The President of the Centre for Human and Socio-Economic Rights (CHSR), Comrade Alex Omotehinse, has scored the current Federal Government low on performance. Omotehinse said the removal of fuel subsidy, floating of the naira and other economic policies of the current government has made life difficult for the masses. The activist spoke in an interview with OLADIPUPO AWOJOBI. Excerpts:
This current government has been in power for almost two years, how would you assess their performance so far based on their policies?
This government is not a serious one, or they are confused, especially when you practice a system that doesn’t positively impact the masses, courtesy demands that you review and revisit it. The government removed fuel subsidy and right from the day President Bola Tinubu announced the removal of fuel subsidy, the prices of goods and services skyrocketed and for the first time in the history of Nigeria, we are now changing dollar for over N1,700. The deceit was that the subsidy money would be diverted into the refinery but today, the refinery is working, tomorrow it’s not working. I cannot point to one reasonable policy or project of this government that has affected the lives of Nigerians positively. Government is about the people, not about an individual. If you are in position or corridor of power, you must be ready to listen to those you are governing. Once the citizens say no, they don’t want this, it’s for you to make them know the reason they should support your policy. But, in Nigeria, it seems that we continue to praise past government as against the present government. Transportation cost is now very high everywhere and some fares moved from N200 to N600. We say when we have local refinery, the price of fuel will go down, but it’s getting worse by the day and nothing seems to be working. This is the second year of this government and I have not seen any tangible policy or programme of the government in the sense that we keep borrowing money to service loans. We talk of education loan, what students need in Nigeria today is not loan, but grants. You cannot say because this policy works for a certain country, where their government puts the citizens first, then you want to introduce the policy here. In Nigeria, it is the government first and the citizens come last. In an ideal society, the citizens come first and the government comes last. If you go to the United States of America or the United Kingdom and bring their policies here, you must also bring their policies of positivity here. For instance, in the United States of America or in the UK, you don’t buy land, the government builds, while you get mortgage. But in Nigeria, the governments of the day are more or less land grabbers. Go to Oko Baba, the Lagos State Government has displaced the plank sellers there, same goes for Odogun, the Lagos State Government, through some faceless groups, displaced the people that were living there legitimately without any alternative. You cannot continue to be doing the same thing and expect different results. President Bola Tinubu used to claim to be a progressive, but today his government is more dictatorial than the military. There are a series of intimidation against dissenting voices under his government. Once you speak against the government, the police would come for you and arraign you for treasonable felony. So, criticism has become a treasonable offence and cyber-bullying. Where are we going, who is deceiving who? As far as I am concerned, nothing seems to be working in the last two years
But the government said that the policies are meant to revamp the nation’s economy and the refineries are now working…
How many refineries are working?
The one in Port Harcourt, Rivers State and that of Warri in Delta State…
Do you have any evidence that they are working? That is what you heard and not what you witnessed. No refinery is working in Nigeria now apart from Dangote Refinery. Let me agree with you that the refineries are working, then what happened to the price of petroleum products? If our local refineries are working, definitely it would reflect in the price of petroleum products.
But what about the price of crude oil and cost of production?
If you are talking of cost of production, you have removed the cost of transportation, and you have removed the cost of import and export duties as well as refining in dollars. Those are the major aspects that took most of the money then and caused increase in prices of petroleum products. You export the crude from here to Germany or wherever you want to refine it and you bring it back here. That would cost us money, now we have local refineries, then the prices should go down to the barest minimum.
To how much?
If our refineries are working, let me take you back to when our refineries were working, as at 2010 and 2011, they sold fuel at N87 per litre and even then our refineries were not working. If our refineries are working, nothing stops us from buying fuel at less than N50 per litre. If I will agree with you that the refineries are working, it should be around N40 or N50. During the January 2012 uprising, it was the same Bola Tinubu and former governor Raji Fashola of Lagos State along with others that claimed that a serious government would not remove subsidy and that it was the only thing that Nigerians were benefitting from the government. They said that it was a scam. We agitated that fuel must go back to N87 as it was increased to N140, then it went back to N97. Now that the refineries are working, nothing stops us from selling fuel below N50 per litre.
What of the dollar rate now?
The dollar rate as at 2011 was less than N400.
Do you think N50 per litre of fuel is realistic with the rate of the dollar to naira now?
That is what I am saying, we don’t have business with dollar when our refineries are working here because we don’t buy crude oil in dollars, we are not refining fuel in dollars. All what we do is done in naira, Nigeria is not a dollar country, we us naira. If naira is N2,000 to a dollar, that would reflect on those outside the country that want to patronise us and foreign countries that want to buy crude oil from us, those are the ones that will use dollar. If I am the owner of my crude oil, I can sell to you at a lower price and I will sell to others at a higher price. Market will dictate its price. If the people from the United Kingdom come with their pounds sterling, I will not sell to them the way I sell to Nigerians that buy in naira since it is a local refinery for local people.
Let’s talk about electricity, the Federal Government said that for Nigerians to enjoy more electricity, they have to pay more, which is why we have Band A, Band B and others…
Can I ask you a question, who is deceiving who here, is the government still in charge of electricity, the answer is no.
They have the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) and the Ministry of Power that monitor the activities of these companies…
They told us that electricity has been privatised, so they should allow those who purchased the electricity companies deal with the people themselves. That tells you that the government is just trying to exploit us. If truly the government has sold Power Holding Company of Nigeria to DISCOs and GENCOs, these are private companies that are in business to make profits, while the government is for everybody. Whatever the government would do should be comfortable for the citizens who are the real government. But they are robbing Peter to pay Paul and telling Nigerians that they have to pay more to enjoy electricity. We don’t even have any opposition in Nigeria.
We have the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)…
The PDP is not an opposition party, you can quote me. An opposition politician is a die-hard believer of his party that would always come out to condemn any atrocity of the present government. Compare the PDP opposition to that of the All Progressives Congress (APC) then, you will see that they are two different things.
What do you see as the roles of the legislature and the judiciary in all of this?
I don’t want to discuss this National Assembly because the Senate President said that everything the President brings, he would not look at it before signing it. That’s enough for them to remove him as the President of the Senate. The essence of the legislature is to give the executive close marking, and to checkmate their atrocities. What we have now is a rubber stamp legislature at the federal level. When Senator Bukola Saraki was the President of the Senate, there was a serious close marking. That was when we had a National Assembly that meant business. But a Senate President that said he would sign anything the President brings is something else. The judiciary is another terrible sector. That sector ought to be the last hope of the common man. If we have a very serious judiciary, where they would not tolerate nonsense, they would bring some cases to court and you will strike it out and tell the prosecutor not to ever bring that kind of case again. There are some charges you look at and say does this warrant a court case. But he who pays the piper dictates the tune, every chief justice is appointed by the President, same goes for the state, where the Governor appoints the chief judge and they want to be in the good books of the president or of the governor, so they do their bidding.
What kind of relationship do you think should be exist between the legislature and the executive with what is happening in the Lagos State House of Assembly?
It is absurd; what happened in the Lagos State House of Assembly is nothing but a shameful act, where it becomes the responsibility of an external force called the Governance Advisory Council (GAC) to dictate what would happen at the state house of assembly. They are the same political party, but they do not belong to the assembly. The lawmakers were elected to represent their constituencies and they are representing all the political parties there and the people in the constituencies regardless of their parties or ethnic groups. To now say that you are waiting for an external body, that shows that they are not capable of being good representatives. If the GAC elders ask the Lagos State House of Assembly to restore former speaker Mudashiru Obasa, I will be one of the people that would ask for the recall of all the members of the Assembly.
But they are in the same party…
There is difference between their party and the house of assembly. Governance is about the residents and the citizens of Lagos State. It’s not about their party, luckily, their party won 39 out of 40 seats, so they have the majority, that does not give the GAC the leverage to dictate to the state house of assembly. The assembly has house rules and there is the constitution. The party leaders are not in their rules or in the constitution. It is only in Lagos State that someone would sit down somewhere and give orders to people anyhow. Some people see Lagos State as their personal property, they go as far as beating people up at polling units that they must not vote for certain candidates or political parties. They brought out masquerades to scare people all because of elections. The opposition should be up and doing. If this assembly falls so cheap as to allow the GAC to dictate to them, CHSR will start an advocacy for the dissolution of the assembly. That shows that they are not capable and that they are just dancing to the tune of the GAC.
