Dr. Junaid Mohammad, a medical
doctor, I is the Convener, Coalition of Concerned Northern Politicians,
Academics, Professionals and Businessmen. The Second Republic
In this interview, the social
critic speaks on the underdevelopment of the North; sovereign national
conference, review of the revenue formula, impending revolution, among other
issues. Excerpts:
What informed the formation of your group
The incompetence and
irresponsibility among some of the 19 Northern governors and our system of
governance informed the decision to form the new group. There were clearly delineated
areas of responsibility between the various levels of government. But what
became obvious was that under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), especially
since 1999 to date is that most of the state governments in the North have
failed to deliver and those who have delivered did in the areas that are not
directly very relevant to the welfare of the people. For example, it is clear
that every state in the North has problems with strategic infrastructure:
roads, railways; agriculture which is the mainstay of the North is in tatters,
there is no investment in agriculture; the farm mechanization system has
collapsed. We used to be a net exporter of groundnuts, cotton, hides and skin,
and many other things, but today, we are importing all these things. So it is
really shameful, when you have an economy so badly managed for so long by one
single party that you found yourself in a situation whereby you begin to ask:
who is really in charge? Who can be held responsible for the devastation in the
North? Without a very serious marshal plan, without a complete re-arrangement
of the fiscal system, of the way the revenue is shared, the North is going to
go under, period.
The states in the North are
poorer, yet they are pressing for free education and what is on ground is that
everything inherited and which made us proud as Northerners by then Northern
governors have been reversed by the PDP government and we are in a state of
where a few mediocre who came to talk about shariah misled the people.
Let me make it clear to you, our
own group, the coalition of concerned Northern intellectuals and professionals
is here because we realized that there is a problem and we also realized that
the governors on the ground are either unprepared for the onerous task of
governance or are there to compound the problems and we cannot continue there
to compound the problems and we cannot continue to watch ourselves reduced to
such level we have found ourselves now.
Look at the results of the
examinations being conducted - the West African School Certificate and the
National Examination Council Examinations, how many candidates passed the
examination from the North? And these are the people who would form the
manpower and the leadership of tomorrow. Indeed, the North is really in a mess
as it is.
Why do you say the North is in a mess
Because it is badly governed and
everything is clear about that. Isn't it obvious? Isn't it self-evident that
there is no system of governance in the North? People simply come, collect the
federal allocation and share it among their friends, do one road or one bridge
in an obscured corner of his state, and then that is the end of the story.
Governors are so irresponsible in the North, such that they cannot even collect
taxes. When'you ask someone to go and collect tax, what he does is to collect
the money and put it in his pocket!
You talked about governors collecting revenues and pocketing same. But
the same set of Northern governors are asking for an upward review of
allocation accruable to the Northern states, so that they would have more money
to develop their states.
I may not like the governors, but
the fact is that they have a solid case by asking that the revenue allocation
law be revisited, because the North was, ab-initio, short-changed by former
President Olusegun Obasanjo and it was a deliberate slight on the part of
Obasanjo against every system of governance in the North.
The heart of the matter is this:
we are talking of democracy but there is no democracy without the rule of law.
If we have a democracy which is underpinned by the rule of law, then that
democracy must be the one that listens and acts in accordance with the dictates
of the judiciary.
The revenue allocation formula
was supposed to be based on a Supreme Court decision. The Attorney General of
the Federation then, late Chief Bola Ige took the attorneys-general of the
states before the Supreme Court and asked the apex court to decide who owns
what in our sources of revenue and the Supreme Court came to conclusion that we
are signatory to the law of the sea convention which stipulates the cardinal
principles of international law that is supposed to guide the allocation and
resource control on the high seas.
I declare that Nigeria Nigeria
Secondly, there are two decrees,
in 1969 and 1970 and those laws are still part of our legal system; which say:
that any mineral anywhere within Nigeria
The agitation for a review in revenue formula is polarizing the North
and South.
I don't want this issue to be
polarized between North and South or between North and South-8outh. The issue
is: is it legal, is it practical to have a nation whereby on an average, one
person earns per capital over 20 to 30 times what the other person gets? The
whole of the 19 Northern states get less than what Rivers and Bayelsa states
get, can you build a nation on that basis? Who is really fooling who? Are we
serious about Nigeria
We may not like what we have
today, but let me tell you, what we have today may be eminently more preferable
to war. I believe that peace is better than war because life is better than
death. That is my own position.
As far as I am concerned, nobody
should hold this country to ransom and what they are doing is holding Nigeria
Why are you so hard on the
governors to the extent of referring to them as irresponsible
If you do the right thing at the
right time, you are responsible and if you don't, you are simply irresponsible.
Forget about the language, the fact is that what is on the ground indicates
that the people have been short-changed and it happened in connivance with the
governors and we cannot run away from that and I have no other way to describe
it
You want to accuse me of being
too harsh on the Northern governors, what has the governors in the South-South
done with the huge amount of money that accrued to them, trillions of naira?
Nothing. I should know because I am supposed to be a development expert in the
South -South. When I went there in 1992, I took over all the abandoned projects
and got most of the contractors to finish the jobs. Here we are today, these
people are getting trillions of naira and they are doing nothing with it. A
large chunk of it is stolen. In the North, it is shared and in the South-South,
it is stolen. In the past, they come to Lagos
So, if I am harsh on the Northern
governors, I should not spare the South-South governors. If you condemn
corruption on the part of the Northern governors, you must do equally with the
South-South governors. While the Northern governors are irresponsible, the
South-South governors have more money than they have patriotism. The
South-South governors are only good at agitation; inciting their people to
agitate, whereas the money they have for their own people are tied down in
private bank accounts in the Western world.
In what specific areas have these governors failed the North
Education; it is the biggest
challenge and you cannot wish it away. Education is the most important human
investment. If you give a child life and you fail to give that child education,
that is tantamount to child abuse. They have denied a large number of people in
the North today going to school, not because they do not want to go to school
but because their parents cannot afford to give them education and that is
tantamount to child abuse and millions of children are being abused in the
North by these governors and you said I should not call them irresponsible.
We are not saying that they are
irresponsible because we hate them, some of these people are our friends, some
are our in-laws and close associates, but the issue of education is so
important that nobody should be spared. I can see the results and they are
stark reality, so what do you want me to do? 'To say there is no problem? No,
there is a problem and somebody must be held responsible and these are the
governors and I find them, from 1999 till today as irresponsible, irrespective
of their political party affiliation.
In some areas, some of the PDP
governors have done so marvelously well while the so-called opposition
governors, especially the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) governors, have done
disgracefully poor. In a nation where many people cannot afford decent three
meals per day, you start talking of shariah, what are you talking about? If you
are healthy and you are not in a position to send your child to school, is it
right to cut your hand because you have stolen something? And can Nigeria
It is the same situation across
the entire Northern region of Nigeria Maiduguri Nigeria
The revolution you are advocating for should come in what form
Let me give you my own definition
of a revolution. A revolution in common parlance is sudden change of power from
the existing organs of government to new organs and actors of government. That
is what I want to see in Nigeria
This is the situation and I don't
believe we can continue to deceive ourselves forever. And this democracy, as it
is being practiced by the PDP is in peril. And if we don't do anything about
it, there is going to be a lot of problems.
I must say, for example, that all
the governors are not doing so badly. Those doing well, we must commend them.
Babatunde Fashola is doing well; I have known Lagos Nigeria
And If you call the governors angels, the people they govern know the
truth and know that they are Irresponsible, so what are you deceiving yourself
about
I would like to mention the fact
that agriculture has been on the decline in the North and whether you like it
or not, the North is the food basket of not only Nigeria, but the whole of
Africa and when we found ourselves in a situation whereby we cannot feed
ourselves, whatever we say about security is nothing but a huge joke. Because
the first security you need is the security of life and property; after that
you think of putting food in your stomach, because without food there is no
life. The North has the capacity not only to provide enough not only for Nigeria Nigeria
Why is the security challenge defying all forms of remedy
We don't have security in Nigeria
There had been times when the
security organizations came close to arresting the head of the Boko Haram sect,
and orders from above came that they should leave the individual alone. I am
aware also of two occasions when they were pin pointed to security agents, and the
location could have easily been helicopter-bombed, but it was never done.
There is no peace today because
some people have more to gain from war. You can imagine 25 per cent security
vote which is not accounted for by anybody and they can bribe their way, which
is the pattern of doing things in the PDP' they can go to the National Assembly
and give them what they want and as long as the status quo continued, peace
would continue to elude Nigeria. Those who are interested in ensuring that
there is no peace in Nigeria