Joda: We Have a Fiscal System Breakdown, We Can't Pay Salaries, We Can't Pay Wages, We Can't Pay Our Debt
So, you remember that Buhari is no longer the soldier he was in 1983. He is now a politician who has to follow laid down rules and regulations. He has to decide on what to do about fuel pricing. State governments and even the federal government are unab
Ahmed Joda, chairman of the 19-man All Progressives Congress Presidential Transition Committee, belongs to the class of those highly revered top civil servants in the 1960s and 70s who played key roles in that era. Since he retired from the civil service 40 years ago, he had been saddled with crucial roles in the nation’s political transition process, atleast, on three major occasions. In 1979, he was the chairman of the Transition committee appointed by then newly-elected President Shehu Shagari. Twenty years later, he was called upon to be a member of a similar committee by former President Olusegun Obasanjo shortly after he emerged winner of the 1999 presidential election. Though in his eighties now, the lot fell on him again when President Muhammadu Buhari was looking for whom to chair the APC Presidential Transition Committee. The committee perused hundreds of pages of the handover notes submitted by the government of former President Goodluck Jonathan. Findings and recommendations of the committee are not only expected to determine the shape and direction of the new government, but will also shed light on the state of the treasury. At his Bakori Road modest house in Kaduna last Wednesday, there were no tell-tale signs that Joda was one of the most powerful permanent secretaries in the history of Nigeria. Wearing a white gown with a coffee-coloured fez cap in a room that looked like a mini conference area, he clutched a white Samsung Android mobilephone, which he occasionally swiped to answer or reject a call, depending on how important it was. For an 85-year old, it was very surprising that he was so mentally alert, recalling dates and events that happened 50 or more years ago, as he fielded questions from Tokunbo Adedoja, Shaka Momodu and Chuks Akunna. He spoke on several issues, including the challenges that confronted his committee, his views on expectations from the Buhari government, an overview of the state of the nation, the Boko Haram challenge, and as expected, he also went down the memory lane, and specifically, shed light on how one of the most controversial state policies - quota system – came to being. Excerpts:
Aside the intermittent invitations to come and be chairman of transition committees, very little has been heard of you. How has life in retirement been for you? Of course, I left on the 1st of April, 1978, which is nearly forty years ago, and of course, as you know, things can’t stand still. They change. So, it is a completely different world now. In my days, when you have to record my speech the way you are doing now, you needed two people to carry the tape recorder. Now it is so small that you can even hide it in your pocket. That kind of change has taken place. When I left in 1978, it was still military rule, there was an election in 1979 and an elected civilian government was in place for four years, and we returned to military rule until December 1983. We continued to have coups and counter-coups until we got to June 12, which, of course, was as traumatic as the civil war. Somehow, we were saved from that and in 1999, we came back to civil rule and so on. Things have gone bad, gone worse, some things would have been better, and there have been progress and there have been some retardation. But we seem to have hope now in the horizon and we should be working towards that.
You participated in three transitions; in 1979, 1999 and the current one.What was each experience like?
Well, I don’t know what to tell you. I didn’t plan to be appointed. I was surprised in 1979, I took very little interest in the election that took place, and it was a complete surprise that President Shehu Shagari asked me to be the chairman of his transition committee. I had wonderful people to work with, and those in the civil service, with whom our committee had to interact with. They were all colleagues and friends. Remember this was October, 1979. I left the service a little above a year. The person appointed to be liaising with our committee had served with me in Federal Ministry of Education as my deputy permanent secretary, so, we were friends, and all the permanent secretaries, all the directors, everybody in the system were close personal friends. We had very little problem interacting with them, even in private. In 1999, of course, President Obasanjo asked me to join Gen. T Y Danjuma in his presidential policy advisory committee. So, when we arrived at the committee, we already had an office with complete staff and accommodation. We just went to work. In 2015, it was a different ball game. If you noticed, the two previous occasions were the military handing over to civilians, and there was no bad blood between them. There was nothing, no history of violence between them. It was a case of a willing buyer and a willing seller. But this time, it was a bitter contest. There was suspicion everywhere, tension in the country. Some of these warranted, some, unwarranted, but that was the situation. I don’t know if the PDP government anticipated defeat in the election but they were, and we had a different situation. I didn’t expect it to be smooth either. But let me say that my personal interaction with Vice President Namadi Sambo and Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, an old friend, was very friendly. They were very polite. I have nothing to say against them. But they had programmes in the government. We asked them when we could have the handover notes? They told us their programmes. We asked if they could give us a bunch of papers, ministry by ministry, whenever they were ready, so that we could read them? They said ‘No!’. They didn’t like that. Our initial plan before the meetings was to receive the notes and work with them to devise new policies, new strategies, new ways of doing things. But this was not forthcoming. We now had to devise ways of getting information from other sources other than government. Of course, there were people all over the country, who were willing and eager to submit memoranda, even though we didn’t publish such request. Somehow, we received many, so much that it was practically impossible to read them in a year. We had a complete compendium from the business community, especially from Lagos, The Nigerian Economic Summit Group, the World Bank, all the foreign agencies, the NGOs in Nigeria, and the experts in various subjects addressing every issue you can imagine, in the Nigerian public interest.
What did you do?
Of course, we worked with these. If you recall, the tenure was remaining two weeks. This seemed totally inadequate because it took one week to establish our office and get the staff, that will get the work done. That said, we received the government papers on the 25th of May, four days to the hand over and you know the volume of papers. We had to sort this out and it took us until about the end of the tenure to do. We had to distribute, discuss and make sense of it. This was well after the inauguration, long after our committee ought to have wound up, but here we were, operating beyond the transition period. Many of us were business people, we had to go back home
You admitted receiving a lot of documents from the public. How reliable, in your opinion, were they?
Well, if you receive and listen to so many people, it doesn’t matter who goes to approach every subject from a different point of view. Maybe in the end you can reach a consensus. But I think if you are thinking that there were materials which were sent in bad faith, or to serve different interest, there may be, but by and large, I think people were trying to be constructive, and what really impressed me from the composition of our committees, from people who made this presentations to us, from the general public perception of it, because we were receiving telephone calls, people in Nigeria were suddenly, or about the same mind, they have differences of how to get there - the destination they wanted for their country. There was no doubt about that. I think there was complete change of attitude, bitterness. So, I was very happy to work with this and to witness the way Nigerians want to go.
Four days to the end of transition is quite short and that was when you received government papers. Don’t you think that there might have been some need for clarifications in some areas, maybe, after studying them?
Yes, certainly, would have been the need, unfortunately, there was no time. We were called Transition Committee and the transition ended on the 29th of May, by which time we had not been able to fully digest it. The most important issues have always been with Nigerian public, that there is corruption, there is poor governance, that we are not very happy with the police and our army, that even the judiciary, people are not quite happy. They respect the judiciary, they don’t want to criticize it, but nevertheless, they are not quite at ease with what is happening. Our civil service has been demoralized, there is so much confusion which is in the mode of…. I think many people expected Nigeria to have collapsed, and many didn’t care if it did. And then suddenly, God in His infinite mercy permitted President Jonathan to make one single call, which defused everything. This changed the country entirely and made people in doubt to now wish to work for it. I mean it took a little time to. But if you know how many Nigerians from different parts of the world rushed back to the country, sent memorandum, sent letters, to continue to make phone calls; I don’t know how they got the phone numbers. Everybody wanted to come back and contribute and to create a country that is good, that they can be proud of, I didn’t know such goodwill existed. But it now depends on all of us to handle that gift that God has given us.
Did that make you feel that change has actually come?
Well, am not so sure. I think, we need a little time to settle, but I think there are people out there who think that we can continue to behave the same way we have always behaved, not minding that that conduct actually brought us to where we are. Those who aspire to lead us, who have now been given opportunity to lead us, must actually be serious. And must look at Nigerians as they are. You know, I think, the Nigerian people are very patient, very understanding and very tolerant. In the First Republic, I was a growing up young man with high hopes, and we saw how things were degenerating and we ended up in a coup d’etat, and all the experience that accompanied it.
How do you mean?
Yes, we had political downturn, not unlike what is happening now. You know in 1962, the Action Group had their convention in Jos, it ended up in crisis, and that split Chiefs Obafemi Awolowo and Samuel Akintola. We did not recover for a long time, we may not have completely recovered from it. The indiscipline, the greed that led to that split, which led to the disturbances in Western Nigeria; we had problems in Tiv land. It may not have been as weighty as Boko Haram. These issues were not solved until that government was overthrown, and it was bloody, and it left some bitterness, it led to a civil war. But again, God in His mercy, the civil war just vanished. I was in the war front.
In the war front as…?
I was permanent secretary, ministry of information and was visiting Udi, Awka, Onitsha, Arochukwu, and places like that. In fact, we spent the night of Saturday the 9th of January 1970 with the Late Ukpabi Asika, Gen. TY Danjuma. Little did we realize that the war would end so soon.
What town did you meet the Late Asika?
That was in Enugu. By the 16th of January, a lot of colleagues from Biafra were already in Lagos for businesses and many business people I know in Kaduna were back in their businesses as if nothing happened. That is Nigerians for you. Everything had been wiped clean, and fortunately, we were in such a mood, that we were Nigerians in that moment and our recovery was easy, and God released the oil wealth and we were able to execute programmes that fundamentally altered this country. Look at the roads, all the way from Lagos to Kano, from Enugu to Kafanchan, to Kaduna, to everywhere. Everywhere you went, people were working, there was full employment. There were so many Africans flocking into the country to find jobs until we had to resort to what we called deportation of illegal aliens. We relaxed, corruption mounted, recklessness, power drunkenness, we forgot everything. We had an election, Shagari won, but everything begun to go bad, and the cause was that the military came back and stayed until that June 12, and the country was sliding. What did we do? Abacha died, Abiola died, so did Shehu Yar’Adua. The slate was again wiped clean and we began another chapter as if nothing happened. Then came 1999 and we started well. But the same indiscipline, in the political parties, the same greed, the same corruption returned and plagued us. Now, I think what happened in 2015 is an election, the kind of which we may not have thought possible. If you remember, Jega conducted an election in 2011. He was heavily criticized. The elections were universally rejected. Now, the same Jega conducted an election for which people praised him. Jonathan contested the election. Of course he had become so unpopular, but nobody expected that an incumbent president, with a powerful political party, who had the Army, the Police, everything, even the business community, could lose. Then, you had Buhari, whose name was not strange, but was known as a sincere person. He is considered by many to be clean, and the man with a courage to lead but with no godfather. He had to go through a screening process to defeat more powerful and richer candidates. And I think, until the end, nobody thought he could really win, nobody was sure what the result would be. But when the true picture emerged, Jonathan called to say ‘congratulations!’ I think that was God’s intervention, maybe for the last time.
What do you think would have happened had Jonathan not made that phone call?
I think most of us expected chaos. There were many outside Nigeria, who wanted to do business with Nigeria, who are friends to Nigeria, waiting to hear that the country has imploded beyond mending. In just one minute, all that disappeared. So, it is irresponsible for our political leaders or for anyone who claims to be leader
So, we need like 18 months, 24 months to begin to make a difference. Before talking to people, I did not expect that situation was this bad. So, there can be no quick fix there. Maybe, to fix the fuel supply system is easier. Now, it is so with our roads, it is so with our water supply system, it is so with so many other things, now, we have no money. And we know that over time, the situation can be remedied. Maybe, in six months, nine months, if all the leakages are blocked, if you stop the wastage, the leakage, the corruption that is going on, more money will be coming back to the treasury
or any of us, who aspire to be leaders in Nigeria, not to wish this country well.
One of the terms of reference of your committee is the mandate to suggest how to“quick fix” the government in thirty days, 100 day, or six months with visible changes. Based on your recommendations, are you optimistic that Nigerians will see visible changes in the next 100 days given the situation on ground - the state of the economy, security?
Well, you know, Nigerians and everybody expect change. I think we should be expecting realistic change. We all want to be able to drive to a petrol station and be able to fill-up and drive away. We tend to forget that a few weeks ago we were spending hours, sleeping in queues to get petrol. Now, what are the causes of these fuel shortages? The fuel importers think they are being owed so much money that they can’t continue to import. The banks will not even give them the money. So, they have that problem. And the money to pay them is not just there. Now, that is the knotty question: Do we deregulate the industry and allow fuel to come in and be sold at any price? President Jonathan tried it and we said ‘no!’ I don’t know if Buhari wants to repeat the same mistake his predecessor made. So, you remember that Buhari is no longer the soldier he was in 1983. He is now a politician who has to follow laid down rules and regulations. He has to decide on what to do about fuel pricing. State governments and even the federal government are unable to find enough money to pay salaries and wages, and for people like me, pensioners. So, if these people say they are broke, they can’t import fuel, they will continue to have this problem. So, it has to take some type of negotiations. There are several ways of doing it, but it has to be negotiated. It has to be done according to the procedures laid down. For instance, we all want electricity. Fine! We were told that a Nigerian capacity to generate electricity stands at 12,000 megawatts, but that only five thousand megawatts is available. And that for various reasons, only 1500 megawatts at a time can be generated and distributed. Now, clearly, there is problem somewhere. We have now learnt that the gas for which we know we have in abundance is not available to be delivered to the power generation plants. But even if the gas was suddenly to be made available, the transmission system is not able to accept it and deliver it to the distribution system. But even when that is possible, the distribution system is so weak, that can also be trouble. So, we need like 18 months, 24 months to begin to make a difference. Before talking to people, I did not expect that situation was this bad. So, there can be no quick fix there. Maybe, to fix the fuel supply system is easier. Now, it is so with our roads, it is so with our water supply system, it is so with so many other things, now, we have no money. And we know that over time, the situation can be remedied. Maybe, in six months, nine months, if all the leakages are blocked, if you stop the wastage, the leakage, the corruption that is going on, more money will be coming back to the treasury and so, we can bail ourselves out. And then the finance people are suggesting, I think they are working on short term measures to do all these things.
Your committee also overviewed the balance sheet of government, and recently, you spoke on the grim state of our treasury. A couple of days ago, President Buhari also came out to say he met a virtually empty treasury, which actually, aligned with your own position. But just this morning, the immediate past minister of state for national planning said they left several billion of dollars, $30 billion in our reserves, that they left sovereign wealth fund and plenty of money in the excess crude account. How did your committee arrive at the figures, I mean the N7 trillion deficit?
I haven’t read or heard of what you just spoke about, and I don’t understand figures; it was one of my worst subjects in school. But no matter what anybody says, we have a complete fiscal system breakdown. We can’t pay salaries, we can’t pay wages, we can’t pay our debts. And we don’t even know how much we owe, and how much deficit we have, it keeps rising. I have said before and I have heard people say with some authority, that when we started, deficit was about N1.3 trillion, by the time we finished, people were talking about N7 trillion. These are facts. Now what I had said in my interview, which you are quoting, is that if Jonathan had returned, and remember he had said in his campaigns that everything was well, the roads were good, electricity was there, 35 thousand kilometer distribution lines, and the railways, and that everything is working, would it have been easy for them to say we are broke on the 1st of June 2015? That sorry, we can’t do this, we can’t do that? But you and I would probably say no, you are telling us lies. Buhari has now been able to say look at the mess that they have made of it. We have to find ways, and we agreed that mess had been made, and we’d better be prepared to say to Buhari, ‘Look, find ways to solve it.’ We’ve to tolerate it for some time. But Jonathan had no excuse and the public anger would have been so much that he wouldn’t have known the consequences he would be facing.
Let us get back to the issue of petrol subsidy.You agreed that this has been a problem.You spoke with marketers obviously, and you have heard their complaints. Has speaking with them changed your view or those of the people now in government?
Look, they drafted me to participate in the presidential election which Abiola ran, under Option A4. I was asleep, and they said I must come around for Adamawa governorship. in one of my campaigns, a journalist raised the issue of petrol subsidy. I dismissed the issue as rubbish. I asked, ‘Why should the price of everything in the market be allowed to rise, except that of fuel? And right now as I speak to you, I see that fuel, which is subsidised by Nigeria, being ferried to the Cameroon Republic, and sold at twice the price. I don’t get it!’ I said it was rubbish. I was called and warned, ‘don’t talk about this.’ But I maintained, and then, occasionally, I’ve written in the press that it is rubbish. Who are we subsidising? Benin Republic, Niger Republic, Chad Republic, Cameroon and beyond. This leakage cannot be sustained by the Nigerian economy. It can only enrich a few Nigerians, maybe two or three people. Why should we pretend. Look, people who are demonstrating against fuel price increase are the same people, who will go and queue up for 24 hours and buy contaminated petrol at crazy prices. I have maintained that position also, because I can’t think of any other sensible thing to do. It is the same thing with fertilizer in agriculture. You cannot do it. It is a way to corrupt people, but I am not talking to you as chairman, Transition Committee,. I am telling you my own personal view.
north keeps crying,‘no money, no money’.You are the cream of the northern establishment.What in your estimation is preventing the north from tapping from farming?
I am not any of the things you described me as. I would talk to you as a simple, observant Nigerian. I have written several papers on the matter. In 1999, I wrote a paper in which I tried in my own ways to demonstrate that within five or six years, if we put ourselves to work, Nigeria will earn more money from agriculture than from oil and it will provide a hundred times more employment to Nigerians. I addressed specifically livestock, with which I am interested - cattle, goats, and sheep. I came out with figures that if we did everything right, within seven years, cattle, sheep, goat, hides and skins and beniseed and vegetables and fruits can be producing two or three times more money than you can get from crude oil. Of all the other things that we can do. Afew days ago, I learnt of a project around Gurara, which the federal government is doing and the Kaduna state government is also interested in. In that area alone, it could transform this country, and there is no reason why it could not be multiplied all over the place. It is the will, and of course, one of the major problems, is that we depend too much on theory and we neglect the practical aspects of doing things. This is the same problem everywhere. You know, in 1975, I was in the ministry of industry, a permanent secretary, we had sugar industries, plantations and industries going, we had cement plants, I can tell you where they are, the sugar was in Bacita. Cement factory in Ewekoro, in Shagamu, in Sokoto, in Ashaka, in Yandev, in Nkalagu. We had an airline, flying to many destinations around the world, and railways, everything was working, we were investing heavily. Where are they? If the River Basin Authorities, that were created in the early 70s, which were functional by the mid 70s, thirteen of them, in different parts of this country, if they were functioning, Nigeria would have been a different country. What is wrong with us? We are not creating, we are destroying.
Does it mean that the leaders then had more vision, more focus, more clarity of purpose than what we have now?
I don’t know, because in terms of education, and skill development, we should have many more Nigerians than we had at that time. We have Nigerians developing other countries, even in the advanced countries. When President Clinton came to Nigeria, during the Obasanjo era, he said if Nigerian workers and other health workers left the United States, their medical services would collapse, not to talk of engineers, lawyers, finance people, and we have them. When I broke my leg in 2010, most of the doctors and nurses that attended to me in a London hospital were Nigerians. I know many doctors, who are in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia, Dubai, who are Nigerians. Do we have medical services? Some people in Nigeria, if they have headache, they take the first plane just to confirm it is only a headache and come back. Many don’t come back, they come back in coffins. Why can’t medical teaching hospitals in Ibadan and Lagos, in Enugu, in Kano, why, why, why can’t they do simple operations? I have a relation who is sick and needs to undergo blood test. We can only take samples here and send to South Africa and wait for two weeks before the results are out. Is it beyond us to have one central laboratory to carry out these services?
You took us down the memory lane. At what point, in your opinion, did the nation begin to slide?
This is not going to be very popular. I think Nigeria was recovering well after the war until 1975 when Gowon was overthrown.
I am glad to say that Gowon is the best thing that happened to Nigeria, because he presided over a government that worked and was working. But he overstayed his welcome. He was advised on the day the war ended to adopt a program which will return Nigeria to civilian rule by the 1st of October 1973. The military did not accept that, they said 1976.
Who gave the advice?
I don’t think I need to name them. But he was given that advice. And I think the 1976 proposal made him extremely unpopular. Corruption was beginning to rise, and the government was losing direction. The incoming government of Murtala was welcomed with jubilation, and I think the expectations at that time was much as the expectations of now. People wanted this thing to be demonstrated. I tell you, I was in education (ministry) when the coup took place, but was thereafter transferred to go to the ministry of Justice. We had worked very meticulously to introduce four new universities in Nigeria in addition to the five older generation universities which were in existence. The new ones were to be put in Jos, Sokoto, Maiduguri and in Calabar. We had a certain number of polytechnics and Federal Government Colleges of Arts and Science, and Advanced Teachers Colleges, and Colleges of Education. They came and said ‘this is too timid’, we want more universities. Put one in Port Harcourt, another in Ilorin, in Kano, and double the polytechnics, double this, double that. This was very popular, it was welcomed and approved. You can confirm with General Obasanjo. In three years it became clear that Nigeria had bitten more than it could chew, and we started to have abandoned projects, some of them up till today. Now, Murtala was fighting corruption, but corruption, established itself more firmly during that regime. It was at the end of that regime that we started to have generals owning banks, estates. I do not accuse either Murtala or Obasanjo. I think, they meant extremely well, but power went into their heads. They believed that if you have political power, you can do anything. Obasanjo, in 1977, realized that the economy was going down and took drastic measures to build up reserves so that the incoming civilian government can be a little comfortable. He is there, you can go and ask him. Shagari didn’t meet an empty treasury.
You have spoken about the financial status of Nigeria when Shagari took over.You were in the transition committee.What is the deficit status of this government?
I don’t know, and I don’t think Buhari can tell you now. I think the figures will come in slowly. But I think if you go to them, they
will be able to give you their latest estimates.
You were quoted to have said seven trillion naira?
No. I said in the beginning, they talked about N1.3 trillion. By the time we finished, the same experts were talking about N7 trillion.
So, having looked and talked to people in the petroleum industry, which is a very critical sector and highest revenue earner for the country.What was your committee’s take on the Petroleum Industry Bill?
We didn’t examine the petroleum industry. I don’t understand the Petroleum Industry Bill, but I know that if we don’t fix the NNPC and its subsidiaries, and if we don’t clean up things, and don’t do things right, God help us!
Many Nigerians, especially from the South, seem unhappy with what they claim is the way states were created in favour of the North. Another point is that, even though the FCT was created to unite Nigerians, no southerner has been appointed FCT minister.Your views?
You started about talking about states’ creation. The FCT issue has always been there, even before the regions. Zik wanted Kafanchan to be the capital of Nigeria. Awolowo, in some of his writings, wanted the capital in the center of Nigeria. I don’t think he named any place. The debate was more in the South, because North, as usual, was never part of the debate. Now, I was in the civil war as a civil servant and the issue came up from time to time because people felt that Lagos, on the coast was too vulnerable, and we feared attacks from outside, and that actually propelled the urgency of the movement to the center. The agitation for the creation of states is an agitation largely driven by the South of Nigeria. The North hardly ever participated in it. If you remember the Willinks Commission, one of the issues it tried to settle was creation of states. It came with the recommendation that more states should be created, that some part of the South of Ilorin province, at that time, Offa, and places like that, be matched with the West. This was rejected. Now, after the coup of 1966, the cry for the creation of states erupted. It was largely, I think, two approaches to it. From the South, so we thought, was the plan to break up the North. From the nationalist angle, it was to weaken the big powerful regions, so that you can create a more united country that is more likely to be loyal to the country than to their regions of origin. Now, if you think, I don’t know, I have never thought myself that the creation of states of Nigeria, the way it is, was to balance the North and the South. If you look at the Nigerian map, the entire South, the 17 states of the South, is less than one quarter of the country, in terms of land size. Today, if you look at some of the local government areas in the North, in terms of land size, they are larger than some of the states in the South. In terms of population, it may be a different story. Have you ever spared a thought on what the population of the North compared to the South shall be in the next 50 years? The population shift is likely to be from the South to the North, and in 50years time, a lot of people from the South will move to the North because we have one Nigeria and they can move. So, if you do that, how do you redistribute it? Now, you talked about military creating states, not civilians. You know the decision making process in the military is simple and direct. You can do it in one hour. You can go to the Supreme Military Council, say bring the map, get the surveyors and they draw the lines, like they did it in 1884-85 in Berlin, the Berlin conference. They just divided it, or as the Pope when the people were going to discover America, and Asia, and they were quarreling, who is going to rule,. He said “bring the map, pencil and ruler,’ and he divided and said, “you go east, and you go west. Now, you talk of six geopolitical zones, my mind has not accepted that. Take what you call North-central. North-central is Tiv land, Idoma land, Igala land, Yoruba land, Nupe and so on. Until you go to Kaima. I don’t know the language they speak there, the people in the border with Benin Republic and the Tiv people in the border with Cameroon, they have absolutely nothing in common. How do you think that if you appoint a minister from Tiv land, Nupe people will think that is justice, or the Jukun people, or even North-east? Take Maiduguri. Shuwa Arabs, they speak Arabic there down to the Chamba people in Takum, and what do you get? They have never met. They are more in tune with the Igbos, the natural interaction, the market, the economic forces. That was why we established the unity colleges, this is why we established universities and polytechnics and colleges and set areas of catchment. That is why we established the National Youth Service Corps scheme so that people can meet at impressive ages, get educated together, rise together. Look, I am more of a stranger in my village, where my father was born. I am more at home in Ibadan, and Lagos, where I grew up and worked, where I had friend, where I had girlfriends and went around. If I go to Yola, they know that I was born there, they know that I am an Adamawa person, they treat me differently from those people who were raised there.
I don’t know. You know Obasanjo was president for eight years, and three years as head of state of Nigeria. You have had Jonathan, for six years as president. Why didn’t they appoint a southerner as FCT minister? You can go ahead and ask, why most Defence ministers are northerners? I don’t know. They never consulted me.
Many people believed that the northern leaders, didn’t do much on Boko Haram during the Jonathan presidency; that if they had acted in good time perhaps we would have nipped it in good time?
I think you people are refusing to accept that as at June 27, 1967, there was no North, there was a uniting force. Up till 1967, there was a government of northern Nigeria; there was a head of government, this was a strong uniting force, but when those six states were carved out, the north ceased to exist. The spirit might be lingering. Just this morning, I was thinking about Boko Haram, who is responsible? I accept that the north did not play the role it should have played, especially, the Moslem North, because they might have said, ‘this is not our problem, this is the problem of the federal government.’ And that may have been translated by Boko Haram adherents to mean overt support. When Sharia happened in Zamfara, we should have taken action, decisive action, because, in name, it was not rooted in Islam, it was not in the interest of any moslem. Look, leaders of the North were all Moslems, we were educated in a way in Western-style schools. Did that change us from being Moslems to being anything else? I don’t know of any person, that went to school from primary, to secondary, to other places, who converted from Islam, because they went to school. We were all practicing our religion. Even the proponents of sharia law were the products of this thing. What makes them different? Now, my own approach to this is, what I knew and did as a young man, and what I know other young men did, I cannot in all good conscience say that a young man of these days shouldn’t do. That
Of course, there were people all over the country, who were willing and eager to submit memoranda, even though we didn’t publish such request. Somehow, we received many, so much that it was practically impossible to read them in a year. We had a complete compendium from the business community, especially from Lagos, The Nigerian Economic Summit Group, the World Bank, all the foreign agencies, the NGOs in Nigeria, and the experts in various subjects addressing every issue you can imagine, in the Nigerian public interest
is one. People say Boko Haram was because the North did not want Jonathan to be president. But don’t forget, Boko Haram started under Yar’Adua. It was under Yar’Adua that they killed Yusuf, and it was that killing that escalated the thing. So, I don’t accept that it was the North against Jonathan, and I think Jonathan and most of his people thought that it was Jonathan and the s Suth. I think that was the mistake. We had Maitasine during Shagari’s time, we had it in Buhari’s time. I think they are trying to distribute the blame. Both sides behaved recklessly, and it is this type of recklessness that is giving us all the trouble that we are passing through.
So, what is the way out of this Boko Haram problem that has become a threat to national security?
I come from Yola, I have my residence there, I go there, I have no reservations about traveling to North –east or anywhere, but I can’t blame anybody sitting in Lagos or Umuahia to believe that going to Yola is committing suicide. Well, our security has always been weak. It may have gotten worse. How I wish the January 15, 1966 coup had been avoided. I believe the coup that overthrew Gowon could have been avoided. I tell you, the day Gowon was leaving Dodan Barracks to Kampala, the Late M.D Yusuf, his chief of security then, went to him and say, ‘ I’ve come to say goodbye,’ and Gowon said ‘thank you very much. See you when I return.’ MD Yusuf asked Gowon, ‘return where?’ Gowon did not take him seriously.
MD Yusuf told Gowon, ‘if you leave this place, you are not coming back.’ And he didn’t return. MD had the names of the people who were going to topple Gowon, but the Head of State wouldn’t listen. Tafawa Balewa had the names of the people who were going to kill him and many others. Somehow, he didn’t do anything about it. I think Ironsi would have known, yet neglected to act. You see why Babangida survived? He didn’t joke with security. If they said, ‘these guys are plotting against you, ‘ Babangida got all of them executed then. Now, he saved himself, I don’t know if he saved Nigeria. But you see, if somebody comes and tells you, sir, ‘this is what they are plotting,’ and you say, ‘No, you boys don’t be silly, get out!’ That is not how to deal with it. You deal with the situation decisively. We are not doing it. We believe in lobbying for everything, the easy way out which is not the best way.
What is your take on the Amnesty International report, some say it is targeted at the Nigerian military?
Please don’t deceive yourself, don’t deceive us. Why do you say it is targeted at the military?
Boko haram is an illegal, outlawed group. You don’t need to talk about them. We are government, we are Nigerian Army, we are the Nigerian Police, subject to law and order. Those people are criminals. You don’t begin to compare the issues. I ‘m sure you know, that the Nigerian Police routinely butcher people. I know people who have suffered such fate. I can identify them, I know their names, I know their relations. Didn’t the Nigerian Army wipe out Baga? These are civilian settlements. Didn’t they wipe out Zaki Biam? What is the name of the place in Bayelsa?
Yes, didn’t they kill people during the civil war, needlessly in Asaba? Should we forget about that? No. When issues like this are raised, if you begin to find excuses for them, no one will take us serious.
What then is your reaction to threats by certain groups to resort to violence should any of their sons be sent to ICC for trial?
Look, if you approach it that way, it may never wipe out impunity in the land. You have a law, people will come and break it, and you say nothing, you do nothing, and you think that will buy you peace? I don’t think so. When they killed Yusuf in the hands of the Nigeria police, in public glare, did we think that was right? Yusuf, may be a criminal, but there is no law in Nigeria that gives the police
the right to summarily execute anybody. There is a law, they should be taken to the law if you have confidence in the law.
What is your formula for reforming the civil service?
The government has many reports about the civil service. People like Asiodu and Adamu Fika wrote reports. Steve Oransoye wrote one recently. Allison Ayida did one, and many. First of all, you have to depoliticize the civil service. You have to protect it from the whims and caprices of the politicians. The careers of civil servants have to be regulated by the civil service commission from their recruitment, to their discipline, to their promotion, to their everything. No minister, no chairman of anything, should be able to promote this, demote this, dismiss this. It has to go through the process. Unless you respect it, a civil servant of any grade, can go to his superior and say look, you can’t do this, this is the way it is done, or director going to the perm sec, or permanent secretary going to the minister, or going to the president and say this is what it is. But today, you can be appointed on the radio, you can be dismissed on the radio, and your career prospects can be jeopardized by anybody. I have seen it with my eyes. You can’t expect that you pay pittance and expect to make them happy to deliver. If you and I go to the same university, finish the same degree, go through the same course, he is rising, and you are stagnant, for no justifiable reason, such a person is bound to be demoralized. The paper work is there, the government needs to act on it and decisively.
A lot of people have argued that putting the federal character clause in the constitution was a big mistake, and the cause of the several problems we have today. Your thoughts?
This is a federation. It depends on how you define merit. Now, in our own situation, it is quite impossible. If, for instance, an Igbo man is in charge of an agency or office, you find out that in due course the place will be dominated by the Igbos, There is no point arguing it. If you are a Hausa man, the story is the same. I noticed that at a time in Yola airport, all the workers at the airport were from Cross River State. It so happened that the boss was from Cross River State. I don’t know how he managed it. When they changed him, and brought somebody else from a different part of the country, the people from Cross River State disappeared and another set of workers appeared. Now, I was involved, not in federal character, but in quota system, I was permanent secretary, Federal Ministry of Education, I was a northerner, and Chief Briggs was my minister, from Ijaw land. Unknown to me and several others in the ministry, he wrote a minute on a small piece of paper to Gen. Gowon. It was a speaking note, that admission into federal government colleges in Nigeria should strictly be on quota basis, equal admission for every state, gave it to Gowon. His own writing, in green ink, Gowon, as Head of State, wrote in red ink. Briggs simply wrote, 25 per cent of admission into federal government colleges should absolutely be on merit; 75 per cent on state allocation. That if any state fails to meet its target, redistribute them according to merit. Gowon signed and Minister Briggs, gave it to me, for implementation. I said fine. So, I called all my directors of education, and we sat down and said, ‘look, go and refine this thing, so we refined it, and started implementing it.’ As soon as it became public knowledge, people in the South, especially from Kings College, went wild. How could King’s College be included in such a thing? And Briggs was an old boy of King’s College. So they called him at their meeting and dressed him down. He said, ‘It is these northerners who are doing this thing; my permanent secretary is more powerful than me.’ Some of the people who attended the King’s College meeting were my classmates, and some, like me, were permanent secretaries and very close friends. They said to me, ‘look, how can you do this?’ When they came to my office, I brought out the file and showed them my minister’s directive. They went away disappointed that it was actually an Ijaw man’s idea. But seriously speaking, Federal Government Colleges were created for the sole purpose of bringing Nigerian children together, to be educated together, grow together to become friends, to become in-laws of Nigeria, that is the only reason. If you say you are going to do it on absolute merit, Lagos children may be the only children in all the Federal Government Colleges in Nigeria. And so, we did it. So, the catchment idea is built into the federal character clause. But Nigerians, even before this policy, always had federal character policy. When they set up the first cabinet in the early 60s, they took three or four people from each of the three regions then. When it became four regions. If you form a cabinet, or a board, anywhere, and you find all the people in the NNPC are from the Niger Delta, or all the people in Ministry of Education are from Kano, will such work? I think there are several ways of implementing it. I have seen in school records in my own class room in my school, when we arrived on our first term examination, the best boys were from certain part of the North. Kwara, Ilorin, Lokoja, Benue, Plateau. By the end of the terminal exams, the situation had changed. They are several explanation for that. However, we said in the ministry, ‘this merit thing must apply to every level.’ You go to the state the people who take the best are among the ones taken until you can’t do so until you have a formula of redistributing. But I think in a federation like ours I think we have about three hundred and something or four hundred tribes. And people run several nationalities. How do we solve this problem? Because as I have said to you. If you say is absolute merit based on examination result or even on the character of the person and other consideration. Then we are not going to have a country.
Finally, sir, people say the Kaduna mafia is back. How true is that?
I don’t know. I’ve never met them. Thank you.