Renowned lawyer and activist, Festus Keyamo, unequivocally justifies the reason he chose to drum support for the All Progressives Congress (APC) to take over power. A he believes in the person of Buhari and the APC as a better alternative to the misrule of the last administration, while adding that the party may lose the support of activists and social crusaders like him, if it derails from path of qualitative governance.
According to him, the current internal crisis in the APC is only temporary as the party is just new in the game of handling power. He adds that a likelihood of such trivial crack breaking the party is only a wishful thinking of the PDP. He believes such rift is meant to occur and the party will sure stabilise in due course.
Keyamo even expresses optimism that he cannot foretell any impending rancour between the National Leader of the APC, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and President Muhammadu Buhari. “PDP wakes up every morning to pray that Tinubu and Buhari must fight. The PDP thinks that their hope lies in that quarrel so that the APC will break up. They are praying, hoping and wishing that Tinubu and Buhari must fight; that Tinubu and Atiku must fight; that Atiku and Buhari must fight. Don’t forget that that was their wishful thinking up until the primaries of the APC”, he said.
In this interview, the 45-year old Ughelli-born Keyamo addresses the issue of the looming corruption in the NNPC, while dragging former petroleum boss, Diezani Alison-Madueke, into the scene.
He also fielded questions on insurgency and other issues of national interest.
Excerpt:
From the episodes of the last elections, what are the lessons to be learnt from the two sides of the divide – the angles of the winners and the losers?
Well, the first and foremost lesson that we can learn from the last election is that it is no longer a guarantee that the ruling party will win an election once the people are determined to get rid of you as a government. So, no ruling party in Nigeria should ever take the electorate for granted. This is the very first lesson. Why I am saying it is the first lesson? It is because this was something that many people never foresaw because for over 50 years. Since independence, it had never happened and that is why I said it is the first lesson. The second lesson is that in conducting an election in Nigeria, it is no longer a guarantee that if you malign a candidate and try to destroy the reputation of candidate through hate campaigns, you will then win the election. Nigerians are now very mature and politically aware that they have a very high sense of judgment to make regarding such information or disinformation. The reason is that the social media is now more power than the regular media and that leads us to the third lesson – do not ignore the social media. I’m sure you know that the social media played a significant role in the last election. In 2011, we did not have as much power in the hands of Nigerians but now, almost every little phone can browse. Once you have access to Facebook, Twitter and the web in specific terms, especially all the major blogs, you are there. The explosion of bloggers in Nigeria is even something else. You have bloggers almost in every house. The last election was a potpourri of varieties of experiences that Nigerians had never seen before and trust politicians that before 2019, they are going to plunge those areas that took them unawares.
Over the last election, you went the part of the APC, only that it was not so well defined…
It was clearly defined! It was obvious; it was unmistakable; it was open. My support for the APC, especially for General Buhari was clearly stated out. I followed him to some places that he went. We went to Chatham House together and to everywhere else during the campaign. I believed in his person and I still do. I do not believe in the person of Jonathan; I do not believe in his policies. I do not hate him as a person because he is just that wonderful neighbour that you can have, who smiles at you every morning but certainly not as the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
But sir, that was President Goodluck Jonathan, a man from the South-south like you.
You mean as mature as you are, as enlightened and journalistic as you are, you are still here in 2015, preaching to me about ethnicity in governance. It is such a political hogwash. It only gives you an ephemeral sense of satisfaction to say ‘my person’, ‘our person’, won the election. It is a temporal sense of satisfaction that such gives. After that, you return to your state of poverty and old ways, and even misery. The fact that someone form my place won an election is no guarantee that you wake up every morning and you open your door and see that the person has dropped 10 thousand dollars at your doorstep because he is your man. It is no guarantee that you didn’t have a job yesterday and you will have today when you are not ordinarily skilled. I saw some people from, the Niger-Delta region who left school five years ago without a job and now wallowing in poverty and they were just in front of me shouting Jonathan and PDP. That day, I just shook my head in utter disbelief of the crass ignorance and lack of sense of direction and purpose. It is unfortunate that people are still using religion and ethnicity as a weapon and it is only a desperate politician that would do such. If you noticed that in the last election, when the back of the PDP was at the wall, they had no option than to shift to ethnicity and religion in a bid to still hang on to power, but that was even their greatest undoing. They kept running one particular advert that was just meant to win more votes for Buhari. The advert was about what he purportedly said in 2001 that he would ensure that Sharia is spread all over Nigeria. As they were running that advert, they were mobilsing the whole of the Muslims behind him unfortunately. He was not losing votes; rather, he was gaining more because he was not the one saying it. They were the one saying it. By that, even the Muslims who never believed in him queued behind him and said this man is a true Muslim. You still had Christians that had a soft spot for him. People did not see it from the reverse angle. For example, if you, as a Christian, hear someone say that he would ensure that the gospel of Jesus is spread across Nigeria, will you not like that person? It is like a pastor who has to preach and make converts. He did not say he was going to enforce his religion on you. He just said he wished he would spread his religion all over the country. People would just tell you that ‘this man is a real Christian, I will vote for him’. That was a pit the PDP dug, fell into it and buried themselves.
What is the level of confidence you repose in the ruling party, the APC, as the party you campaigned for?
It is not a route to Eldorado. I said it consistently then that the change we are preaching is not a change from imperfection to perfection. The change was that let us have an alternative. Let us do things in a different way. We had been doing the same thing over and over again since 1999 and it was not just working. So, why can’t we do it another way round? That was the type of change we were preaching. The hope I have now is the hope that fresh hands, different strategy and different modus-operandi may just bring the desired result.
But as it is now, this same APC you beat your chest to have campaigned for now has an internal crisis, particularly, as it relates to the election of the leadership of the National Assembly. What is your reaction to this?
It is a normal thing. They have never handled power at that level and for the normal few lessons, they will go through it and after that, they will stabilise. I can assure you that. It is just that they are doing things for the first time, at a different level in many years. The crisis is a normal thing. They will stabilise.
Let’s now get to the issue of the National Assembly. What went wrong during that election?
Well, I don’t want to comment on that. All I want to do is to wish that they close ranks and get down to legislative duties as quick as possible. I wish they meet the yearnings of Nigerians, no matter who is there. My reply on that is more of prayers, wishful thinking that things go right for them. I don’t want to comment on the intrigues.
What does the whole drama portend for the ruling party? Doesn’t that spell a disaster for the party?
Disaster for the party? The party is still the biggest party with so many governors and positions all over the place. What is the disaster there? In fact, I laugh when I hear some people say that because the party has lost one or two positions in the National Assembly to the PDP, then the party is on a downward slide. I laugh. I also laugh when people use the opportunity to deride the National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, over the loss of his candidate or something like that. How possible is it that all the good victories and political feats he has gathered would now be diminished and lost because of his support for one candidate for a position, here and there. It is just that the incident at the National Assembly is an indication that people were already wishing the party bad. Detractors are already at the edge and in a mood to see the party fail. I think the press has also blown it out of proportion, if you ask me. It is just like quarrelsome neighbours who are envious of each other and you hear that one of them has had an accident and has been rushed to the hospital and you come out in the open and begin to cry that he is dead. That is what enemies and detractors do. So, yes there was once a battle of choices in the National Assembly and some people got it for now, all of a sudden, the PDP cries to town and begins to cry that the APC is on a downward slide. I think this is just a joke.
Don’t you foresee an impending rift between the National Leader of the APC, Tinubu, and President Buhari?
It is still the wishful thinking of some people that there has to be a rift between them. The PDP wakes up every morning to pray that Tinubu and Buhari must fight. The PDP thinks that their hope lies in that quarrel so that the APC will break up. They are praying, hoping and wishing that Tinubu and Buhari must fight; that Tinubu and Atiku must fight; that Atiku and Buhari must fight. Don’t forget that that was their wishful thinking up until the primaries of the APC. They believe that the primaries would tear the party apart and what happened? They were so pleasantly disappointed when, after the primaries, other candidates still rallied behind General Buhari. What you find flying around in the media is the wishing thinking of the press. Once in a while, there may be a clash of interest regarding candidates and tactics, but at the end of the day, superior arguments will always prevail. I can assure you that once there is a disagreement within the party, you will see screaming headlines that Buhari and Tinubu are in the trenches, but I can assure you that all that is just to blow the whole thing out of proportion.
Now that you have a soft spot for the APC and you are not even hiding it….
No, I am not hiding it and the reason is because many of us activists pretend that we don’t have a soft spot for the opposition but activists always have soft spot for the opposition because they are always against the existing bad order. It is absolutely ridiculous and stupid for you to wish that a system is changed; like the PDP we had been trying to chase out all the years. It is ridiculous, stupid and idiotic to think and wish that a political system changes and new hands come on board without you participating in the process of making that change possible. We discovered that since 1999, we shouted and shouted but nothing happened until we began to mobilise. You will see that APC took to a lot of civil groups, human right activists and voices who came for the party to give it a moral fibre to chase the PDP out of governance. Guess what! The work does not end there. Slowly and surely, if the APC begins to tow the line of the PDP, they will begin to drift away from the support of people like us – activists, social crusaders and the critical voices that helped it. The romance will end if the APC continues in the way of the PDP.
Is there a likelihood of seeing Festus Keyamo at the scene of partisan politics someday?
For now, I am not thinking about that. In the recent past, I tried to but for now, I am not thinking of politics, for now.
Let’s talk about the parameters for ministerial appointments. What should President Buhari be looking at?
You are asking me as if I am a Special Adviser to President Buhari on Political Matters (laughs). I think it is his prerogative. The yardsticks should be within his parameters. It depends on what he wants to achieve and how fast he wants to achieve them but I expect to see a lot of young and able hands in government. Let me tell you something about Tinubu and how Lagos worked under him and Fashola. I don’t want the PDP to come for my head and say accuse me; although Lagos wasn’t perfect. Let me say it was far better than what it was in 1999. Why did people vote for Ambode? Not that Ambode was better than Agbaje. His antecedents are not better than that of Agbaje but people were too sceptical to change what had been working in Lagos. People saw that Ambode was coming from the same political lineage as Tinubu and Fashola and Lagosians were not ready to take a risk of changing that lineage and that was how Ambode got it and so, he needs to deliver to Lagosians to continue to believe in that lineage. So, I think that is totally at the discretion of the President. I am not the President and I am not closer to being one. So, it is strictly at the discretion of Mr. President. I just think he needs a lot of energetic and fresh-blooded people around him to complement his age and wisdom and Mr. President has all that as his strength.
Are you trying to talk about Mr. President’s recent comment about his age? You know that issue has been blown beyond measure, recently.
It is part of the death wish of the opposition. He simply said that what I did at a younger age, I will not be able to do them now. He said he wished he was 33 when he became the President and he even clarified that the next day. He is just saying that he would do things in a different way because he has age and wisdom on his side now. To cite an example, maybe if he was younger, the next day he came in, he would have dissolved all parastatals; sacked everybody. You know that is what a young man is likely to do. He has age and wisdom on his part and he will harness that. If he was a much younger person, maybe he won’t have supported Akinwunmi Adesina for the African Development Bank job because this was someone who campaigned against him and worked for Jonathan. For the sake of age and wisdom, he put politics aside and chose to support Adesina. That is what I think he was talking about that he would do things differently. Someone else of a younger age would have said “What! I will never support Adesina’. He would have blessed one of his own person who campaigned for him with that position. Those who blew the statement out of proportion are those that nursed a death wish for him. They wanted to dance to the market and say “We told you so” (laughs).
If the issue of corruption is all that Mr. President would tackle in government, I’m sure you know Nigerians would heave a sigh of relief on his administration. What can the President do to finally lay the siege of corruption to rest in the Nigerian system?
Two or three things – the first is to ensure that those who are found wanting are not covered up. For the culprits, whether they are party members or not, the President should have the political will power to bring whoever to book. Secondly, you must fund the anti-corruption agencies and make them truly independent. Then, you must reform our judicial system that people who are taken to court must be brought to book on time. Four, the rules regarding procurements and certain conducts in public offices must be strictly adhered to and the rules must be obeyed. Nobody must cover up the rules. For example, the easiest way to steal money from public offices is through procurements. Procurement is the biggest avenue through which money is stolen in public offices, either through a top up or inflated process. But there is actually a Public Procurement Act and there is a Bureau for Public Procurements that should oversee all these. So, why don’t you make them function and ensure that these rules are upheld? I mean the rules for public procurement. They were under the due process office during the regime of Obasanjo but then, the Due Process Office is not the Bureau for Public Procurement. It was now legalised into a statute. That is the type of thing we should pursue now. I even expect that these days, if I were the President, on all procurements in public offices, apart from the bidding process, awards and all that, every parastatal and ministry must always publish the contracts that have been awarded in the last weeks or months; the amount and date of completion of the contract must also be slated. If it is the supply of biros, tell us who got it and for what price – put it there. Also put the name of the MDs of the companies that get the contracts so that we know when the same name appears against all the companies that have been listed. If you have supplied just one biro for N5m, let the public see it.
You wrote to the National Assembly insisting that the NNPC must be probed. What point are you trying to make by that action?
It is very simple. The former Minister herself wrote to the National Assembly before she left office. So, I am only taking a cue from her. Diezani herself wrote, inviting the EFCC to come and probe. If she herself wrote, what is wrong in supporting what she has done? She said they should investigate her and the system and I am only adding to it. The only curiosity I find is this: Why did you wait till the wee hours when you were leaving the office before writing? Secondly, why would you write to be investigated over matters which you have total control over? There are subordinates under you that you could have queried and also documents you had total access to. Recently, the press has been deceived about crude oil swaps. Certain companies have been given crude oil to take to the international market and bring in petroleum products; take crude oil to refineries and bring it back to the country. We have it that so many of them reneged and these monies were being shared between the oil and gas companies and some NNPC officials. I am just calling for a public hearing. I am not making any accusation or conclusion. I am only saying that the National Assembly should hold a public hearing. Yes, the investigative bodies are doing their work but let us have a public hearing so that Nigerians would know why they don’t have good roads, health facilities, power, etc. Nigerians should know where their money is going.
Are you also in support that President Buhari should prosecute all corrupt officers in the system, particularly the ones in the last administration?
He himself has said it that he is not going to wake up in the morning, carry a torch and begin to look at the past. That is what they call deliberate probe of the past. He has said he would not do that. He said he would be pointing the torch forward, but when he starts to point the torch forward and now sees a shadow of someone who has done something wrong or eaten money behind, he cannot but invite the person to come and explain himself. The point is that if in the course of discharging government functions, issues come up regarding the mismanagement of certain funds, he won’t close his eyes to it. At that point, he is not probing the past. If he stumbles on legitimate complaints of malfeasance and misappropriation of public fund that has happened, he has no option but to look at it because he has not granted amnesty to past looters, he only said that he would not probe the past and like we say in Warri: “If hand touch anyone, hand touch am be that” (laughs).
How about the issue of insurgency – do you think Mr. President is toeing the direct paths in that regard?
The President and Commander-in-chief is very knowledgeable in this issue and I think I will concede that to him because I may not know what to do about that myself on how to handle insurgency but I believe that the basic issue is to cut off funding, supply and cut of the exit routes of the insurgents where they attack. With this, I don’t think insurgents will always escape to certain routes every time. Once you cut off those areas, I think we will get somewhere with the issue of Boko Haram.
What advice would you like to give to Nigerians on the present administration?
Very simply! People should not wake up every morning wishing Buhari dead or that he fails, even the opposition. It is still our county and we still own this country together. They should pray for the President, wish him well and give him ideas. If he now fails to deliver after all that, then they can take a decision later regarding the party and the President. At this time, he needs our prayers and support.
You think he can perform creditably well to the satisfaction of the people?
I have no reason to be pessimistic.
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