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A few lawyers have frowned at the Abuja High Court ruling
extending the tenure of the governors of Adamawa, Bayelsa, Cross River, Sokoto
and Kogi states based on the fact that they swore new oaths after rerun
elections were conducted in their states.

Presiding judge, Adamu Bello, said any elections in Kogi,
Sokoto, Adamawa, Cross River and Bayelsa states would have to wait until next
year. The ruling also set new dates for the termination of the governors’
tenures. Ibrahim Idris, Kogi will stay on till April 5, 2012; Aliyu Wammakko,
Sokoto remains till May 28, 2012; Timipre Sylva, Bayelsa leaves on May 29,
2012; Liyel Imoke’s tenure in Cross River terminates on August 28, 2012; and
Murtala Nyako, Adamawa got his tenure elongated till April 30, 2012.

According to Ubani Monday, a lawyer: “We have to have this
matter resolved at the appellate court, but in my own opinion, that judgement
is legally right but morally wrong. Because allowing a situation where someone
who has been in power without the people’s mandate to spend three and a half
years and you now send him for a rerun election and the system is manipulated
in his favour and now give him extra four years.

“Then all those years that he spent without the people’s
mandate, what has happened to it? They didn’t punish him, they did not bring
him to any justice, they did not in any way query him and they now feel very
emboldened to add to his years, and morally, it is wrong to give such people
this traditional tenure elongation.”

Malachy Ugwummadu, also a lawyer, told NEXT at the High Court
premises, Ikeja that only the Appeal Court could resolve this, as the electoral
commission had two controversial rulings to deal with. However, the Independent
National Electoral Commission says it is still studying the case to be sure
weather election will take place in the states.

Baffling judgement

According to Aghanya Dennis, former CPC national publicity
secretary, “the matter should be appealed by INEC and the Supreme Court should
give it accelerated hearing. Maybe the judgment may be upturned at that level.”

According to him, “the danger in the judgment is that electoral
crime is encouraged rather than discouraged. For somebody who was confirmed to
have enjoyed a stolen mandate in the first place and his victory was upturned
by a court of law to be given this reprieve by the same court of justice is a
contradiction to the same justice the court is expected to give. A thief is a
thief however you look at it. But whom do you blame, the judge who abided by
the constitution or the beneficiaries of the judgment who are exercising their
constitutional right?”

Basssey Ewa-Henshaw, a senator representing PDP, Cross River
said that he was baffled by the judgment.

“If I remember correctly, the Supreme Court had already taken a decision on
the matter that if you were the incumbent and you had to go for a rerun and you
won, your tenure continued from where it stopped. This judgment is a bit
baffling to me and I need to be able to look at the two judgments to know what
the judges used as a foundation to arrive at their decisions.”

The plan for the general elections
suffered a setback last week when a federal high court sitting in Abuja
ruled that there should be no governorship elections in five states in
April because the governors started their terms after they won rerun
elections in their states. The governors of the five states: Ibrahim
Idris of Kogi, Aliyu Wamako of Sokoto, Timiprieye Sylva of Bayelsa,
Murtala Nyako of Adamawa and Liyel Imoke of Cross-River had, last
September, challenged the decision of the Independent National
Electoral Commission (INEC) to conduct governorship polls in their
states this year while, according to them, their tenure was still
running. They also asked the court to stop their party, the People’s
Democratic Party (PDP), from conducting any primaries for the
governorship elections in their states.

The presiding judge, Adamu Bello,
in his judgment, held that since the 2007 elections which initially
brought the governors to power was nullified and set aside by courts of
competent jurisdiction, the oath of office and allegiance subscribed to
by the five governors had been nullified and set aside along with the
elections.

“The tenure of governors starts counting from the day they took their oath of office and oath of allegiance,” the judge said.

The ruling also set new dates for
the termination of the tenures of the governors. Ibrahim Idris, Kogi,
will stay on till April 5, 2012; Aliyu Wammakko, Sokoto, remains till
May 28, 2012; Timipre Sylva, Bayelsa, leaves the next day on May 29,
2012; Liyel Imoke’s tenure in Cross River terminates on August 28,
2012; and Murtala Nyako, Adamawa, gets his tenure extended till April
30, 2012. INEC had last August announced that the tenures of governors
who were re-elected after their 2007 elections were cut short by
tribunals would end on May 29, 2011. The position of the electoral
commission was bolstered by an amendment to the electoral act. Section
135 of the principal act, which deals with governors’ tenure, was
amended in subsection (2) by insertion of a new paragraph, c. It states
that: “In the determination of the four-year term, where a rerun
election has taken place and the person earlier sworn in wins the rerun
election, the time spent in the office before the date the election was
annulled, shall be taken into account.” INEC also advised political
parties to organise primaries in the states, which the affected
governors also participated in, although their lawsuit challenging the
primaries was still in court. As it happened, all the governors won the
party primaries and have already started their campaign for the April
election.

Appeal the judgement

INEC said at the weekend that it
was still studying the judgement and will not announce its next move
until its lawyers have provided legal advice. But one of the counsel to
the commission said at the weekend that the electoral body might appeal
the judgement.

“Our teams of legal experts are
still studying the judgment and may likely appeal against it and
election will hold in those states, as we will apply for an order of
stay of judgment pending the determination of the matter,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Some of the candidates of other
parties have also threatened to challenge the court ruling regardless
of the decision of INEC on the matter. The governorship candidate of
the Congress of Progressive Change in Adamwa State, Buba Marwa, who
expressed disagreement with the court ruling on the extension in which
the tenure of the state governor, Mr. Nyako of Adamawa state will
subsist until 2012, said the ruling makes rigging of elections
attractive to the political class.

“The deeper meaning is that it is
an incentive to rig. We are not in agreement and that is why we are
appealing it for the elections to hold this year,” he said.

“This is in fact without prejudice
to what INEC will do because originally the governors took INEC to
court. But as an interested party we are appealing the case and I have
reached out to all our teeming supporters and members of our great
party, the CPC to remain calm and continue with our programmes. Because
our programmes continue and we are expecting to flag of in a couple of
days.”

In his explanation of the
rationale for his planned court action, Mr. Marwa said a postponement
of governorship elections in the five states will only serve to confer
“additional bonus” to the benefitting governors.

He said the issue to be considered
was whether the original framers of the constitution intended for the
occupants to serve four years as governor or they can continue to take
advantage of judicial electoral victories to serve “extended tenure of
office”.

“Because if I know this will
happen, then I will rig the elections blatantly and in a manifest
manner so that the other side will take me to the tribunal,” Mr. Marwa
said. “This type of thing is something that we should address.” Mr.
Marwa’s stand is at variance with that of other opposition political
parties in the state, who are rather appealing to INEC and the federal
government to appeal the judgement in order to have it set it aside.

Aghanya Dennis, the former
national publicity secretary for the CPC called for an appeal by INEC,
adding that the judgement can only be resolved by the Supreme Court.

“The matter should be appealed by
INEC and the Supreme Court should give it accelerated hearing. Maybe
the judgment may be upturned at that level,” he said. “The danger in
the judgment is that electoral crime is encouraged rather than
discouraged. For somebody who was confirmed to have enjoyed a stolen
mandate in the first place and his victory was upturned by a court of
law to be given this reprieve by the same court of justice is a
contradiction to the same justice the court is expected to give. A
thief is a thief, however, you look at it. But whom do you blame, the
judge who abided by the constitution or the beneficiaries of the
judgment who are exercising their constitutional right?” Basssey
Ewa-Henshaw, a senator, (PDP, Cross River) said he was baffled by the
judgment, especially as it ran counter to an earlier ruling by the
Supreme court.

“If I remember correctly, the Supreme Court had already taken a
decision on the matter, that if you were the incumbent and you had to
go for a re-run and you won, your tenure continued from where it
stopped. This judgment is a bit baffling to me and I need to be able to
look at the two judgments to know what the judges used as a foundation
to arrive at their decisions. The Supreme Court is the apex court and
it is superior to the Court of Appeal,” he said.

When Fola Adeola was belatedly
announced this week as the ACN running mate to presidential candidate
Nuhu Ribadu, it completed the campaign roster of the four main
candidates vying for president. Almost as important as the presidential
candidate, the role of a running mate cannot be underestimated. As the
country’s number two citizen, the deputy’s credentials must therefore
be just as strong as the presidential candidates themselves.

The architect and the academic

The debate had raged, ever since
one-time university lecturer Goodluck Jonathan was named acting
president, over whether he would appoint a number two. That discussion
became moot when he was eventually named as substantive president. His
decision to pick Namadi Sambo can be described as a surprise at the
time. Apart from the fact that there were more prominent contenders,
Mr. Sambo’s three-year tenure as governor of Kaduna had not seen any
great distinction. Expectations were high in 2007 when he was elected
into his first major political role. He trumpeted an 11-point agenda
which he promised would reposition Kaduna as a national force. Promises
were made to revive the state’s health and educational sectors as well
as improve water supply, infrastructure and roads. As of May 15, 2010,
when his name was submitted to the National Assembly, no significant
inroads had been made in any of these areas. Mr. Sambo did record
significant success in cleaning up Kaduna’s image as a hotbed of ethnic
clashes. He is widely credited as the brain behind Operation Yaki, an
innovative task force which combined the strengths of local vigilante
groups, the police and even the armed forces. The security force has
been responsible for reducing crime in the state and preventing the
spillover of clashes that have occurred in Plateau and Bauchi. Prior to
his life in the public sector, Mr. Sambo was a businessman of some
renown. He still owns three companies and developed a reputation as a
very prominent architect in the 1980s. A quiet, unassuming character,
he is not the most inspirational of speakers and will probably connect
only with his constituents.

The banker and the policeman

The Action Congress of Nigeria
(ACN) were the last major party to name a presidential running mate.
The delay bordered on the absurd after at least three names were on the
verge of being announced before being pulled at the last minute. It was
hardly heartening to supporters of the party that Sunny Ugochukwu,
Ngozi Okonji-Iweala and Chris Ngige were all considered before former
banker Fola Adeola was eventually named this week. The delay also
exposed the underlying rift that lay between Nuhu Ribadu and Bola
Tinubu. The setbacks notwithstanding, Fola Adeola will join the
campaign trail from Monday and appears a popular choice amongst party
support. With Nuhu Ribadu at the helm, the ACN are using the
‘progressive’ tag as a mantra and, on paper, Mr. Adeola certainly fits
the bill. The chartered accountant was the founder and managing
director of Guaranty Trust Bank until he retired in 2002. His
professional life has been largely without scandal and GTB was one of
the banks that avoided the banking crisis of 2009.

In spite of his impressive CV, Mr.
Adeola comes with no real political experience. This is not for a lack
of trying. As a PDP candidate, he contested in the 2007 elections for
the Ogun Central Senatorial district but eventually lost out to Iyabo
Obasanjo-Bello. In 2003, he was reportedly offered the position of
finance minister in President Obasanjo’s regime. He refused for reasons
that remained undisclosed. He has played a prominent role in the
National Pensions Commission but has never been involved in frontline
politics. What he may lack in political sense, he makes up for in
strong rhetoric. Where Mr. Ribadu is more reticent, his running mate is
a trained motivational speaker. His speeches, however, are usually
aimed at high-level professionals and executives. It will be
interesting to see if he can adapt his style when addressing grassroot
voters. As a Muslim, he and Ribadu echo the Abiola/Kingibe ticket in
1992’s annulled elections. Supporters point to the overwhelming
popularity of that particular duo. Critics, on the other hand, suggest
that ethnic and religious tensions have heightened somewhat since then.

The pastor and the general

Many of Muhammed Buhari’s critics
have expressed concerns about his inflexible style, expressing concern
that this may extend to his religious views. The former general has
been at great pains to deny suggestions that he has an underlying
radical Islamist agenda. It is believed that this counted against him
in the 2003 and 2007 elections. It was always likely, therefore, that
he would pick a Christian southerner as a running mate, but he went a
step further by naming a bonafide pastor in Tunde Bakare. It remains to
be seen if the move is a masterstroke for the Congress for Progressive
Change (CPC) but Mr. Bakare is an immensely popular personality.
Although not a politician, the head of the Latter Rain Assembly, has
never been shy about criticising the government. So vehement was his
criticism that he was detained and questioned by state security
officials in 2002 for speaking out against President Obasanjo’s
administration. He famously called the former president ‘a false
messiah.’ A fiery character, the Pentecostal pastor has achieved great
success through his brand of ‘televangelism’ both domestically and
internationally. He also started an advocacy group, Save Nigeria Group,
which played a pivotal role in organizing protest rallies during the
late President Yar’Adua’s protracted absence. The pastor created a stir
last year after his group visited President Jonathan last year and
reportedly declined a $50,000 gift. His lack of political clout is an
obvious disadvantage but, like Mr. Adeola, he can speak directly to a
crowd, thanks to his background as a lawyer and pastor. Mr. Buhari is
occasionally labeled as being aloof but his running mate talks in a
language that people can identify with.

Although an intriguing choice as
running mate, he is similar in many ways to Mr. Buhari. The two men can
be described as radicals who often hold extremist views. Neither has
yet displayed a capacity to show great flexibility in their approach.
As a firebrand character, Mr. Bakare’s presence in the campaign team
will not counterbalance the public’s view of Mr. Buhari.

The governor and the governor

At 71, John Odigie Oyegun is the
oldest of the men seeking to be vice-president. As the All Nigeria
People’s party (ANPP) presidential candidate Ibrahim Shekarau’s running
mate, Mr. Oyegun does however possess some political pedigree. In 1992,
he was elected as the first civilian governor of the newly-formed Edo
state but was removed when Sani Abacha seized power. A development
planner by training, Mr. Oyegun had previously been in the employ of
the federal civil service and had served as a permanent secretary
across several ministries. ANPP’s strategy is clear. The plan is to use
Mr. Oyegun to capture votes in the South-South where the party has no
foothold. Although Mr. Oyegun is remembered favourably from his
20-month stint, he has little clout in the region. He is the party’s
deputy chairman in the south but his appointment may lend little value
to the chances of the ANPP. Mr. Oyegun is a highly knowledgeable and
eloquent individual but his age might be a disadvantage. With the
rigours of a political campaign to consider, this could prove a crucial
factor for a party still struggling with its identity.

Fans of ‘The
Project’, a politics-centred interview programme on Television
Continental (TVC) in Lagos, will have to look for another programme
because there are claims that the programme has been dropped from the
station based on the directive of Bola Tinubu. Mr Adekeye said the
decision to discontinue the programme was communicated to him on phone
by the management of the station on Tuesday, 48 hours after he had a
meeting with the management where they informed him of Mr Tinubu’s
displeasure with an article he had written earlier in the month.

On 4 February, Mr
Adekeye wrote an article he titled “Dynasty Toples Democracy” that was
published in NEXT’s opinion page. In the article, he expressed his
dissatisfaction with the manner Mr Tinubu, leader of the Action
Congress of Nigeria (ACN), was personalising the party. He also
criticised Mr Tinubu’s romance with the Congress for Progressive Change
(CPC) in search of a vice president position at the detriment of his
party’s presidential candidate, Nuhu Ribadu.

Eleven days later,
Kehinde Bamigbetan, Chairman of Ejigbo local council in Lagos and
former spokesman for Mr Tinubu wrote a rejoinder he titled “Tinubu Does
Not Deserve Ribadu’s Scorn” that was also published in NEXT.

“Let the real
Muyiwa Adekeye, political consultant and protégé of Nuhu Ribadu, the
presidential candidate of Action Congress of Nigeria, shake off the
paraphernalia of his pretence and stand where he truly belongs,” Mr
Bamigbetan wrote in his opening paragraph for his rejoinder.

He criticised
Mr.Adekeye’s opinion and choice of language in the article. “Adekeye’s
reference to our leaders as potentates indicates the little regard he
has for experience and expertise on the field,” he added.

After the programme was routinely aired that week, Mr Adekeye was invited for a meeting with the management of TVC.

At the meeting,
“they left me with no doubt that the owner of TVC (Mr Tinubu) was not
happy with my articles,” Mr Adekeye said. “I was told that Mr Tinubu
was unhappy with some of the things I said in the article… and I made
it clear that I wasn’t going to surrender my right to express myself
freely as a Nigerian.” The following day, Mr Adekeye wrote a reply to
Mr Bamigbetan’s rejoinder, but published it in another national daily.
The article gave his programme a red card. According to Mr Adekeye, the
morning after his second article was published, the station manager,
Gbolahan Olalemi, informed him that the “directors have decided to rest
the programme.” Mr Olalemi in an interview with NEXT, however, denied
the allegation that the programme was dropped based on the orders of Mr
Tinubu. He said that the claim came as a surpprise to him. “The man
(Mr. Tinubu) doesn’t even know there is a programme called The Project.
How could he have said it should be dropped?” The Project was first
aired on 8 January and since has hosted high profile guests like Nuhu
Ribadu, ACN’s presidential candidate, Tunde Bakare, CPC’s vice
presidential candidate,

Adamu Ciroma, chairman Northern Elders Forum, and Kayode Fayemi, the governor of Ekiti State.

The station
manager, however, said the programme did not meet up with the station’s
quality standards and needed to be improved and that was the reason it
was dropped.

“I called him and
said he should improve the quality of The Project.” The station manager
said. He added that he had at some point offered to produce the
programme himself to ensure it got the needed standard.

Mr Adekeye, however, disagreed with the station manager.

“There is a Yoruba
saying that: if a witch cries at night and a child dies the following
morning, everyone knows the cause of the child’s death,” said Mr
Adekeye, tracing the fate of his programme to his articles.

Mr Bamigbetan who still speaks for Mr Tinubu told NEXT he was not
aware of Mr Adekeye’s difficultuties with the station. “This is news to
me. I will dig into it and get back to you,” he said.

Lack of
coordination between security agencies and the fact that there is no
clear rule about which agency is in charge of crowd control are the
main causes of stampedes, security experts have said.

Last week,
President Goodluck Jonathan ordered the office of the National Security
Adviser (NSA) to ensure special training on crowd control for security
officers, to prevent future tragedies like the stampede in
Port-Harcourt.

But there is also an intense inter-agency rivalry that needs to be addressed as well.

The Nigerian
Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) and the Nigerian Police both
claim that they are responsible for crowd control.

The corps’ spokesperson, Emmanuel Okeh, said crowd control is one of the core functions of the agency.

Olusola Amore,
Police Public Relations Officer, however said that the police is
usually in charge of crowd control, but in the case of Port-Harcourt, a
collaboration of security agencies were involved.

Both agencies also
claim that their officers receive crowd control training. Mr. Amore
said that, “Police training is all embracing, including training for
crowd control and riot,” and officers are taught to appreciate the
situation and respond with the appropriate measure of force.

“It would be wrong
to confront market women who are throwing potatoes and tomatoes at you,
with firearms,” he said. However, if officers are in genuine fear for
their lives, then firearms would be necessary. The defence corps
however de-emphasized the use of fire-arms. “Crowd control does not
involve the use of arms. It does not involve things that are
injurious,” said Mr. Okeh. Rather, he said, the agency uses trained
dogs while their staff study human psychology and how to handle
difficult people.

Neither police nor defence corps

A security expert,
Harrison Jatau, however said that crowd control should be left to the
experts in private security firms instead of national security agencies.

Mr Jatau, who is the regional manager of Halogen Security in Abuja and a retired naval officer,

said that people in
industrial security are better trained in crowd control than their
counterparts in security agencies. “What gives a security man, like an
army man, confidence is his gun. Take the gun from the army man and he
might not be able to function effectively in crowd control,” he said.

Mr. Jatau, who
worked with security officers at the Star Mega Jam in Abuja, said there
was chaos among the rank and file of the security agencies at the
popular R. Kelly concert in December, last year. The Military, Mobile
Police, the Nigerian Police, Bomb Squad, SSS, and Civil Defence were
all present and they were receiving overriding orders from their
different leaders, he said.

“The event managers must ensure that each security agency is well
represented and meetings are held,” he said, “so that at the end of the
day, we will have a clear idea of the command of control, who is
actually in charge.” Mr. Okeh also acknowledged that if the agencies
worked together, their duties would be performed better. However, Mr.
Jatau, who retired from the Navy in 2005, said that there is often
discrimination between the agencies and one force usually thinks that
it is superior to the other. “The Military tends to look down on the
Police, and the Police looks down on Civil Defence,” said Mr. Jatau who
added that this mentality needs to end if the agencies are to perform
their duties well.

What do you make of the situation in your country Libya?

The situation in
Libya today is not only pathetic, but a challenge to the entire mankind
to stand-up against injustice, against brutal dictatorship. Muammar
Gaddafi is a brutal dictator who has ruled his country for over four
decades (42 years) with nothing positive to show other than attracting
the world’s scorn.

The people of
Libya have been subjugated to a merciless regime for too long, hence
they are yearning for a change and you know indeed change is the only
thing constant in life. I don’t blame them.

The people of
Libya deserve to be liberated from the brutal dictatorship of this
‘God-less’ creature! It is a pity and agonising as well to note that
Libya is one of the richest countries in terms of God-given resources
in Africa, yet there is infrastructural decay, massive unemployment of
the teeming Libyan youth, highest rate of nepotism in the world;
Gaddafi’s sons and relatives own Libya. Indeed, he made his clan, the
Sirte people, first-class citizens over and above every other clan.

Gaddafi used the
‘divide-and-rule’ system to the maximum level to create a state of
fear, suspicion and enmity amongst his people; a father is afraid of
his child simply because he knows the child can be recruited by the
ruthless dictator as a spy against the father. It’s that bad.

Is there any justification for the revolt?

Yes, the popular
uprising is not only justified but long overdue. Like I said earlier,
Libyan people deserve to be liberated from the brutal, merciless iron
fist of the world’s worst current dictator.

What is your feeling about the killings going on in your country?

My feeling and I
want to believe it’s the feeling of any human being, is that of sadness
and bereavement for the merciless and brutal massacre of defenceless
citizens exercising their fundamental human right to protest against
tyranny.

However, what
hurts me the most is the deafening silence of the West – so-called
epitomes of democracy – on this massacre taking place in Libya at the
moment. Indeed, if there is any crisis that has exposed the hypocrisy
and double-standard of the West, especially the US in recent history,
the Gaddafi massacre of the poor citizens of Libya is it. When the
Tunisian uprising began, the West was extremely vocal in condemning the
use of force against defenceless citizens! Again, during the Egyptian
people’s revolt against their dictator, the West was practically
calling for the head of Mubarak; Obama was on air every three hours on
that fateful day, warning, cautioning and even threatening U.S. actions
before Mubarak towed the path of honour and resigned and in the 18 days
the uprising lasted, Mubarak made concessions of momentous proportions,
condoled the bereaved who lost loved ones. He never used uncouth
language talk less of threatening the good people of Egypt with death
if they didn’t stop the protest. Yet, the West demanded he must go.

While for Libya
not only did this devil hire mercenaries to massacre the Libyan
citizens; he has ordered his fighter jet bombers to bomb defenceless
citizens; ordered his goons to shoot any protester in sight.

So far, over 2000
defenceless citizens of Libya have been massacred by this evil monster
and he has the temerity to tell the whole world to go to hell, he will
not resign, rather he will shed every blood in Libya to continue
ruining that country. Yet, all that the West has to say is “We are
watching the awful events unfolding in Libya and will make a decision”
perhaps after the man has exterminated the entire citizenry; shame on
the hypocrites.

Libyans are said to be doing well under Gaddafi, why the revolt?

I’m glad you
qualified the statement with “it is said” because the truth is that it
is all propaganda. Like I said earlier, there is a teeming population
of youth in Libya who are unemployable because they have no skills. The
Libyan educational system does not train you to be productive; rather,
it forces the inculcation of the so-called “Revolution mentality” on
the youth, whereby they become totally dependent on ‘handouts’, food
rations and other basic necessities of life. Yes, as a Libyan, you
don’t have to work to get food to eat; every commune has something like
a cooperative store that gives people of the community basic foodstuff
like wheat, barley, rice, oil, salt. The fundamental question is; “Does
man live on bread alone”? A famous saying has it. “It is by far better
to teach a man how to fish, than to give him a fish daily.” Gaddafi has
denied the Libyan youth the knowledge, the skills of “how to fish”.

It always amazes
me when Nigerians, especially in the North speak so glowingly of
Gaddafi; of “how he takes care of his people”. I only say if only you
knew what and who Gaddafi is; they will make special congregational
prayers to invoke God’s wrath upon this tyrant.

Libya is one of
the most richly oil-endowed countries in the world, with a GDP of
US$70b (2010), with a very small population size (five million citizens
only) yet Abuja, the capital city of Nigeria is by far more developed,
more modern than Tripoli, which has been in existence before Nigeria’s
independence from colonial-rule.

In the city of Tripoli, there are still untarred streets with open-gutters as recent as 2006, my last visit.

Libya has been
exploring and exporting oil long before Dubai discovered oil, yet, in
terms of advancement in every facet of life, Dubai is light years ahead
of Libya, no thanks to Gaddafi’s wicked and warped ideology of
communism. Substantial revenues from the energy sector, coupled with a
small population gives Libya one of the highest per capita GDPs in
Africa, but very little of this income flows down to the lower orders
of society.

A study conducted
in the 90’s showed that from the time Gaddafi toppled the Monarch
(1969-1998); Libya earned a whopping $769 billion as oil revenue, yet,
there is nothing to show for all that money! Well, actually, there are
plenty things Gaddafi did with Libyan’s oil wealth; sponsoring and
supporting unrest, civil wars, terrorism. Former Justice minister, who
recently resigned in protest to the mass-massacre of defenceless
citizens has today told the world that he has proof that Gaddafi
ordered the bombing of the Pan-Am airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland in
1988 which killed 238 innocent lives.

Gaddafi treats
Libya as his personal estate, hence its resources are his to do as his
whims and caprices dictate. There is the so-called Gaddafi-foundation,
which has in its kitty, a staggering US$150 billion, and it’s solely
controlled by one of his deranged sons, Saif Gaddafi, who is also
reported to be the richest (thief) in Africa.

This foundation is
the conduit-pipe through which Gaddafi funds most of the wars he
sponsors, and his sons (kith and kin) also help themselves with! That
is why when we complain about public officials in Nigeria looting the
treasury, it seems they are saints compared to what Gaddafi and his
progeny are committing in Libya.

Doesn’t it make sense to stop the protest in the face of Gaddafi’s threat that he will fight to the end?

I would like to urge my brethren in Libya to persevere, to keep pushing out the “Evil-Dictator” to liberate themselves.

God Almighty
detests tyranny and injustice, thus God will grant them victory. It is
the supreme-sacrifice Libyans are making today, but history will indeed
record them as those who stood up against tyranny and that is the most
precious legacy any human being will ever wish for.

What is your advice for Gaddafi?

To the “Tyrant”;
may God almighty inflict upon you even one-tenth of the pain,
deprivations and anguish you inflicted upon the peace-loving
almost-to-a-fault people of Libya.

And to the world,
I’m urging every God-fearing human being regardless of creed, race,
tribe or colour to rise up in unison and condemn the brutal massacre of
defenceless, unarmed citizens trying to free themselves from the
shackles of a dictator.

Do you have refugees coming to Nigeria from your country?

As at now, I don’t
know of anyone that is able to escape to Nigeria from the tyrant
because Gaddafi has blocked all media of communication with Libya; no
telephone, no internet. We cannot even get across to our relatives in
Libya; only God knows if they are still alive or not.

Jamal Abdallah
Ahmad Elbaff’s Grandfather, Ahmad Elbaff was born in Kukawa,
present-day Borno in 1887, like his late father. However, he still has
‘blood-links’ with Libya by as his cousins and distant relatives still
live there.

How do you intend to win election in a state practically controlled by a dynasty?

We intend to win
the election simply by connecting with the people of the state. The
people are yearning for positive change. They want an improvement in
their lives; they want restoration of their dignity as Kwara people.
They want economic, social and political liberation from a hegemonic
few; so these are the things people are yearning for and these are the
areas we are connecting with people and these are the basis upon which
we will win the election.

You work and reside in Lagos, how connected are you with the common man in Patigi or Shonga?

Well, most of my
life has been in Kwara State. I went to secondary school in IIorin and
even after secondary school, I spent my holidays in Ilorin. A lot of my
childhood and personal friends and family all live in Kwara State.
Don’t forget that my father worked as the Solicitor-General and
Commissioner for Justice, so I am very in touch with people.

What strategies do you have to counter the massive followership of the Saraki dynasty?

Election is about
the true test of the popularity of people and in a free and fair
election, we (the Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN) will clearly dispute
that assertion of the Saraki’s supposed multitude supporters. What we
have is a situation whereby we are offering the people what they should
be getting all these years. We are offering them free qualitative
education, free medical services to a certain class. We are giving
people the opportunity to earn a living and giving them the power to
believe in themselves to uplift themselves economically because this is
the key. If you take out electoral malpractices (a lot of which we have
discovered in past elections) and then take out the use of state
instrumentalities of suppression and bribery, the Saraki factor is
nothing in Kwara politics.

How will you assess the eight years of Bukola Saraki’s administration?

I will say it’s not
good enough. The last eight years of Bukola Saraki has not done enough
to give the people of Kwara what they need, what they deserve and what
is their right. He is one of the better PDP governors but he is only
better amongst a very, very bad lot. In terms of overall achievement I
won’t score him high at all.

Do you think the split between brother and sister will be in your favour?

Split or no split
between them has absolutely no concern for me. I am concerned with
delivering to the generality of the people of Kwara. It is what the
Kwara people need at this time that we are concerned with, not what
happens between a brother and a sister or a father and a son.

What are your economic plans for the state popularly referred to as a civil service state?

There are certain
disadvantaged areas in the state. The first thing that we will do is
bring in some activities by establishing some government presence
because at the moment the government is still the largest benefactor in
any society. So we’ll bring government presence to generate some
micro-effect and to create jobs and a few more bread winners and that
will begin to give a boost. We already have a proposal in contemplation
where we will set-up some high employment generating activity in each
of the three senatorial zones and we will do this within the first six
months. That creates employment; which is the key to boost morale. As
more people have jobs then we’ll have the trickle-down effect which
then enables the government to plan its activities because in the short
term, people are seeing things and earning income.

One of the touted projects of the outgoing administration is the Shonga farms. What will your policy be on the project?

The jury is still
out on Shonga farms. Any agricultural policy must have three things for
it to be successful in my view. One, it must boost food production for
the people of the state. Two, it’s got to create employment and three,
generate revenue for the state. Those are the three criteria on which
any agricultural policy must be judged and the Shonga farms fails
woefully on all three. It is a total waste of money. Foreign investment
as I understand it, is that the foreigner brings in the investment and
that is not the case with Shonga farms.

What they’ve done
is that they pay them (the Zimbabwean white farmers) to come and then
we are paying them to repatriate proceeds of the investment. That is
not foreign investments and it defeats the essence of the agricultural
policy. The produce of Shonga farms are not available for the benefit
of the local community. Till date the government has not given a proper
account of how much revenue has been earned from the Shonga farms since
its inception.

So what will you do with Shonga farm when you become governor of Kwara State?

We will certainly
have a good look at it. It will be foolish of me to say we will abolish
it or discontinue all together. We will not throw away the baby with
the bath water. In other words if the project can be salvaged to make
it genuinely meaningful and beneficial to the state and its people, we
will look for ways of salvaging it and that must be the first priority
because a lot of money has gone into it and we won’t want to waste
that. But if it turns that it is just a total drain on the state’s
resources and it is something that is bad for the morale of the people
then we may just have to cut our losses. But then again, it will be
subject to a thorough review.

What is the crux of your Kwara content policy?

Kwara content
policy is our initiative to ensure that government patronage would
first be given to Kwara people to enhance employment generation. In
other words when there are big projects to be executed by the state
government we will look for capacity from Kwara people.

When there is no
capacity the contractor that gets the project will be conditioned to
employ local people and must set about a credible programme where our
local people must be trained to transfer technology which will
ultimately generate such capacity in the state. All contracts will be
made public, so local labour, skilled and unskilled, can show interest.
There is nothing new to this scheme; it’s akin to the local content
policy in the oil and gas industry. That is one of major ways we
believe we can develop local capacity because as long as certain
calibre of jobs necessarily go to certain people because there is no
local capacity, we will never develop our local capacity.

Given the ethnic politics between Offa and Ilorin, aren’t you at a disadvantage as an Ilorin indigene?

At this point in
time, what Kwara needs is not where anybody is from, it is who will
salvage the state and take it to the next level, giving it a giant leap
in its development. It’s a fair and sensible argument and I respect
people who make it because there is a sense of fairness and equity in
it, but we have got to look at the circumstance of the state. What
Kwara needs is proper economic development at this time. Though being a
state since 1967, Kwara State has not truly developed to its potential.

Kwara need not be a
civil-servant state. So what people are looking at is who can propel
its growth and I think it is secondary nature where anybody comes from
at this time.

What’s your
take on the controversy over your emergence as ACN’s candidate with
support from Lagos and the party’s lack of internal democracy?

There is nothing
that says I as an individual cannot aspire to an office and secondly
there is nothing that says anybody that wants to support me, should
not. The questions we should ask is, did I go through the right
process? Yes I came into the party on the back of strong support from
almost everybody in the ACN simply because the party has certain
attributes they want in their candidates and immediately I expressed
that interest they saw that this could be a good guy. But unlike you
have in other parties there was never any time we said there will be no
primaries in Kwara, or which the rules were changed for me, nor were
any candidates forced to step down. What happened was that immediately
we got into the race, we attracted massive support from the general
public and that was the ground swell that we took to the primaries. A
few people who clearly will leave the party if they didn’t get their
way, left at the end of the primaries but the party remains very
strong. My message to those few who have left is always that, we still
want them back and that we will welcome them with open arms.

Why do you want to sacrifice a successful career for the murky waters of Nigerian politics?

Because the
country needs it. We all have to get out of our comfort zones. It is
not enough for us to be comfortable. For example, look at what is
happening now in Lagos where kidnapping is growing to be a norm. This
thing started four, five years ago in the Niger Delta and nobody spoke
up because it wasn’t a major concern for us here. We can’t just sit in
our comfort zone and not be concerned with what is going on. We have to
see what is going on in the states and country has a challenge and we
have all got to come out and salvage it. For me, leadership is about
sacrifice, it’s not about personal gain or aggrandisement. It’s not
about seeking attention; it is about trying to make things better than
the way you have found it and that’s why am in this race.

How are you financing your campaigns?

I have realised
it’s a very expensive business and it is particularly expensive in
Kwara State given the fact that money has been the determining factor
all these years, but this is where one draws on the goodwill that has
been built over the years and this has increased the number of people
who supported our course, who believe that Kwara cannot go on
continuing in the current condition that it is. There must be change
and from these people we get support financially, logistically and so
on but I do agree that it’s a big money venture and we are giving it
all we’ve got.