National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, in this interview monitored in Abuja on the Independent Television programme “Osasu Igbinedion Show”, gave reasons why President Muhammadu Buhari is delaying the appointment of his cabinet. He also spoke on the controversy that rocked the National Assembly after election of principal officers.Excerpts:
The story of the APC as the first party to democratically overthrow an incumbent party and president remains topical. Can you talk about how this happened?
The first stage was the realisation and recognition by the major opposition parties that the nation was going nowhere. In fact, by that time, the nation was headed for the rocks. So, it became necessary for true patriots, those who truly love the country, and think that the people of the nation deserve a choice to come together. It was clear that as regional parties; the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), which is mainly in the South-West, the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) majorly in the North, the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), a fraction of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) felt that as regional parties, there was no chance for any of them individually to take on a monstrous Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). By coming together, it was clear that we created an alternative national platform.
We were ready to make the sacrifice in the interest of the nation. The parties were able to come together, give up their individual interests and form one single national entity called the APC. That was stage number one. Of course, there were all sorts of issues and problems: We won’t be registered. We won’t be recognised by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). But we planned things carefully with the law in mind at every stage. And we left nobody with any excuse not to have the APC officially registered and recognised. That stage one was successfully completed. So, we took a deep breath. Now, we are a party. We have a monster in government. How do we get rid of them? This simple thing to do is to go to the people. We then devised one of the most comprehensive surveys that probably no other political party had undertaken. We went to town asking the people from every part of this nation: What do you people want? What do you want from the government? What kind of changes do you want? What are the ailments? What are your complaints? What are your ills? What areas do you want any government to address?
And it was a most revealing exercise. When we thought security will be the issue, people were saying they wanted jobs. In summary, people who were saying that they wanted jobs topped the lists. They also wanted security, power, agriculture and education and so on.
The third leg was what do the people expect from a political party? We knew the people were tired of opposition. We knew they were tired of impunity. They wanted a breath of fresh air. So, as a matter of design and policy, when the new party leadership came on board, they decided we must be above board. Let the people themselves see that they’re participants in the process of generating who governs them. And so, we ensured that to a great extent possible, all our primaries and all our selective processes and the rest of it were done in full public glare. They were above board. So, we’ve very little recriminations all the way down to the top. Finally, when we had the presidential primaries in Lagos, it was clear. To our great surprise, the entire world was watching. And that took two days meticulously in full public glare. That was the clincher. At that point, the people of this nation, you could hear them heave a collective sigh of relief: “yes, we finally have a party that can take on the PDP”. The rest is history.
Were you really disappointed by the current crisis rocking your party, especially in the National Assembly, having been accused of supporting one of the candidates?
Well, disappointed is the word. I cannot hide the fact that it was a bit of setback unexpected. Things had gone so well that I thought it would be one whole ball game all the way. But maybe, we need that bit of hiccup to show us that it was not yet eureka. When you merge and put people with disparity in interest and ambitions together at one stage or the other, there is likelihood to have disconnects and clash of interests. When everybody now wants to assert authority and control, that’s precisely what happened. We should have expected it. But I didn’t think it would be quite as bad as it became. But those are parts of the growing pains that we have to suffer when I was talking about the growth that came together. I forgot to mention that at certain stage, we had five PDP governors which was quite a shot of adrenaline to a young party, that also had interest and expectations.
I think these are the things that finally came to a head in the National Assembly with the party at stake in a position. The party is insisting on discipline. The party is insisting on supremacy of the party. But at the same time, it takes into consideration that this is an independent arm of the tripod of government. So, their feelings and expectations must also be taken into consideration.
But let me make this clear, at no stage did we dictate to them. We always provide a platform for members of the House of Representatives and senators to indicate their preference for leadership. That was what the party did at every stage. I think we are on top of that issue. We hope it will go well. In fact, the accusations against me were somehow the greatest vindication. There were two major interest groups. ‘A’ said I was favouring ‘B’. ‘B’ said I was favouring ‘A’. I said hurray! That showed I had placed my foursquare in the middle by not aligning with either.
If the party doesn’t have a direct influence over the legislative arm of the government, then why did the party organise the straw poll which produced Senator Lawan as the party’s candidate?
Like I said, the party provided the platform only for the senators and members-elect themselves. They were the only ones voting. No member of the party was involved. In the Senate, we have 59 members. We should have 60. But we lost one to death. The PDP, the opposition party has 49. So, it was clear that if we went with two aspirants, candidates for any position and there was any split whatsoever, it was a split on our side. If the APC goes with two candidates for the president of the Senate or speaker of the House for that matter, it will affect us. So, it was in our interest to organise that strong pool for the senators-elect themselves to indicate who, one person, that they themselves want to be their leader because of the realities of the numbers in the Senate. That was the only thing that we did.
Unfortunately, ambitions had become so excessively entrenched. We had two opportunities to do this strong pool. The first time, one of the contending groups walked out. Ostensibly, my own personal reading of the situation is that they foresaw they may lose out in the struggle. Unfortunately, the second time that produced Lawan, maybe the others are those who saw that they stood a chance of losing out. They too didn’t appear. But that time, we had only a day or two to the convening of the National Assembly. So, we could not afford to shift anymore. The majority at that point indicated a preference for Lawan.
Mr. President and other top leaders of the APC have used the word ‘indiscipline’ a number of times. How is the party going to discipline these party elders who went against the party’s will?
Discipline them? (Laughs) Oh well, it means a lot of things – political spanking. Nothing is ruled out at the end of the day. Persons that were promoted, so to speak, by the party turned against the party. If they persist, something of course has to give. There must be consequences. Otherwise, no organisation can survive if everybody can do precisely what he likes. If everybody’s opinion becomes law, there must be consequences.
Why is President Buhari going slowly on the issues of governance, especially as it relates to cabinet appointment?
Well, I’m sorry about that tag. I think it is terribly undeserved. I can understand because the people of this nation have suffered for so long and President Buhari has such a reputation for uprightness and the rest of it. One will acknowledge that people thought there is a bit of magic to him and that once he came into office, he will flick the switch and everything will start being corrected. But that is not reality. The situation that he took over has turned out to be a lot worse than we in our worst imaginations ever expected. That is point number one. Point number two is that the expectations of the public in terms of the kind of persons that they don’t want to see in governance are so high that even he (Buhari) with all his prestige and core followership has to be careful about who he appoints even as a cleaner in the villa.
Yes, it may look slow. But before you do any project, you have to plan. He needs to plan. We had a very short transition period. That should have been three months. But he didn’t have three months. But in spite of that you can see the changes are gradually coming. You can see the change. Take the international arena, where we were almost reduced to pariah status. Today, the status of Nigeria in the world arena has changed. He hit the ground running as far as the reconnection of Nigeria with the international community – as a credible nation with people who can do business – is concerned.
