With recent happenings in the political terrains of our
beloved country, Nigeria, here is another one from Chief Bode George, a
prominent South West leader of the Peoples Democratic Party.
In a new interview with Punch, Bode George talked about various
things including the recent proclamations of former President Olusegun
Obasanjo, election postponement and all the dramas accompanying it,
military surrounded Asiwaju Bola Tinubu’s house and other national
issues. Bode George also talked about politics in Lagos and what he
thinks about it….
Read the engaging, explosive and mind blowing excerpts from the interview below:
Former President Olusegun
Obasanjo says President Goodluck Jonathan plans to perpetuate himself in
government like the former President of Cote d’Ivoire, Laurent Gbagbo.
What do you think of this comment?
He (Obasanjo) says he is a Christian and as a Christian, it is
emphasised in the New Testament of the Bible where Christ said judge not
so that you will not be judged. But his judgment is no longer about the
policies of Jonathan. He has gone down to the extent of saying Maj.
Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) will jail you (Jonathan), that is why you
are afraid. I am holding my breath because in an African setting, you
talk to elders with respect and that is why I am trying to get the right
words to describe my feelings. Baba (Obasanjo) is not a young man. He
was Head of State at 39. So averagely, he should be about 84 or 85 and I
am requesting that he should graciously fade away into the midnight. In
the Bible, Romans chapter 13 states clearly that we should pray for
those in authority. It says pray for your leaders so that they don’t run
aground. So, to me that is my own interpretation. If baba (Obasanjo)
had attended the Council of State meeting in Abuja, where they were very
well briefed, and that it was decided that only the Chairman of the
Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof. Attahiru Jega, that
could pronounce a postponement and that he should go and come up with a
decision and Jega addressed a press conference. Now to start comparing
our President with Gbagbo in Cote d’Ivoire is unjust, unsavoury and
unfair because what is the population of Ivory Coast? What are the
tribal sentiments of Ivory Coast? Are they the same here? I want to
plead with Baba. God has been kind to him and he has served his own
time. I don’t want to conclude that his life will be like King Saul in
the Bible. I pray it will not be so. Baba has played his role. No
generation can finish any job. Nation building is a continuous exercise.
You come, do your own and go back into history.
Apart from the issue of insecurity which Jega gave as the
reason for the postponement of the elections, do you think INEC was
ready to conduct the elections on February 14 and 28?
I granted an interview recently and there were two posers that I gave
to Jega. Thank God Jega is a professor. He told us that there was an 88
per cent collection rate in Borno State where there is massive
insurgency as well as in Yobe and Adamawa states. Here, where there is
calmness and civility, only 30 something per cent of the populace had
collected PVCs. It is just improving. I think as of last Friday over
three million had collected as against 5.6 million. And he is saying we
are ready. Without the Permanent Voter Cards, you are immediately
disenfranchised. Ask Jega that as a professor, will it be fair to
conduct an examination whereby you have (students who have) covered 80
per cent syllabus and another class where you have (students who have)
covered only 30 per cent syllabus. Is it fair?
The other question is this issue of card readers. Have they been
tested? I am talking as an electronic engineer of 48 years in practice.
You just bought equipment from China and the last time it was tested was
in China. Our own environment is not the same. Look at the vagaries of
the temperature here from the swampy areas of the South and the savannah
in the North. Who has tested the equipment? Now, I am not saying they
will not all work but if there are almost 9,000 polling units in Lagos,
is he saying all the 9,000 card readers will be functional? If the card
readers fail to work in some polling units, what shall we do?
Why did the military surround former Governor Bola Tinubu’s house?
If Bola Tinubu finds his way into national government, I will go on
exile. He hasn’t the temerity and the calmness of mind. They don’t even
know what to do in power. Because the vice-president is his boy, he will
just order that Bode George should be picked up. He said soldiers came
to him but he must have been dreaming. When he said soldiers had
surrounded his house, I drove down there because my house is not too far
from there. I know the hierarchy of the military and its behaviour.
That they surrounded his house is lie number one because on either side
of his house are two buildings. There is also one at the back. So, I
wondered where the soldiers were hiding. Why would you lie for public
consumption? So when I got down there, I knew that his spin doctors were
working. These days people go on the social media and the story went
viral. Why would he (President Godluck Jonathan) from Abuja, be running
after Bola? Let them be very careful about the statements they are
making. More so, if Obasanjo is now linking Jonathan with what happened
in Cote d’Ivoire and coup; not in this 21st Century. That is past and
gone forever. No nation goes through this kind of tribulation twice and
survive. We have had our own experience of Civil War and I pray that God
does not direct our minds in that direction and our people have to
watch their mouths.
The general perception in Lagos is that the governorship race is between yourself and Tinubu.
Absolutely not! In the PDP, no individual owns the party. I happen to
have been the first national vice chairman, South-West PDP, and then
became deputy national chairman South and then deputy national chairman
for the whole country and having done that, they have honoured me that
as long as I remain in the party, I remain a member of the Board of
Trustees and I am the only one representing the South-West in the
national caucus forever. That is a great honour in our party but I don’t
decide who becomes a candidate. Primaries were conducted and in this
particular case, the voice of the people became louder than anybody’s. I
am not like Bola Tinubu, I don’t have the papers of the party in my
pocket. I don’t even have a veto power. But the other side doesn’t
practice democracy. We have friends that are members there. Jimi Agbaje
has no godfather but will not behave like an authoritarian governor.
But Senator Musiliu Obanikoro said you were the one that imposed Agbaje.
That is absolute garbage, he knew he was lying. You know he came from
their party and that is why he was saying it was me. He has now
retracted the statement. We are now one indivisible party and we are
ready for election. All the vagaries and all that happened during the
primary was a test of the ability and the strength of our party and we
listened to the voice of the people. The voice of the people is the
voice of God.
Jonathan’s perception in the South-West is not as
favourable as it was in 2011. There has been blame on you and other PDP
Yoruba leaders for allowing Buhari to increase in popularity in the
South-West.
If you had said this about two or three weeks ago, I would have
agreed. I got these feelers straight to my face. People came to me and
said they would vote for Agbaje but they will not vote for Jonathan
because he had done nothing for us here. And I explained that there is a
general misunderstanding of the concept of operation in this country.
The long periods of military rule presupposed that the Head of State was
responsible for everything and it is that same thinking that is
responsible for this situation. We are all hands on deck explaining the
differences between military governance and democratic governance.
Highly educated people, my age groups, were asking me this question
but I explained to them that 60 per cent of the impact the President
will have on you is through the federal allocation to your state. Does
he give every state and every local government allocation? Yes. They
collect it religiously every 30 days. In the area of security, he
guarantees it. It is only three states in the North-East battling
insecurity. There is peace and he guarantees that. What of
infrastructure? All federal roads in Lagos from Alfred Rewane in Ikoyi
all the way to Third Mainland Bridge and Ebute Meta are federal roads.
Are they like the roads in Somolu and Akowonjo?
Secondly, the APC refused to participate in the National Conference.
Since he (Buhari) has refused to debate, what will he do about the
resolution unanimously reached by the National Conference? What will
happen to the report? The decisions of the National Conference are so
germane to the future of this country. The more reasons why the man who
conceptualised it should be allowed to implement his decisions.
It would be recalled that just recently, the South West chairman of
the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) condemned the statement by Olusegun
Obasanjo that the elections were shifted in favour of Goodluck Jonathan.
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