A former Minority Whip in the House of Representatives and currently the National Leader of the pan-Yoruba organisation, Afenifere, Oba Oladipo Olaitan, in this interview with OLAOLU OLADIPO talked about his impression of the country 65 years after the attainment of its Independence. According to him, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu should call the bluff of some entrenched interests and rework Nigeria to the path of progress. Excerpts:
Today (October 1) is Nigeria’s 65th anniversary. Looking back and reflecting, do you think we have achieved the visions of the nation’s founding fathers for a great country? T
he answer is no! We’ve fallen far short of our founders’ expectations. What can you attribute this failure to? I think it is unfortunate that leaders we had after the founding fathers lacked vision, lacked capacity, and were not forthright. They did not even quite believe in the nation they were pretending to rule. They did nothing to harmonise all the interests in the state. They did nothing to establish a system that will work. They were very egocentric. They believed in themselves. So, they faltered and failed. They couldn’t really build a nation. They didn’t quite understand how to build a nation. They lacked capacity, they lacked vision, and that’s where we are. All they were able to do was to build some pseudo-millionaires, some pseudo-billionaires, some, oh God, rapacious individuals who are now using the God-given resources of the nation to further their nests, not to build a nation. That is why in Nigeria today you find billionaires and you find millions and millions of Nigerians not being able to have one square meal a day. Every day we are turning out millionaires, but when you turn out one millionaire and you turn out one million homeless people, what achievement is that?
From the way you’ve spoken, could it be said that in all, we’ve not achieved anything positive or substantial since 1960?
Well, thanks to God, we have not completely broken apart. If that is an achievement, at least we are still together somehow, if you count that as an achievement. But beyond that, we have not even established a nation state. We have not even been able to establish a nation. But through God’s mercy, we have been able to just stay together, even though we’ve had an unfortunate civil war. But somehow, we are still hanging on
. So you attribute this failure to the calibre of leadership the country has thrown up?
Yes!
One characteristic of our trajectory is the emergence of the military in power. Some people are of the opinion that possibly some of the incremental accomplishments that we’ve made as a country happened during military rule, and that it is the civilians who have done little or nothing in the advancement of the country. Do you agree with this assertion? What did they do?
They built roads. They built a few bridges and built a few roads and then lined their own pockets with billions of Naira. Is that achievement? They built schools. They erected buildings, but they did not even equip the buildings. They built schools but did not develop brains inside the schools. They built schools but didn’t build teachers to teach in the schools. They built universities, but didn’t build professors. If that is achievement, they did that. You can see a few universities turning out second class, third class brains.
How would you react to the school of thought that had the military not taken over the reins of power in 1966, possibly our fortunes would have been better?
Yes! I’m tempted to agree with that because even though we were fortunate, we were not getting it right, but we were learning. We were learning. Democracy was beginning to take root. Yes, they used to fight in the Houses of Assembly then, but then they resolved it and went on. We would have been learning by piecemeal and by now maybe we would have got it right. But the army came and completely thwarted this and pushed us back to level one. So, I agree with you. If the military had not come up, maybe we would have progressed naturally. We would have learned a lot of lessons from our mistakes and maybe we would have got better results.
We are having the longest span of democratic rule, spanning 25 years without military interruption. If you have to look back, do you think the nation has done enough to correct some of the errors of the past?
No. I think all we have done is to change tactics. Yes, before the military came, we had thieves but now we have robbers and armed robbers. Before the military came, we had pick pockets, you know, small thieves but when the army came, they graduated to real armed robbers. They used to steal thousands in those days but they are now stealing billions. We have not progressed at all. Our economy has been completely marooned. They didn’t allow us to progress.
If you are to suggest a solution, what will be in terms of leadership recruitment?
How do we ensure we recruit quality people into leadership and governance positions? Well, we have to look at our system. If you are not a corrupt person, you cannot even get on in Nigeria, you won’t be able to get anywhere. So, we have to find a way to change that system, a system that breeds corruption, a system that breeds armed robbers, a system that breeds only people that are out to ruin the nation. For example, how do you expect a pious person may be, he’s contesting an election and he’s that person that will nominate the chairman of the umpire of that election? The person that is contesting the election is the person that will nominate the chairman of that body that will supervise the election. What are you saying? You’re deceiving yourself. Such a thing should stop. And I see no reason, for example, why we have more than 257 indigenous nationalities in Nigeria, and then you want to have one police to police this breed of people with diverse cultures and everything. When I was growing up, we used to have native policemen that were native, we called them native police, and they were in charge of small areas. They were from those places, and knew the areas they were supervising. So we knew them, they knew the wrong people in those places, and it was easy for them to apprehend them, to catch them. But now you have one single command, and the nomination for that single command is done by the person that is going to contest the election. It’s the same and all that has to change. Our judiciary is completely bastardised. The same person who is contesting election is the person who will create the body that will choose the judges. And it’s the judges that will take your case, the tribunal cases. We have to stop, we just have to.
Did you listen to the speech of President Bola Tinubu today?
What do you make of his speech? I didn’t bother to listen because I knew what he’ was going to say. He was going to tell lies that our economy was okay, when we all know it’s not okay. He was going to tell us that they’re fighting terrorism when we are not fighting it. What do you expect him to say? He can’t say the truth, he can only say things that will make you hopeful, hopeful in deceit. I didn’t bother to listen to that, honestly, I didn’t bother.
You’ve always been a critic of this government. Do you see anything changing as we move towards 2027, in terms of the delivery of good governance?
Well, as long as the system is like this, nothing good can come out of it. I’m being honest with you, nothing. The man in charge of the realm of affairs, however nice he may want to be, however diligent he may want to be, they all are heavily weighed against him. He’s there alone, he’s marooned inside. He’s surrounded by people that can never, never wish him well. If he tries to, for example, to change the system, they will kill him. So you have to pity him sometimes. I mean, the system is there. We all hear the story of one man who wanted to be the head of state of this country, and in preparation for it, fearing that he might lose, went and imported Fulanis to this country, so that in case he loses, they will unleash mayhem on Nigeria. The story is out there, and those people he invited, they are saying, he is killing us. So, this man comes up now, he wins now, and he wants to send those Fulanis away. How can he? How can he? He cannot. He cannot. Even if he wishes to, he cannot. That’s the problem. He cannot. However good intentioned he may be, they all are weighed against him heavily, heavily.
Finally, if you are to provide just one solution to the problem with Nigeria, what will be your solution?
My solution is that I’m being brutally frank here. This man, the head of state today, he has a golden opportunity, the one chance in his life to write his name in this golden sands of time. He can call the bluff of all these impediments around him and to restructure this country. Change the system. He cannot, after he has won in 2027, finished. He has only one time left. Let him use that time to change the system of this country for better. And that’s all. You see, he’s not going to contest any election anymore. He’s not going to fear anything anymore. But let him change the system that whoever will use the next system that he’s going to create will be a just person that will study the ways of this nation to succeed. Let him do that and his name will be written in gold, in the sands of time. What does he want again in life? He’s not a young man. He doesn’t need money anymore. All he needs now is eternal glory. And he can get it. God has given him the opportunity to do it.
