Curfew in Bauchi, North East Nigeria Over Religious Clash afp20090727614002 Abuja Hot fm in English 26 Jul 09

Had Buhari also met with former Lagos State governor, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu? "Yes, we met for the purpose of the electoral reforms. There is this saying that nearly anybody can steer the ship of a group or a nation but not everybody can chart the course for a nation. To have leaders who combine the two is very crucial for the success of a nation. We have to forget the attitude of failure and believe in ourselves that we can do it.

Yes, we can. If Obama didn’t believe in himself, he would not have been President of the United States of America today," Tinubu told reporters at the end of his meeting with Buhari.

The meetings between Buhari and other politicians has since developed in to a new coalition, the National Democratic Initiative [NDI]. Present at the maiden consultative forum of the coalition, held in Abuja on Wednesday 28 October, were Atiku, Bafarawa, the national secretary of the AC, Usman Bugafe, Chief Tom Ikimi, Chief Olu Falae, Alhaji Lawal Kaita, Professor Pat Utomi, a former presidential candidate and Senator Olorunnimbe Mamora among others.

Buhari told reporters at the end of the meeting: "Naturally, no conscientious citizen can remain unconcerned in the face of what is happening today. This is why we are alarmed. Bu t we are tired of sitting and agonizing over what is happening. Therefore, we are here because we want change in the direction in which this nation is going. But by its very nature, change cannot come by itself; it has to be brought about. So, we are all gathered here today to begin exploring ways of bringing about that needed democratic change peacefully."

The former head of state said that the task of rescuing Nigeria from the ruling PDP is even more urgent with the failure of the party in the performance of basic functions of the government. "Law and order have been routinely breaking down among various communities throughout the nation. Kidnappings and ritual killings have put personal security in great jeopardy, infrastructure has dilapidated beyond repair, and service provision has all but collapsed. Our roads are impassable, our schools are closed," Buhari said. He noted further that the country may dangerously slide in to a failed state.

In a press release the same day the meeting of the NDI was held at Abuja, Professor Nuhu Alkali, the PDP national publicity secretary said that the party is unperturbed by the assembly of those he described as "bad losers". But in his reaction early last week, the senior special assistant to President Yar’Adua on political matters, Senator Polycarp Nwite, described Buhari as an alarmist.

"The continuous tirade against this government by the former military ruler, Gen. Buhari, is at best an affront on the culture of free speech and courageous Nigerian media, both of which he did everything to emasculate during his days as a military dictator," Nwite said in a press release.

Yet, as harsh as this criticism of Buhari may seem, Nwite only echoed the views of many who have continued to query Buhari’s democratic credentials against the backdrop of the authoritarian approach of the military regime he headed From 31 December 1983 to 27 August 1985. The Buhari-led Supreme Military Council promulgated the State Security (Detention of Persons) Decree No.2, which gave the Chief of Staff Supreme Headquarters the power to detain for up to six months without trial anyone considered a security risk,

There was also the Public Officers (Protection Against False Accusation) Decree No.4, which criminalized reportage of any information deemed to be embarrassing to the military government. Two journalists, Tunde Thompson and Nduka Irabor, were convicted under the decree.

Another action of the regime which many said has continued to hang on the neck of Buhari was the public execution, through firing squad, of the trio of Bernard Ogedengbe, Bartholomew Owoh, and Lawai Ofulope for drug trafficking through a decree promulgated retroactively to stipulate capital punishment for the offence. But in obvious defense of the actions of the military administration he headed, Buhari told this magazine in an interview that none of the punishments were meted out arbitrarily as all concerned were given the opportunity of defending themselves.

But in spite of such criticisms, however, the Buhari-led military regime has remained in the minds of Nigerians for its War Against Indiscipline, which many still fondly recall as helping to instill a great deal of order in the society while it lasted. In the same vein, many Nigerians have also come to regard the former military ruler as incorruptible. Indeed, Buahri perceives integrity as the major asset that has kept him in politics.

Born in Daura in the present Katsina State on 17 December 1942, General Buhari first came into national prominence when he was appointed as governor of the then North-Eastern State during the regime of late General Murtala Muhammed. He later became the commissioner for petroleum and natural resources in 1975 when General Olusegun Obasanjo succeeded Murtala Mohammed after the latter’s assassination.

After he was overthrown by General Ibrahim Babangida in 1985, Buhari retired to a quiet civilian life until he was appointed the boss of the Petroleum Trust Fund under the late General Sani Abacha.

Buhari’s first incursion into politics was in 2003 when he contested as the presidential candidate of the ANPP. He lost the election. Though the Supreme Court, in a petition instituted by Buhari, agreed that the election which returned the incumbent President Olusegun Obasanjo was marred by irregularities, it refused to annul it.

The former head of state was again nominated by his party to contest the April 2007 presidential election but lost to his Katsina kinsman, Umaru Yar’Adua, the candidate of the PDP. Just like in 2003, Buhari filed a petition against the election which he alleged was marred by irregularities.

Though he lost at the Appeal Court, at the Supreme Court, three of the seven justices that sat over the petition agreed with Buhari that the malpractices that dogged the 2007 presidential election were enough for the polls to be annulled. But four disagreed, thus allowing President Yar’Adua to continue in office.

As it is, Buhari is not ready to retire to Daura. As he told this magazine: "I said it on the 31st December 1983 that we have no other country than Nigeria and we must stay and salvage it together. That is still my position. I have no other country than Nigeria, so I cannot just sit down while some fraudsters take over the country and bring it into ruins because where do I go if that happens? Where do my children go? Don’t forget, I told you that I came from a generation of crisis.

Professionally from 15 Feb 1966 till today, I have been involved in all the crises in this country and you want me to go to Daura and sit down because I love myself so much? No. As long as I breathe, I am telling you, I will continue."

In spite of this assertion, the former military head of state is quick to acknowledge that the task of rescuing Nigeria from the ruinous rule of the PDP is a job for all Nigerians and that the elite have to be at the vanguard of the expected change. "The elite across the different sectors must see that their country is about to collapse and begin to organize themselves like they did in Lagos, Kano and Bauchi to deliver the country. They have 18 months to do that; otherwise, we will remain slaves in our own country," Buhari said in the interview.

Q: You seem to be very busy lately.

A: Yes, I have been doing what I am doing quietly but when Atiku decided to visit the house and also Attahiru Bafarawa, then it could no longer be suppressed. There are a number of things on which I wouldn’t like to be quoted. One is that I had inkling then that the Peoples Democratic Party was going to have a special convention and that the convention would be to pass a resolution that in 2011, it’s going to be a total carry go like what Olusegun Obasanjo wanted to do.

From the councilors to the president, there will be no convention, no primaries. They will just have a roll call let me put it that way. It will just be a roll call. So, I was waiting for them because I knew it would not work. No matter what they did, it would not have worked. I was in the United Kingdom and I heard that the convention ended before it started because it lasted not more than two and half hours.

In fact, as some people were leaving the convention ground, others were just coming in and they were told that the convention was over. And part of the aims of the convention was to force Obasanjo to step down as chairman of the PDP Board of Trustees. But I later heard that they had to issue a statement that when it’s time to do that, there will be an election. And secondly, I stayed a bit longer in the UK than I expected.

I had planned to stay for two weeks but it became five. And thirdly, it would appear to me that the major parties - the PDP and the ANPP, are failing. So, we are in a sort of transition period again. There are so many groups coming up in the South-East, South-West and in the North and they are talking to each other. Now, if the parties are solid on the ground, this type of thing wouldn’t be happening. They will just belong to one party or the other.

But now, people are moving across the country, across the parties and talking. Look at what happened in the PDP primaries in Kano and what is happening in the Anambra PDP. How can 48 people in one state and in one party aspire to one position? With that, you’ll know that there is a total breakdown of discipline in the party. These are all realities that we will have to face by 2011.

Q: So many things have been said about the 2011 elections. Some people have said that it may mark the end of Nigeria as a country. Do you have this fear?

A: I have made statements on that. What I will say is that the way the PDP is going and the way institutions which should sustain democracy and rule of law have been compromised, I think every sensible Nigerian would dread 2011. The government has to go for elections in 2011 to have the constitutional stand for occupation of office. But if you have been following what happened during the local government and by-elections and recent events in Ekiti and Anambra, it will be very clear to you that the PDP has been doing anything it likes and damning the consequences.

Nigerians have to face them on the battleground if they want to salvage their country. Before now, I had talked about ‘Somaliasation’ of Nigeria and it’s still valid. What we saw during the local council and by-elections happened across the parties. It’s not only the PDP that rigged. Whatever party that is in power in the states rigged. I don’t know whether the governors agreed among themselves to hold on to what they had and say to hell with the rest.

That is the system they adopted. The most dangerous thing about that, for me, is that those of us in the opposition are supposed to be in tribunals and in courts fighting the rigging of the 2007 elections. Yet, the ruling party, because it rigged itself into power in majority of the states, still does what it did in the local government elections in the by-elections and even in Anambra. What that means is that it is a waste of time if you feel hurt to go to INEC, the police or to court.

If these institutions that sustain a nation/state have been totally compromised, then really, 2011 should be feared. When I appeared before the Senate Committee, I told them this. I said that I have been in court 50 times between 2003 and 2008 and I told a joke to break the ice. I said that one of my cynical friends gave me the title of Senior Advocate of Nigeria for going to court. For the 30 months our case lasted in 2003, I missed only four sittings.

The first time was when we went to bury Chuba Okadigbo, the late Senate President. Another was when I was receiving medical attention. Really, our saviour is not the judiciary. But my hope is that Nigerians across the country would repeat what Kano did in 2003 and Bauchi and Lagos did in 2007. I am very much aware of what Kano and Bauchi did but the details for Lagos, I don’t have.

What they did in Kano was that the university community, the business community, the Ulamas and the youths were organized to ensure that the elections were conducted in every polling booth according to the 2002 Electoral Act. They made sure that they had the correct forms, that there were representatives of the parties contesting according to the law, and the law enforcement agencies - the Police, the State Security Service [SSS], and certainly, INEC-were present.

People voted, forms were filled, and they were made to sign and given copies. They moved from there to the local government collation centers and then to the state. And then at the INEC headquarters in Kano, there were problems between 9 pm up to about 4 am, when all the results were announced. They said that they had all the results and if anybody announced anything different, they were all going to die. The same thing happened in Bauchi in 2007. So, if Nigerians are serious, they can save themselves in 2011. if they are not, I think they have accepted the state of slavery.

Q: Are you willing to be at the forefront of ensuring that every vote counts in the 2011 elections?

A: I have been doing that since 2002. There is an Hausa slogan that we developed-Akasa Asare. In Bauchi, they say Araka, meaning if you go to the market, the people that are selling vegetables or other wares put them on the floor or on the table and if anybody takes them, he has to pay. So, we developed that slang and we told the people to protect their votes. Of course, the elite led and it worked. When I appeared at the National Assembly and Falae made a presentation for the mega party movement, I was asked to comment.

And for the umpteenth time, I dealt with the Nigerian elite. I said that we, including myself, are all responsible for this. Or do were expect someone pushing a wheel barrow to come and lead us?

Q: But what are the chances of this grand coalition succeeding against the PDP, given that previous efforts were frustrated by ambitions of leaders of various groups within the coalition?

A: I will throw it back to the elite. And it must not be left alone for the political elite. It must be the elite across the spectrum of the society because if the house collapses, everybody under the roof will be victim. Isn’t it? It’s not only the political elite. The thing I advise is that the elite must have the time to go to their constituencies to educate them and liberate them. And they have to do it with respect. They must respect the people. Even if you’ll give them money, you have to persuade them that it’s in their own interest to vote for my party or to vote for me or to vote for XYZ.

I really don’t see what is difficult with Nigerians or why the elite are so cynical about the country. I will give you one example. The National Examinations Council [NECO] in its last examination recorded only 10 per cent pass. In WAEC, it is 25 per cent. To me, that spells doom for Nigeria. And if you check with the respective examination bodies, I believe between 75 and 90 per cent of those who pass will be from private schools.

That means that majority of Nigerians, including some members of the middle class, cannot even afford to educate their children. Is that good for this country? If you drive from Lagos to Kano now, there are large stretches where you would rather walk. Where is the rail system, the shipping line, and power generation? In 10 years of the PDP where are all the resources we had? Go and check the details. Before Professor Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala left office as minister of finance, she published a book on the revenue this country realized in six years under Obasanjo and allocations to the three tiers of government.

Certainly, it was admitted that the revenue realized by Nigeria under Obasanjo is more than the total we’ve had since we came together as a country. It’s on record. And for 10 years, there was no single good road that linked North and South or East and West. Can you drive now from Sagamu to Benin without fear? How many times was money allocated for the repair of that road? We are really in trouble. It’s you (the media) that will ring the bell for the elite. You can’t expect a drug pusher to lead the country.

Q: But how far can the opposition parties really go against the PDP given the fact that the party is in firm control of state institutions and agencies of government?

A: I have answered your question. The elite have to go back to their constituencies. If they can’t go because they are civil servants for example, others can go. But they should try to empower them. Even the NECO result is enough to wake people up. It means that their children will never receive education even if they are very bright.

Q: But don’t you think that Nigerians are now so psychologically battered that when the time comes, they will listen to the man who brings money?

A: But I just told you how Kano, Lagos, and Bauchi were able to overcome that. It’s an extremely serious issue. It’s still the elite and I told you it’s the elite across the different segments of the society, not just politicians who want to go the state or the National Assembly and their first mission and priority are the allowances they will receive or whatever they can get. But the elite across the different sectors must see that their country is about to collapse and begin to organize themselves, like they did in Lagos, Kano and Bauchi, to deliver the country. They have 18 months to do that otherwise we will remain slaves in our own country.

Q: Those places you mentioned have traditions of resistance. But there are many places in Nigeria where people still believe that whoever is in government is right…

A: I don’t agree with you. All the cultures in Nigeria have traditions of resistance. Go and check what happened in the Niger Delta area in the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries. Go and ask the Portuguese, the first colonialists that came to our shores. They were sent packing by the Niger-Delta people. Go and find out what happened during the Enugu coal crisis in the East, not to mention the North and West that had empires and physically fought. There is no part of Nigeria that has no history of resistance to either colonialism or oppression. There is none

Q: You once tried to fight corruption. What’s your impression of the current effort against corruption?

A: First, you should note that I operated in a different context. I think that’s the first thing. I was a soldier. I went through coups, civil war, and counter-coups. So, even in my profession, I knew my right from my left. I started from fighting indiscipline, not corruption. I could still recall after our first Supreme Military Council meeting, I called the late Tunde Idiagbon to my office and I said: Tunde, the problem of this country is indiscipline. I will give you a quick example. You are old enough to realize that this scandal of the mid 70s – Lockheed, brought down many governments across the world. Almost up to the last 10 years, I would say, every government that was brought down in Japan was brought down because of corruption.

Japan has, however, maintained its position as the second largest economy in the world. The Japanese culture was not broken even after it went through the World War and atomic bombing. Japan still holds itself against the world because it has a strong culture of discipline. So, I said, let’s have the war against indiscipline and for the 20 months that we were there, Nigerians know the result.

Q: That time, you jailed people for stealing even two million ir three million naira and all that. But now, we are talking of people stealing billions. In the next few years, we may not even know how to put a figure to what people are stealing if we do not fight corruption...

A: It is still the fault of the Nigerian elite. What we wanted to do then would have been difficult if not for the efforts of people like the late Chief Gani Fawehinmi. Remember that the corrupt ones quickly went and compromised the Nigerian Bar Association and said that lawyers should not appear at the tribunals and so on. But Gani said that it was rubbish as you can’t deal with these people without being unconventional.

He said that his chamber was going to appear before every tribunal to offer its services and Gani did it. We did not charge anybody based on hearsay. We produced the documentary evidence. You have been a minister, you have been a head of an agency and so much of the public funds went other than through the proper way, you pay back or you go to jail.

Q: Do you see people looting the national treasury today paying for their crimes anytime in the future?

A: It has happened before even if it was temporary. It may happen again. So, don’t give up.

Q: Given your previous efforts at becoming president and at the end of the day, the votes were stolen and then going through court processes and all of those problems, are you ready to go through that process again?

A: I will always refer to the elite and in this case. INEC and the press are the most important. I have said it and I will continue to say it. The process we are going through now is being guided by five documents as far as I know. I am not a lawyer. I am just talking based on experience. There is the constitution itself and then the INEC Act. The INEC Act is so powerful because it gives it (INEC) the important role of registering political associations as political parties and those parties registered must deposit their constitutions with INEC. INEC is the supervisor.

The parties must work within what is in their constitution. Then, for each election, there is an Electoral Act, for 2002/2003 and for 2006/2007. And that is why we went to court and spent 16 months to prove to the judiciary that the elections of 2003 and 2007 were not elections and we are not alone. Those who wish us well in developing this system - international observers also said so in their records about the elections. The 2003 and 2007 polls were not elections.

Look at Afghanistan. They are fighting a bloody war but when there was so much rigging in the result of their election, they insisted that there must be a run-off. Look at what Ghana did. Look at South Africa. Even in Zimbabwe and Kenya, elections were more credible than Nigerian elections. Why? It is because our institutions have been compromised. In Ghana, the electoral body said that it had to conduct the elections again in so and so constituencies. In Kenya, they said that the votes had to be recounted. But it was not so in Nigeria. All the institutions have been compromised.

Q: With this grim picture you’ve painted, are you still prepared to go through the rigors of being a presidential candidate in 2011?

A: That’s why I am telling you. Try and believe in those books and documents that are supposed to be a guide for conducting our elections. A lot of noise is being made about electoral reform, but we are trying to reform what we’ve not even practiced. If Nigerians insist on those documents I have mentioned, the system can be improved. This system is good, the documents are good. Whether we like is or nor, the constitution is what we’ve been using as Nigerians and there is a provision in it on how it can be modified or changed. So, why can’t we do it? Now, the party I am in, the constitution is deposited with INEC and I am a member.

If members of the party say that they want Buhari as their presidential candidate as they did in 2003 and 2007, I will say yes to it. I will like you to confirm through your research: I am the only presidential candidate that went to 34 states, some of them several times in 2003 and 33 states in 2007. In some of the states like Bauchi, which has 20 councils, I went to 19 of them. In 2003, I campaigned for Shekarau in all the 44 local councils in Kano.

Q: Why do you think it has been difficult mobilizing Nigerians for the kind of change you have been talking about?