Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, has in the past one year been unsparing in his comments on the running of the affairs of state under the incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan. In this interview with journalists in his Hilltop presidential mansion, Obasanjo in his characteristic manner x-rays the state of the nation and delivers his verdict.
Sir, you have been away from the country for some time and while you were away, a lot happened as regards the state of the nation. How do you see the situation in the country currently?
I was away because I had a number of assignments abroad which took me to Morocco, Munich, Nairobi, London and New Delhi. We were in Munich for what they called Munich security conferences annual event and all the people who are in the security community, normally, you would find them there. For this year, the Vice President of America was there, the Secretary of State, John Kerry was there, the Chancellor of Federal Republic of Germany was there, President of Ukraine was there and many others. I was there with Koffie Annan. Our side was to talk about peace and security in Africa. I was to handle the African perspective while Koffie Annan was to look at it from the global perspective. Suddenly, people started asking me questions about what was happening in my country; Americans, British, German and every other person. Koffie Annan was particularly agitated.
While I was out, I refused to make any categorical statement on this issue because I wanted to come back home and learn at firsthand, what actually transpired and what was going on, and it turned out to be a forced decision on the INEC because it was alleged that the Security Chiefs were unable to provide security and as a result the Chairman of INEC has to postpone, in accordance with the dictates of the so called Security Chiefs.
I think for me, that was bad precedent for democracy in Nigeria. It means it doesn’t matter what preparations or lack of preparations any electoral body could make in Nigeria, the final decision whether election will take place on the day scheduled for it lies in the domains of the security, it is a sad day for democracy in Nigeria. And I will say this, we must all feel concerned before democracy is killed. The observable and what would appear to be happening is that the president has a grand plan, a grand plan to ensure that by hook or by crook, he wins the election or if it all fails, they scuttle it and create chaos, confusion and unpleasantness in the whole country. Because it is the duty and function and responsibility of the security officers to provide security, the President is the Chief Security Officer of the country and he is the Commander-in- Chief and if security is required anywhere anytime, it is his duty to provide it. Failure to provide it is dereliction of duty, pure and simple. Either the President is following his own grand plan or his aides and associates are working a script, they are playing a script which must not get his endorsement, if not initiated by him.
It looks to me as if the President is trying to play Gbagbo. Gbagbo is the former President of Cote d’Ivoire and Gbagbo made sure he postponed the election in his country until he was sure he would win and then allowed the election to take place. He got an inconclusive election in the first ballot and I believe this is the sort of thing Nigeria may fall into if I am right in what I observed as the grand plan. In the run-off, Gbagbo lost with 8% behind Ouattara and then refused to hand over. All reasonable persuasion and pleading was rebuffed by him and he unleashed horror on that country until nemesis caught up with him. I believe that we may be seeing the repeat of Gbagbo or what I call Gbagbo saga here in Nigeria, I hope not.
They gave the intensity of the Boko Haram insurgency as excuse for INEC to postpone the elections…
(Cuts in) For me, you can give any excuse or you can give any ratonalisation or you can rationalise anything. Look, the Boko Haram problem, as they are now, has been with us since 2009. If we say what we have not been able to achieve since 2009 would be achieved in six weeks, all I would say is that God is a God of miracle. God can do anything but knowing what we know, look, countries like Syria had election, they have full scale war all over their countries. Countries like Iraq held election, they had full scale war and they are still having. Countries like Afghanistan had election, they even had election where the incumbent had his term and moved out, even countries like Colombia where FARC, their insurgent group have been active for more than 50 years. We have been having elections regularly and FARC is still very active. So, to say that what we have not been able to achieve in five years, we will achieve in six weeks, let us wait and see. That would be my own thinking but when people want to make excuses, they should look for excuses that are tenable.
But if you really want to get the job done, the job will be done by Nigerian troops who are properly trained, properly motivated, properly equipped, with high moral and properly led, not asking for force we have in these other countries. For a country of 180 million people and the resources that we have, I believe it leaves a little bit to be desired. Let us see, the days are going, may be something monumental may happen.
There are speculations that President Jonathan may not be ready to leave office. What’s your take on this allegation against him?
I believe the president’s concern or fear is not life out of office per se, because he and I have had occasions to talk about this both seriously and jovially. I believe the President would want an opportunity to disengage peacefully and have a nice, decent and a glorious exit. I believe the President’s fear is particularly motivated by those who he sees as his likely successor; that is General Buhari. I believe people would have been telling him that Buhari is a hard man, he would fight corruption and you may end up in jail if not in grave. I believe people must have told him all sorts of things and he is not the only one. There are other people who may be afraid of Buhari, but why? I would say that Buhari has learnt his lessons. If he hasn’t learnt his lessons, then he would be probably the most unlearned human being. If he has learnt his lessons, he would know that you do not fight corruption by putting people in jail for 200 years and this has been done by my own predecessor in office, General Abdus-Salam Abubakar. He recovered over US$750 million from the Abacha estate without putting anybody in jail, without hurting or harming anybody. When I took over, we recovered over US$1.25 billion from the same Abacha estate without hurting anybody, without harming anybody.
I don’t think the President is afraid of being out, there’s life after Aso Villa. It may depend of course, to a large extent, on how his descent takes place and how his exit takes place. Out there in the international world, there’s so much need for the wisdom and experience of people who have done it before. They also want people who are creditable and credible.
How do you see the criticisms against Buhari’s anti-corruption stance?
Corruption must not remain part of our national life. Whoever comes in at anytime in future will fight corruption, and we must even encourage successive fight against corruption. We must. Recklessness and impunity must not continue to be our part of lives, whether recklessness and impunity in the management of our economic affairs, in the running of our finances and even in political affairs, they must not be allowed to remain part of us.
I believe that within reason, judging by his track records, and I have said that at the end of the day, I look at people’s track records to see what they can do and what they cannot do, to see where I go and where I do not go. I believe he will fight corruption, he has tried to do it before. I believe he will give firm leadership which is what is good for a country like this.
Again, I appeal to President Jonathan not to listen to those who are creating phobia, phobia for Buhari, phobia for inquiry and all that. President Jonathan has done well to the best of his ability and he has made history as the first elected Nigerian president from a minority tribe and nobody can take that away from him; he can even make a second history, if it turns out that way. If he contests a fair, free and transparent election and if he loses, to have a dignified decend and a dignified exit, he will be on the mountain top and he would be acclaimed as a true patriot and a true democrat. What stops him from doing these?
I will want to appeal to the PDP and APC, as the two major parties, they have responsibilities to see the continuation of our present democratic process and if any of them does anything to short-circuit or cut shot the process, the verdict of history will be very drastic.
I also will like to appeal to General Buhari, if the election takes place, I sincerely hope that it will take place, and if he happens to win, one of his first responsibilities is to allay the fears of those who see Buhari as a buggy, as a threat, particularly in the areas of human rights, in the areas of the rule of law, and in the areas of obedience to our constitution.
I will want to appeal to Nigerians, we all have a stake and a say in what is going on. Don’t let us just fold our hands and say ‘there’s nothing I can do’. There’s everything you can do and we must all try to do everything to sustain this process that we have made.
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