‘FG Not Serious About Ending Insurgency’

‘FG Not Serious About Ending Insurgency’

Katsina state APC has endorsed General Muhammadu Buhari as its sole candidate for 2015 Presidential election. In the face of challenges posed by other powerful aspirants, how do you think the General stands a chance?

As you rightly said, only Katsina state APC has endorsed General Muhammadu Buhari as its sole candidate. It also went ahead to source money from supports to pay for the expression of interest and nomination forms. This is to strengthen the position that, not only had we endorsed him but also sponsored him because people in the country have realised that it is only with Buhari that you can have the mass support and followership including many PDP supporters and even those who do not belong to any political party, because they believe in his capacity and ability to perform. In the present day Nigeria, it is Buhari who can turn around the aspirations of his people. And it is Buhari who certainly, if he stands in the election, can stop the normal rigging of the PDP, because people will not like the kind of things that happened before; people are all out now to ensure that Buhari wins the election; so I think he stands an excellent chance to win the ticket.

Is the APC really prepared to wrestle power from the ruling PDP?

Certainly it is ever ready and willing anytime and even if the elections were to hold today, I believe that for the APC, all we want is for the organs responsible for the conduct of the elections; particularly INEC, the security agencies to ensure a level-playing ground for everybody, ensure peace and transparency in the conduct of the elections. We have the followership, the supporters, mass supporters from across the country. If you go round the country you see PDP is dead in most places; where you see some semblance of PDP, it is people who are looking for contracts and some patronages and not supporters, genuine supporters because the PDP has failed everybody, people are disappointed.

The situation in the country makes everybody believe PDP cannot tackle these problems especially where insecurity and poverty are concerned. Take the energy sector for instance; how many years? The president lied to the country, to the people of Nigeria that by last year, everybody would have abandoned his generating set but what is the situation now? People are buying more and more generating sets are being imported into the country. So the point is, people have realised that PDP cannot deliver. Things are getting worse by the day, corruption is becoming almost a norm in the PDP government, and this is what is really eating the whole system in Nigeria where things do not work. Public institutions have completely failed; schools are not working, hospitals, power not working and so many things.

So APC stands a very good chance, people really have hope in APC and believe it is the only party that can win election and has the capacity. Take the APC states for instance, it is not just by coincidence where all the governors in APC states you find are doing very well. The people of these states are happy and are seeing the dividends of democracy all over, so I believe APC government is coming by 2015 and by the grace of God things will definitely change for the better.

Then we have the war on insurgency that appears to be with no end in the North, particularly in the Northeast. Could you comment on the way out of this menacing imbroglio?

This has been said many times but one thing is very clear, the government is not serious, is not determined or willing to do anything and that is why many people accuse the government of being part of it, because if you look at the environment, the place where all these things happen is a porous open land; if you fight and win a war in the Niger Delta area, I wonder who the Nigerian Army cannot stop this insurgency in a matter of weeks. That is why I said people believe strongly that government is either behind this or is non-challant on because the area does not concern the government – is in the North – so they are not bothered. Take the issue of this Ebola disease, see the kind of seriousness from the government in tackling the issue; it contained the issue with dispatch because people alleged it was recorded in the Southern part of Nigeria.

If it were from the Northern parts, maybe the North would not have anything to stop it. So, I think because it has no moral basis, the government was not elected, so they do things based on ethnic or religious sentiments, otherwise we have no reason to go into the kind of things we have undergone regarding this insurgency. Where do they get the arms, who trains and finances them? where do they get food and so on; they get covered. Some soldiers have said it openly; the Nigerian Army were all put there to be killed, they were not given enough ammunition and sometimes the strategies are leaked out and so on. I think a lot of questions really need to be answered here by the security operatives; nothing is being done seriously about this. It is certainly below expectation and we believe they are complacent in this matter.

Finally, how do you see Nigeria with regard to 2015 elections and the survival of the nation as an entity? Do you buy their theory that the country is poised to break up if we are to go by the current happenings in the polity?

I think things will be ok, only if, like I said earlier if the INEC and the security agencies will allow things to happen normally, to play the game according to the rules but if they decide to do otherwise, may be to support rigging in the election, that is where you cannot guarantee anything here, because people are so determined to ensure that they change this government. So any attempt by the government agencies, INEC in particular and the security agencies, will definitely be faced with challenges; people will definitely not allow what happened in 20011 to repeat itself. Their vote must be counted. The person who is supposed to win, must be allowed to win. I only hope INEC, this time around, will allow elections to hold in a free and fair atmosphere. The military should not be involved.

I think we will resist any attempt by the government to involve military into the election issue; they have no business being there. In other countries, especially in African countries, you see elections holding without a single policeman at the polling unit. In places where there are even wars say Syria and Sierra Leone, they held elections peacefully. In Ghana, they held elections peacefully without any problem, so why should military personnel be all over the place during elections in Nigeria simply because they don’t want to have a situation where people will be allowed to vote. So I think the country will remain united as long as people are allowed to elect who they want and the person who wins the election is allowed to govern in victory, but nothing short of that.

SOURCE: Leadership News