By JideAjani, General Editor
Something is bound to give; and we must deal with it. Because Nigeria is at crossroads, whatever needs to be done must be done.
This first phase in this series is not just about an interview. It is a melange of views espoused by presidential contestants (the candidates and their running mates) at different fora, including but not limited to television interviews and social media content. The main interviews would follow in due time.
We believe it will be better to engage a bottom up mode, instead of a top to bottom arrangement, hence, we are starting with the vice presidential candidates of the major political parties in the land. Like the leopard, Nigerian politicians have never and will never change their spots. Those who have established a cordial relationship with corruption will continue to have their romance with corruption. Those who have been religious bigots will merely seek to accentuate their bigotry whenever the opportunties arise. The ones who just want the title will do whatever it takes to rig their way to power. Those with nepotic instincts will not relent once in office. They ills have always lined their ways.
If you are in doubt, these questions will burst your brand: Why has Nigeria continued to retrogress? Regarding regimes, why has it been so easy for Nigerians to prefer the former which they demonised, while lamenting the woes under the present which they welcomed with open hands? Or, is it because they were never really held down to some conditions? Is it because the Nigerian politician suddenly changed? Is it because Nigerians did not properly interroigate the antecedents of the in-coming leaders?
It is in addressing that last question that we have harvested past statements – in their own voice, with video evidence – of those aspiring to lead Nigeria from next year. We have codified their statements in a thematic form and each can be held to account. The contexts of their statements have neither been befuddled, not their essence obfuscated by ill-will. The internet never forgets.
In THE POLITICS BOOK, we are reminded of how Johann Gottried Herder (1744-1803) posited that ”each nationality contains its centre of happiness within itself”.
The authors broke it down thus: ”People are shaped by the places they group up…-…because shared languages and landscapes help to create a national spirit, or Volksgeist.-this national spirit forges a community with a particular national character.-people depend on this national community for happiness.-Each nationality contains its centre of happiness within itself.
So, we ask: does the Nigerian nationality contain its centre of sadness, backwardness, insecurity and corruption within itself? The answer is yes. But the same Nigerians have another opportunity to change the narrative as we begin to interrogate the personalities and their ideas in the quest to lead us.
By default, instead of the perenial All Progressives Congress, APC, and the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Labour Party, LP, has happened on the stage. But for LP now, it is more about the optics of mobilisation and excitement rather than voting proper. Then there is the New Nigeria Peoples Party, NNPP. We also have some other political parties in the mix.
Today, we present the thoughts and ideas of Dr. Datti Baba Ahmed, the running mate to Dr. Peter Obi of the Labour Party. The views are strictly his and were made at different times – some during interviews, others in-session with young professionals and some were things he said in 2018/2019. It burrows into the dept of the mind of Baba Ahmed.
Compiled by Dapo Akinrefon and Gabriel Olawale
How to make Nigeria work
Nepotism, personal and group interests in appointment is why you get the wrong people into right offices and right people into wrong offices. We can only be 100 percent correct. What they call Due Process Office and Bureau of Public Procurement, I was involved in 1999. I designed it and among about 1,000 members that have been to national assembly, go and check it, I am the only one that sponsored a bill against inflated government contracts. This has destroyed Nigeria in about two decades. We all shout against corruption but when it is time to act, people turn away because they are going to benefit from it. The next Nigerian President must be somebody practically ready to micro-manage Nigeria.
In Canada, among the top ten professors, there is a Nigerian; and among the top ten surgeons in every top hospitals in Europe and America, there is a Nigerian.
When I started my PhD in Westminster in 1997, the highest paid individual was not the Vice Chancellor but a Nigerian who is the Head of IT.
We need to tap from our people in Diaspora. If you think we should develop technology, it doesn’t work in a vacuum; what we have is a vacuum.
Corruption
not so sure President Buhari really understands corruption.
I can quickly tell you that there are seven different ways corruption is perpetrated in Nigeria. First, inflated government contracts, which is responsible for anything between 55% to 65% of the quantum of corruption. Second one is unremitted revenue.
The third one is extortion – from the N50 collected on the road to the multi-million dollar deals that are done before anybody could see the president. Fourth one is conversion of public property into private. Fifth is the use of security votes – the way you have it before is the way you still have it today. Sixth one is wastefulness – criminal wastefulness, anything you can create to spend money on recklessly, including undue use of private jets and any other instruments of government that is wastefu, it is wastful, it is corruption.
The seventh one is undue influence of fraternity and relationship, which we call influence-peddling (man knows man). Buhari has never scientifucally looked at corruption. Corruption does not perpetrate itself. There are ways that it happens. Of these seven, some are administrative, some are legal and you’ll discover that about 70% of the way corruoption is done in NIgeria is simple administration. What President Buhari has been saying about corruoption since 1984 has been mere rhetorics, he has never fought corruption till this moment. The way contracts were awarded during the PDP years is the same way that contracts are awarded today.
Arresting people does not address the issue of corruption. It addresses the criminality. What we should be technically interested in is how did the act happen? They inflated the conrcat so how would you stop it? It is to control the mechanism. Logical limits and mathematical limits. Those jailed now you’ll discover that some of their cases started during the PDP era.
To fight corruption, first pass the bill on inflated contracts. Secondly, deploy tecghnology so that people do not under-report or divert Nigeria’s revenue.You cannot deal with extortion by not leading. When you surround yourself in Aso Rcok Villa with friends, family and cronies, the natural tendency is for them to extort moeny from business people and politicians before they get to see you. Surround yourselef with technocrats and experts in various fields, not a nephew who was never elected. That is how to fight corruption. Somebody has been doing the complete opposite of fighting corruption but because his actions tally with the typical illiterate, ignorant (pardon my language)Nigerian, who, all they want to see in life is the downfall of others. In the meantime, there has never been any government in the history of Nigeria that has promoted corruption in the way Buhari’s government has done and the worst form of corruption is a fake war on corruption. I stand by what I’ve said.
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