Jackson Ojo
As Nigerians continue to groan under one of the most excruciating economic situations in living memory, a security expert and Chieftain of the ruling APC, Chief Jackson Lekan Ojo, has blamed President Bola Tinubu for towing the same path with former President Buhari.
In a telephone interview with MIKE ODIAKOSE, he expressed regrets that Nigerians are regretting ever electing APC into office.
Excerpts:
Protests are building up in several states over hardship and hyper-inflation. NLC has also threatened to go on strike over same issue. Many Nigerians are apprehensive that Nigeria is heading for something akin to the Arab Spring. What is your take on this?
The situation is hitting everybody very hard. When you look at the situation today in the country it is getting not bad, it is getting worse. If you are earning a million Naira before it had value but today it has no value. A 50kg bag of rice under the last administration before the APC government was N6,000; a basin of gari was N400, a tin of milk was N20-N30, a litre of petrol, PMS, was N65. Flying from Abuja to Port Harcourt, Port Harcourt Lagos, Lagos Abuja was N15, 000 but how much is it today?
We thought the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu was going to give us a lot of surprises in the positive but today they are in the negative. Today people are dying, people are withdrawing their children from private schools and public schools are not good for it. Students in the federal universities were paying how much – N35,000, N25,000 but today Students are paying over N100,000 and they are not affordable. The parents can’t feed the children, couldn’t cloth the children and we are going to the extent that they cannot afford to pay school fees. What was the cost of transportation before? There was a time I came to Abuja during the National Assembly inauguratiion and my return flight was cancelled so I had to go by road. It was early N31,000 and it took us almost 16 hours from Abuja to Port Harcourt. The road is not safe, the road is not passable. The road is a trap for the kidnappers. The rate of hired killings, the rate of kidnappings is growing higher. The rate of stealing, corruption is increasing on a daily basis. Why? When they are paying a man wages for 30, 31 days but his wages cannot sustain him and the bill of his family for three days he has to look somewhere else and any opportunity he has to embezzle he will. When you give a contractor job and at the end of the day because of the cost of labour and other things he couldn’t make enough profit he will give you substandard road. That is corruption which will adversely affect every sector.
So, to me when the Nigerian Labour Congress is preparing for this (protest), if they want Nigerians to take them serious again they should go ahead with the protests and Nigerians will troop out to support them. The only thing the police could do is for the police to move around them so that miscreants will not take economic advantage of it.
As a security expert what does the present economic situation portend for Nigeria?
As a Security Expert I tell you that what is bringing about crime and criminality is poverty when people could not eat, when people could not take the little little responsibilities in their families. It has gotten to a situation where road transportation is no longer affordable air transportation is no longer affordable and rail transport is not available what do you expect? There was a common saying that any man that is hungry will definitely be angry ànd anger could lead to series of negativities, series of anarchy, series of lawlessness and disorderliness. All these have to do with insecurity. That is it. The Implication of the bad economy is food insecurity and when food insecurity rears its ugly head the police, the Army, the Civil Defence and other security agencies, is the government feeding them? No. They feed themselves from the little stipends they earn. There may not even be enough to feed their children. Such a man is holding gun; if he hears the sound of armed robbers from angle 80 he will take to angle 360. A that does not have strength, a man that is sad over the economic situation in his family cannot gather the momentum to fight insecurity. So, there is serious security implications. If the economic situation remains like this or getting worst we should expect the worst security situation.
PDP governors recently called on President Tinubu to resign if he is incapable of managing the country. Some people, including the APC, are of the opinion that PDP governors are opportunists are capitalizing on the anger in the land to gain relevance. What is your take?
Calling on President Tinubu to resign is not the issue. This is not about the person of President Tinubu. You have the president and you have the presidency. You have the Ministers, you have the Special Advisers, those that recently stole money did they steal the money and give it to President Tinubu? If Tinubu resigns today who is taking over?Kasheem Shetima is taking over, he is in the system. This is a systemic problem. The system has gone worst that I don’t know who can handle the security and economic situation in Nigeria today and correct it within 12 years. The corruption is on the high side, the lackadaisical attitude of people in government is worst than ever. If Mr President resigns today the Vice President will automatically take over. Is the Vice President not in the system? It is a systemic problem. It is not a personal problem. There is no law that says APC can redesign, there is no constitutional provision like that.
To me, Nigerians are regretting having ever to consider APC in government. Is it not shameful for anyone to be thinking now about the PDP era? There was a time I changed my children’s home teacher when they were in secondary school but I never knew the boys were not serious. I got another home teacher but there was nothing he could do because the boy was not willing then. So, what are we taking about now? The situation is bad. Somebody was appointed head of a parastatal and within months she stole billions. Minister within few months stole billions. Do we know what those who are in government today stealing just because their own books have not been opened? So, I think the whole Nigerians are regretting having APC in power. With due respect this cuts across all political parties. I don’t see any political party. I don’t see any political party today that can do anything meaningful. No political party today in Nigeria is built on any ideological stand. No ideology. It is either it is my turn or it is for one zone or it is our party. No ideology. When you give birth to your child and you name the child ‘Thief’, what do you expect everybody to call the child? What is the difference between the APC, PDP and Labour Party today to be sincere? Senator Godswill Akapabio is today a chieftain of APC but he was commissioner under PDP, he was governor under PDP, he was Minority Leader in the Senate under PDP but today he will be condemning PDP.Rotimi Amechi was Speaker, was Governor under PDP, today he will be condemning PDP because he is now in APC. I can mention several of them like that. These are people that are just criss-crossing. When you know you cannot win your party’s ticket you cross to the other party to pick ticket. That is just what they are doing. So our political system is bad, our political handlers are worst and our political practitioners are rogues. We don’t have political leaders in this country, all we have are pseudo-leaders.
Federal government ordered for release of grains to checkmate astronomical hike in cost of food stuff. Some have argued that it is cosmetic approach that will have very little impact across the country. What is your take on this?
We are not talking about releasing of grains, Nigerians are not beggars. Let there be security so that farmers can go to their farms, do legitimate business and sell. Let the people that are working earn their salaries, meaningful salaries. Let people have value for their money. What is the meaning of releasing grains, why would they lockup the grains before? Let it be meaningful, let it be affordable and everybody will go to buy. The grains you have in stock right now will finish in one month. Where will you get another one when farmers cannot enter their farms? Nobody is begging you to give us fish, we have learnt to fish only give us the enabling environment to do the fishing. It is all part of corruption. Most of the governors and lawmakers will collect the grains and go and sell them. And the idea of sharing money is nonsensical. Buhari did it and the whole world condemned him and that is exactly what Tinubu is doing now. They are now blaming Buhari whereas they are building on the foundation Buhari laid, negative, deadly foundation. That is what the present administration is building on. There is no difference between Muhammadu Buhari and Tinubu’s administration. They are pseudo-leaders. When Buhari was coming people were looking up to him because so disciplined as military Head of State. People also mistakingly voted for Tinubu because he was former governor of Lagos State. Enough of this.
There is no step government could take now. Let there be protests all round the country because any emergency step they take like they want to share two, two thousand Naira and they will share it amongst themselves. Even the grains they will share it amongst themselves. This government is not serious; it is like they are clueless, they are directionless. Am a chieftain of the ruling party, am a strong supporters of President Tinubu but he has failed the country. They are trying to collapse this country. The economic team look at the members. Just because Wale Edun was commissioner of finance in Lagos, just because Cardoso worked in Lagos that automatically qualified them to be Governor of Central Bank and finance minister in Nigeria? Just because someone has done well as commissioner in a state with 20 local governments automatically catapulted them to come and handle 774 local governments? This is rubbish. Most of these ministers appointed should be sacked. Forget about political patronage, look at good economists of global repute, we have so many of them in Nigeria. The military and paramilitary chiefs sack all these people, they have done their best, inject some new hands and give them terms of reference that if by this time you cannot resolve the security problems you automatically steps down. Let there be a raised standard and any appointee that cannot meet up in six months is automatically sacked. If there are no disciplinary actions like this no matter who you are… Look at Olusegun Obasanjo’s era, people like Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala were brought into the system and see what happened. Just because some people were commissioners in Lagos with only 20 local governments that automatically qualified them to govern over 774 local governments. Rubbish.
Some Nigerians have suggested that President Tinubu should reverse his decision on fuel subsidy removal, arguing that he did not put adequate measures in place to cushion the effects of subsidy removal. Is that the way to go?
There is nothing too bad about fuel subsidy removal but there is supposed to have been arrangements on ground to be an alternative to cushion the negative effect of subsidy removal. It is like the house you are living with your children you have not gotten a rented apartment or a building of your own and you just chased your wife and children out one day and you demolish the house. For long years to come your children will be in poverty, they will be living outside exposed to reptiles and mosquitoes. There are actions that can be taken but you don’t believe in the action: you just go to Eagle Square to make such important pronouncement with putting measures in place to cushion the impact. The people that were supplying the fuel during the subsidy era and they were embezzling the money how many have been penalised now? This person’s are same persons that are still the ones who are still importing petrol into the country. How many of our refineries are functional? You can have a relationship on oxygen life support and you go and remove the oxygen pipe. The person will die. Nigerians are dying. It is good policy but the way they did it is very wrong and that is what is killing the country.
Some Afenifere leaders recently blamed former President Buhari for the economic situation in Nigeria today. As a member of the APC do you agree that your party’s last administration should be held liable.
Those people who are blaming Buhari and former presidents are not serious Afenifere people. Those people are hungry Afenifere that are hungry. They are Afenifere that do not have any interest in progressive Nigeria at heart. They are kind of Afenifere that are stingy and self-centered. They are just using the name of Afenifere for their pockets. They are saying all these in order for them to get some appointments, for political patronage and economic benefits. They don’t know what they are saying. Bola Tinubu and those at the helm of affairs today are members of the APC, they were at the corridor of power, the President of the Senate and others all of them were in government under Buhari, so what are we talking? The Afeniferis are people that Yoruba people don’t respect them again because they don’t really know what they are doing again. They are just talking rubbish.
Nigerian youths are getting very restive over sufferings in the land. What are the security implications of this?
Nigerians youths are getting restive over sufferings in the land and it is not only the Nigerian youths. It is only the elderly they fo not have the vigour and strength and energy to be restive. If they have the strength they would have done more. But the youths that are just starting their lives, they don’t have jobs and empowerment and that is why they are jumping out. If things are not corrected you will see father and mother of restiveness across the country. People are hungry and angry and they are not ready to listen to anyone. The implications are heavy. When you allow the youths to be angry because they are jobless, they are not even seeing the entrance of the tunnel talk less about the end of the tunnel they will be lawless and lawlessness is insecurity. Crime and criminality will be too much in the land.
