for them. I think that era has gone now. It is history.

People are so worried about that attachment that we used to have in PDP or ANPP at that time. It’s to a very large extent not there now. What is likely going to happen in 2023 elections is simply that people will choose a candidate in PDP or APC or any other party for that matter.

People will be more concerned about the candidate than just APC or PDP or APGA or any other party. That is the scenario that we are anticipating in 2023.

Where do you see power going exactly? South easterners are clamoring for it. Northerners are saying no. South westerners and middle belters too are coming up. So, where do you see power going after it has resided in the North for eight years under the present administration?

There are so many arguments around. For those who are talking about South, they make the same arguments you are making that Buhari has spent eight years. So, it is only fair, according to them, to take the presidency to the South.

For those who are arguing for this side of the country in the North, they will add 16 to eight, that is, 24. Out of the 24, it is only eight years plus two by Yar ‘Adua, that is, 10. So, it depends on who you listen to. But my worry is that so many people, especially my colleague politicians, you can see so many of them are so much in a hurry to the extent that they have nothing to show other than sentiment.

I am in politics, I contested 16 times and won 13 times and I lost three times. There are chances that, by the grace of God, I will contest again though I have not made up my mind on that because we are in the process of consultation.

So you see, you get people who had worked let’s say in the organized private sector. They were managing directors. They were chairmen, very important people. They want to join politics.

They want to go either parallel or go up from that position, forgetting that they are now in a very brand new world and not the sort of the corporate world they used to know. We have retired military, retired civil servants and so on, who would want to retire from 3 stars, 4 stars, whatever stars and be 4 stars in politics.

You have people who were in business, counting billions or even trillions. They want from that point to either go parallel or go up. Some were lucky but luck doesn’t come all the time. Now those of us who have taken time…for example in 1992, I was Deputy Speaker of the House of Reps, now, it is exactly 30 years in the field, working on Sundays, Fridays, Tuesdays, everyday, Christmas, Sallah, New Year day and, I am sure you must have seen hundreds of people who are just coming, some will come for condolences but, of course, after condolences, the next thing they will ask is “how’s the country?” It’s politics.

And we are not in a hurry. If I contested twice in 2015 and 2019 to be President, I wasn’t presenting myself because I was from the North-West or from northern Nigeria, no. I was presenting myself based on the fact that I believed I was the best material to win primary election or presidential election itself and the best person to do the job because there are two things, winning, you can get tickets, and tickets are just everywhere, we have so many parties.

In 2019, we had close to 100 parties, so, ticket wasn’t an issue. What was the issue was who could win the general elections? So, sometimes when I hear the issue of zoning, religion and some are even talking about all sorts of things that one shouldn’t rely really on them… If I am presenting myself for the position of President, I am not presenting myself because I am a Christian or a Muslim or because I am from the North-West or North-Central but because we have done so much, we have proved all the points.

You see, in 2007, my colleagues who were governors with me in 1999 were busy wanting to be President, At that time, based on the realities on the ground, I felt that I was more relevant in terms of becoming the President and Commander-in-Chief because I was Deputy Speaker of the House of Reps.

I was an elected delegate to the Constitutional Conference 1994, 1995. I was governor for four years and Minister of Defense; so, there was no better experience to handle the job among my colleagues at that particular time. But I was not in a hurry. I thought I had an unfinished job in Kano. I wanted to go and finish it.

I went back to Kano, contested and won election, proved the point in terms of removing a sitting government, proved the point in terms of performance and it was only in 2015 when there was no more job really to be done at the state level that I decided to come up. Not because I didn’t have the educational qualification or any other issue.

But I felt that I had to wait because we have seen people who are opportune to go for position A, B, C or D but they never had time really to consolidate any position and, at the end of the day, they crashed. So, I have seen people, my colleagues who are in politics, who are too much in a hurry, not only too much in a hurry but they are using things they shouldn’t use.

People should work hard. Any time I open the social media, I laugh and I thank my God that everybody now wanting to be President will put Kwankwaso as his running mate. I am not the only one from North-West. I am not the only northerner.

I never told anybody I want to be his Vice President in this country. But you see, they have gone round, some are doing it scientifically. They will go to America and get people who will go and do polls and find out who is on the ground. They have done that.

Many people will go and talk to Babalawo and ask him who is on the ground. You cannot be on the ground overnight. You have to work hard to prove your point. And while I thank God for what I am seeing in the social media, I also thank the Almighty God for sparing my life and keeping me intact with my integrity.

Over these 30 years, in fact even before 30 years, I was 17 years in the civil service in Kano, there was nothing people did not do to dent my image, they tried everything under the sun but God protected us.

But it is a lesson to me and a lesson to everybody that if you are in power, don’t be a mad man. Do the right thing. Whatever your assignment, whatever you are giving or taking, make sure it is not against the laws of the land.

You have been around for a while now: Deputy Speaker, Minister of Defense, two-term governor, senator and presidential aspirant. Late last year, Mr President declined assent to the Electoral Act Amendment Bill because of direct primary. Does that bother you or you are one of those who would say it is inconsequential?

There are two issues there. First is the issue of direct election, meaning everybody who is a member of a party is free to go and vote for a candidate of his or her choice. The other one is indirect which refers to delegates. Out of the 16 elections I had, some were direct, some, indirect.

The last one I had direct was in 1999. We were elected as flag bearers of PDP as governors in 1999 using direct primary and many other elections were indirect. Now, from my personal experience, those systems have got their pluses and negatives and the negative of the direct election is simply that it is very cumbersome.

When we had our own, it was the military in power, at least, they were neutral because they didn’t belong to any of the parties but still it was cumbersome. Now, on the other hand, this one is prone to manipulation by people, by leaders, I mean indirect primary and money plays a very significant role in deciding who becomes what in any party; especially now with the level of poverty only God knows who will go and vote under his own conscience.

Many people will be happy to take dollar. I am not sure if people are seeing dollar now. Dollar is very difficult to see and many people when they see it they start shivering.

But if I were to advise Mr President, honestly, I would have told him to sign it because, for whatever reasons, vast majority of Nigerians want to see direct elections in this country because it is like people are sick and tired of manipulations by a few people and I think he would have been hailed really if he had signed the bill.

But he didn’t sign it. We look forward to what the National Assembly will do. Others, on the other hand, are saying they will overrule him, go and get two thirds of the National Assembly, while some of the leaders are saying Buhari isn’t wrong.

So, we will all wait and see if they can do it. But whatever the case, we hope that the 2023 elections, both primary and secondary elections.

There was no love lost between you and your successor in Kano. The issue is public knowledge. It is everywhere. But, recently, something very remarkable happened. The governor, in his New Year message, came up to say that 2022 will be a year of reconciliation and everybody thought he was talking about reconciling with you. Are you excited about that? What really transpired between you two? Do you feel betrayed by your former deputy and successor?

In politics, you have to do whatever you can to do the right thing at every given time and anything to the contrary will either show immediately or in due time or course. For me, I am in politics to ensure that the right people are in government.

I am in politics to ensure that people in government are doing the right thing. Now, as you have rightly said, Ganduje was my deputy 1999 to 2003. He was my SA in the Ministry of Defense and when we left office in 2007, Yar ‘Adua came and we worked out something for him in Chad Republic as the Executive Secretary of Chad Basin.

He was there in 2010 when I got ticket and I asked him to resign and come back. When he came back, he was my deputy again and, in 2015, when I was going, I believed he was the most senior and I had wanted to have an inclusive group or party in Kano and even elsewhere.

So, at the end of the day, we decided to support him and he became governor and, from there, all what happened in terms of our fight and so on happened and if he decides now to come back, even though he just came for condolence, he didn’t come to say he was coming for reconciliation, he came for condolence.

I wished he had come on other issues that happened before then, now it is time for us to wait and see how it goes.

Specifically speaking, are you contesting for President in 2023 elections?

Yes, 2023 is around the corner, we are already in 2022 and this is the time to consult, contact our friends. People have to be realistic and, unless you are realistic, you find it very difficult to go far in this game of politics.

You have to contact the right caliber of people, you have to think very well on what you are venturing into and we have a group known as Kwankwasiya and in Kwankwasiya, we would love to see or to listen to them, to tell us about what is happening in their state, in their local government and, together, we will sit down and take decision on either to contest or to support any of our members, anybody for that matter.

So, maybe in the next couple of months or so, I should be in the position to answer this question very clearly.

Any more words for Nigerians?

I am not sure if there is anything other than to thank them for their resilience, for their patience, for their understanding. We want them to do whatever they can to ensure peace in this country.

Those of us who are politicians, we cannot contest elections unless you have a country or constituency and whatever you want to do, not only politicians, in whatever you are doing, you need peace and that is why we always advocate peace across the country. And it is an opportunity to appeal to the government to do more in terms of security and the economy.

This security that we have now, under normal circumstance, is not acceptable. A situation where Nigerians are being picked from villages, roads and markets should not be acceptable even by the government itself because we all know that is the primary duty of any responsible government.

So, the government must do something. And many of us are surprised and we are shocked on why we are where we are today, why the military and other security agencies cannot protect Nigerians.

We are not happy with the situation because my experience with the military is that I personally have this conviction that they are among the best on this continent and that has been tested and that has been proven; the question is what went wrong?

We have bandits, we have criminals along major roads, bandits who will come and attack today, tomorrow, next tomorrow, they come out again and they kill people, they maim people, they take them to the bush and still nothing is done, they are still there. And in these towns, villages and even cities, these people are known; it is not like they came from Jupiter or somewhere.

They are citizens of those areas. Most of them have not even gone to school in their lives. It is very pathetic and unfortunate that we have this military that we know as the best, committed, professionals, gentlemen, allowing Nigerians to be treated this way and I think the military itself especially the leadership has to device ways and means, not even because of the President or anybody even because of the institution.

I don’t want the military, I believe for many obvious reasons, in fact, I call myself a member of the extended family that are being reduced to what we are seeing now and we still want to know why is this happening at this time.

When I was there in the military, I never thought that in my life time, the military will come to this point and I think this must be reversed and we hope everybody in this country should support the military, should do whatever they can to support them because they are our last resort.

Without them, we will all run away, we cannot stay. We are staying because they are there, because they are committed to protecting us, otherwise everybody will look his own way and run away if you don’t have military.

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