January 09, (THEWILL) – Segun Sowunmi is a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and spokesperson of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar. In this interview with SEGUN AYINDE, he speaks on the refusal of President Muhammadu Buhari to sign the Electoral Reform Amendment Bill and sundry issues. Excerpts:
What is your take on President Muhammadu Buhari’s refusal to sign the Electoral Reform Amendment Bill?
A lot of people have commented on this bill. Four things bother me. The first is whether democracy is designed in such a manner that one individual can go against the collective will of the majority. I know that there is a constitutional provision that gives the President the power to veto. Looking at the previous National Assembly and the present one, I have not seen any legislature that asserts its independence in a manner that shows they are the representatives of the people.
I ask myself if democracy empowers one person, I mean one individual, which is the President, to say no, even when every other person is saying yes. The second is that people are fixated on the laws they want. It is one law today and another tomorrow. But I think that election will not have integrity on the basis of law. Why do we need so many laws as if we are going to rob the bank? The third issue is that in the buildup to the 2019 general election, all efforts to improve the electoral act was rebuffed by President Muhammadu Buhari. We are now in 2022 and we are still dilly-dallying on the presidential assent to an Electoral Act. Is it his own personal conviction that he does not believe that we should improve the electoral process?
When you look at it comprehensively, you have to ask what are the specific things in that Act that would guarantee peace or integrity. You will not be able to create the type of electoral law that will befit Nigeria until the people of this country understand that election is not war. You want to do electronic transfer of results, why should any human being not be interested in the process that reduces the appearance of human beings in the election, if it is something a machine can do to make it easy for everybody? Why should anybody need to be begged to do that? How can a political party like APC that has majority governors, majority representatives, majority senators and the President fail to recognise an opportunity for far reaching reforms that this absolute majority gives them if only they will be sincere?
My party, the PDP, was in government for 16 years. We tried to carry out some reforms .We were always willing improve on it. Yar’Adua won an election and he declared that the election that brought him in was not the best. He set up a commission to look at it. Jonathan passed an electoral act and improved on it before he left, but Buhari wants to leave power and he has refused to sign the bill. The President has no excuse. Is it out of place for the presidency to have a joint session with the senate with a view to strengthen our elections? Why should we be spending about N305bn to vote and we are not even sure that the process has integrity. It is beyond offensive.
It is unfortunate that in democracy the people have to bear some responsibilities. President Buhari is busy borrowing from foreign countries, people are dying anyhow, the economy is not growing, poverty is very heavy in the land, inflation is crazy, almost 90 percent of our revenue will be used to service debt and you know the funniest thing because of this annoying concept of democracy? There is nothing anybody can do about it until the next election. So if the people who are supposed to be players in that process are now careless, we are going to have a terrible situation in our hands.
For me, the inability of the President to do what is reasonable is a reflection of the fact that he sees Nigeria only from the eyes of the few people who will be telling him that if you do it like this, this man will get advantage over you. Why should any President want to teleguide an electoral process to such a point that it no longer makes sense? It is disgraceful. All the members of the APC should be ashamed of themselves. Can you imagine the discordant tune from that party. The state governors are saying one thing, the ones who have the power to make the laws are saying one thing and the president is saying another thing. So everybody in the country is being taken for a ride. It is most unfortunate. I pray Nigerians understand that their civil responsibility is to endure this madness until another opportunity comes to select a new leader that will do the right thing.
What do you think about the Senate’s plan to override Buhari’s veto on his refusal to sign the bill?
The fact that the President did not sign the bill is embarrassing and disgraceful. In the last six years that he was in charge, he never made an attempt to improve the electoral process. it will be a threat to the independence of the present Senate if they cannot do what the Constitution allows them to do. But I doubt it because they do not look to me like the kind of men who have the courage to override the President’s veto. They should veto him if they need to do so. The President cannot be bigger than democracy. I doubt if the present Senate will be able to do that. If it were the Bukola Saraki-led 8th National Assembly, we wouldn’t be in this situation.
What does that say about Buhari and his desire for political reforms?
I do not know why President Muhammadu Buhari’s advisers seem to be determined to let him go down in history as a failure. There is no need for that. I don’t expect him to ignore the signing of the bill. He didn’t sign it in 2018 and 2019. I think he is going to go down in history as one who came into power with a lot of goodwill and he is leaving with none.
What is the way forward?
The law says they should bring the bill to the President and it allows the President to either sign it or withhold his veto. If you don’t want to sign that bill, did you have to wait till the last day? If he had good intentions, he could have returned it to the National Assembly with a clause for adjustment.
The youth in the North recently protested the worsening insecurity in the region. What is your reaction to this?
The day a man knows realises that he is in bondage is the day he will stand up and fight for freedom. No matter how long you tell a man to change his ways or or stand up for his right, if he does not see himself as living in bondage, he cannot do snything. It doesn’t matter if he stays in that condition for 10 years or more, the day he stands up is the day he will be liberated. Maybe the North is about to be liberated.
I expected the youth in the North to quarrel not only about insecurity, but also about excruciating poverty, unemployment and the wide gap between the rich and the poor. Maybe they will become more vocal, like their counterparts in the South or their leaders will have a rethink. There is no reason why southern Nigerian should be doing better than the North. The latter have resources and a higher population than the South. If the people will apply the little that the Federal Government is giving to all of them every month, the way they are supposed to apply it, the situation in the North will not be what it is today. If they will apply orientation, embrace education by sending their children to school, the North will not be the way it is. If they embrace self reliance, the North will be a lot better. So if they are standing up to say the North is bleeding, we have been screaming for a long time that, indeed, it is bleeding.
If we are talking of terrorism, we should be worried about the active connivance of the people in that part of the country. Where do terrorists get the water they are drinking? Where do they get the food that they are eating? Where do they get the matches they use to cook? Where do they get salt? Who is supplying them fuel? Where do they get these materials? These are questions that require answers. Until we say that enough is enough, we will not get out of the present situation in the country. Thank God that our brothers in the North are saying enough now. I join them to say, indeed the North is bleeding.
It is rumoured that the National Leader of the APC, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, intends to run for presidency in 2023. What is your take on this?
As far as I am concerned, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu has not declared his intention. He is a Nigerian like any other person and the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria guarantees anybody that desires to be President of Nigeria the right to contest. When I look at Bola Tinubu and the way people have been going about this issue, sometimes I used to say he is a phenomenon. People talk about him nonstop. What exactly has he done other than install some people in Lagos State. So why should he be the problem of the people in Anambra, Kano why and Ogun States? Why should Tinubu be our problem? If he wants to run for president, he is welcome. It is his right. He should go out there and contest and let Nigerians decide on who is the best to lead the country. Nobody should be bullied and denied his right. As far as I am concerned anybody Nigerians choose should be their leader.
With Atiku eyeing presidential seat once more, people are asking if power should go to the North again?
We the Yoruba need to be very careful and stop pretending as if the South is divided into three parts and the North is one. You know for sure that the North is also divided into three parts, just like the South. There is the South-West, South-east and South-South, ju st as there is North-West, North-East and North-Central. So, when you say power can’t go to the North again, what are you saying? Are you saying the whole of the South is made up of only Yoruba. Why are the Igbo agitating for the presidency and why are the Yoruba also thinking that they have the right to contest for president? The North-West is producing the president now. They still have North-Central and North-East. Don’t subsume them with your. Obasanjo has been president for two terms and he is Yoruba. Jonathan has served the country first as Vice President and later as President. He is from the South-South. Osinbajo is now the Vice President and he has been in power for two terms. He is Yoruba. Tell me, why do the Yoruba think they deserve to produce the next president? Are you the only ones in the South? If you want to be doing rotation, then there are only three zones in the country that are legitimate. So maybe the advantage of 2023 will be to allow a Nigerian that comes from anywhere, who the people likes and trusts, to come and lead us.
