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Obasanjo Solicited My Support For Third Term – Onyia

Excerpts:

After the April general elections, you followed up your protest over electoral malpractices by taking your case to the Enugu Election Petition Tribunal. Can we know how the case is going?

I just want to say that I am very proud of the Nigerian Judiciary because, as the last hope of the common man and democracy in this country, the tribunals, contrary to the earlier expectation of Nigerians, have done very well. I am telling you that I have not even met any member of the tribunal in Enugu today, but I am very impressed with the way they are doing their job. The chairman has been firm and the members have been doing tremendously very well. I mean, I have never been to election tribunal ever since I joined politics. I have won election into the Constituent Assembly, I won election twice into the National Assembly before I became a minister. So I have never been protesting over elections.

But the way the April 2007 elections were conducted, if you recall, in 2003, as a Minister of the Federal Republic, I had an interview with the NTA (Nigerian Television Authority) where I condemned the conduct of the 2003 elections, because I believe that having fought for democracy in this country, we must set a standard. That is the only hope of the common man in this country. We cannot make any economic and social advancement in this country without getting democracy well institutionalised and true democracy is sine qua num with economic and social development of this country. It pains those of us who fought for democracy, both during the Ibrahim Babangida and Abacha periods, you know, as the Secretary General of Eastern Mandate Union (EMU), what we went through. Some of us were in detention when Abacha died. So how can we come now, when somebody else the beneficiary of those struggles where many people died, many common Nigerians died in Lagos, most of them, unsung. And the former President Olusegun Obasanjo, became a beneficiary of those struggles of the common people of this country. It therefore behoves on us to ensure that democracy survives and is consolidated. So when that thing happened in 2003, as a serving minister, I condemned it. Now, in 2007, it became worse. But seeing what the judiciary is doing, people like me feel so happy because it shows that there is hope for the common man in this country, it shows that there is hope for democracy. So I went to the tribunal, for the first time in my life, to fight for democracy. I see it as the continuation of the struggle for the enthronement and entrenchment of democracy in this country. And I tell you, when I was going, people were saying to me, oh, you can’t get anything from the tribunal, that the tribunal is not going to do anything. But the story is different. Tribunal members, all over the country, are doing very well. In Enugu, we went there, nobody gave us a chance. We went, presented our case and today we have closed our evidence, our petition, as you may have been told or you have read in the papers, the reply of Governor Sullivan Chime to my petition, has been dismissed. Also, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) reply to my petition was equally dismissed for lack of time and we have addressed the tribunal and we are waiting for judgement. What we want, whoever is going to be the governor of Enugu State, would have the mandate of the people. The only way you can correct this absurd quest for enrichment or stealing of peoples’ money, is if you allow the people to elect their own leaders, the leaders that would be responsible to the people. It is only then that you will have leaders who will be responsible to the people. You see, I once said to the former President, that the only reason why people are flocking to the centre, the national level, is because the governors in the various states have refused to do what they are supposed to do. Nigeria is a confederation. When you share the national budget and the governors take their own, if they do what they are expected to do with the money or the federal allocation, create jobs, people will, get employment in their states. That will curb the rate at which people rush to Abuja.

Let us take you back to the elections. We read a lot about what happened in Enugu during the elections. You were a participant-observer. Could you share your experience with us?

It is unbelievable. First of all, the night before the elections, when the materials came into the state and the party agents and chairmen went there to witness the sharing of the materials and their distribution to the local governments and wards, they discovered that the most the important document, Form EC8B, was missing, but INEC could not explain what happened. They said: ‘Oh! May be it was forgotten in Abuja. May be the vehicle is yet to bring it. But in the paper they signed acknowledging that the documents were received from Abuja, that Form EC8B, was ticked as having been received. So the next day when we got there, they said the thing came early in the morning and what we saw, they brought out cartons that had been tampered with, opened. So we queried it. The law says that you must bring the carton but, all the agents must see it, the party chairmen would see it and you must open it in their presence and distribute the materials, not cartons that have already been tampered with. So we queried it and told them, please get us Form EC8B. The argument went on till Ishmail Igbani (INEC’S national commissioner) came. I met him and said to him, Igbani what is happening here? He said, Well you know, the mistake of INEC, they brought another one this morning. I said to him, But the cartons had been tampered with. Why is it so? The argument went on until about 1.30p.m.

That was on 14 April?

Yes, on the 14 April, when Obasanjo, asked the 82 Division Commander, to come out with troops. The International observers were there. I went to him and said, Look my friend, you are today a military officer, 82 Div Commander; you will retire tomorrow. What kind of country are you trying to preserve for your children? I told him that this democracy will affect you and affect your children. That what we are asking for is that INEC should get us the proper documents so that we can go for election. In any case, we went to INEC around 1.30p.m. We said, why don’t you ask Abuja to give you the documents so that you can start elections tomorrow. But what they did was to give instruction to the military men and they started shooting. Even the international observers took cover. Everybody took cover and they opened the gate and carted away the materials.

The soldiers?

No, they opened the gate and vehicles moved in, but we don’t know who took the materials; we don’t know what happened but the vehicles just drove out.

Were you trying to ensure that the vehicles didn’t leave there?

Exactly. We were doing that so that we could get the materials and get them properly shared. Now, even if we shared the materials by 1.30P.m, there is a place called Akuiyi Umulokpa, in Uzouwani. It takes a minimum of five hours to get there, because of the bad roads. That is the local government headquarters. And if the vehicles conveying the materials leave Enugu at 1.30p.m., it would get to Uzouwani by 6.30p.m. From there, they will share the materials to various wards. From Akuiyi Umulokpa to Adani, one of the wards is another three or four hours ride on a bad road. So the materials will be getting there by 9 p.m. or 10p.m. Before they start sharing it to the (polling) booths, it will be around 11p.m. or 12 midnight. Does it make sense? So INEC owned up at their headquarters, that by the time the materials leave the Central Bank, Enugu, it would not be possible for them to get to the rural areas. But the following day on the 15, we heard that INEC had declared results in 14 local government councils in the state. They now cancelled results of four wards in the urban areas, may be to hoodwink the world that elections had taken place and they were on top of the situation!

But urban areas are where the materials would have gotten to easily?

Exactly, you get my point. But in any case because there was no election, it was difficult for INEC to declare anybody winner. So they didn’t declare the present governor winner till April 29. They were trying to play around their result and see if they could change things. But they didn’t have any result to present so they declared the result on April 29 any how. Now, if somebody like myself who has been fighting for democracy all my life, keep quiet, what is the hope of my own children and grand children? That was why I went to the tribunal.

The role the military played, especially the G.O.C. of 82 Division of Nigeria Army, Enugu, has so far not come up at the tribunal. Why is it so?

They did not even reply to their summons. We summoned them, we petitioned them. In my petition, they were mentioned. They did not even reply. They did not bother to reply. But it came up in the video I presented at the tribunal. The tribunal members saw the shooting. They heard the shooting, they heard it. So you can see that, but for the role the present tribunals are playing in this country today, I would have said to you that there is no hope for democracy in this country. I would have said that. But thank God for them. I hope by the time they finish in the various states, those who will survive and those who will eventually lead their various states and lead this country, will now understand that they can no longer afford to play with democracy.

There was this letter you wrote to your friend, late Dr. Chuba Okadigbo. What message were you trying to send across through the letter?

I was only trying to tell Chuba that he should continue to have his rest. Everyday I remember him in prayers when I go for morning mass. I pray that his soul will rest in peace. And I wanted to let him know that nothing has changed since he left. The man who fought him ended up messing up this country. Obasanjo ended up cutting his nose to spite his face. He was one man who was respected and revered, not only in the West African sub-region but in the entire world. But today he is a pariah. When Africans formed the club of past African Heads of States, they did not invite him. He was not one of them. When they called elder statesmen in the world, nobody invites him. But if he had taken the advice some of us gave him and landed very well by anchoring democracy, if he had not gone in for third term, he would have been one of the most revered former heads of states in the world as we speak. In fact, this award that Joachim Chisano (former President of Mozambique) won would have been won by him. But he went into this old thinking of "if I cannot have it, nobody will". He thus destroyed the reputation and credibility that he had. So, I was telling Chuba that the National Assembly he fought to maintain its sanctity, which was interfered with by Obasanjo throughout his stay in power. That he was accused of anticipatory approval of N57 million but somebody who ate up to N628 million, is said to be a child’s play, pocket money. To Obasanjo, it is nothing. But the N57 million which Chuba approved was blown out of proportion by the president. Also, the N55million of Adolphus Wabara warranted a national broadcast on a network television by Obasanjo. It also consumed not only Wabara, but Professor Fabian Osuji, of Igbo extraction. It shows the deep hatred of the Igbo which Obasanjo has, when he was president of this country. All the people he dealt with are Igbo. Chuba is Igbo, Wabara is Igbo, Osuji is also Igbo. He wanted to deal with Anyim too. He went after Orji Uzor Kalu and made sure that Chief Ralph Uwazuruike languished in jail for over two years, until he was granted a three-month conditional pardon for the burial of his late mother. So I was trying to tell Okadigbo that he should rest in peace, that the man who fought him will live to reap the fruit of all the bad things he did in this country.

Talking about Obasanjo, you worked closely with him as Minister of State for Foreign Affairs. Were you surprised about the steps Obasanjo took after 2003, especially with regards to the plot to perpetrate himself in office via the third term agenda?

I was not surprised because he told me. He told me that he wanted my support.

That was when?

That was around 2003, when he conceived the idea. I mean, he once told me when we were going to a country together, that it is only a stupid man who would have power and throw it away. I went to him once, after the establishment of New Partnership for Africa Development (NEPAD). One of the essential ingredients of NEPAD is the Peer Review Mechanism. When President Eyadema of Togo reviewed the Constitution of his country and made himself life president, I went to Obasanjo and said, ‘Your Excellency, why don’t you try and get in touch with your brother in Togo’. That this his review of the constitution and making himself life President in Togo, that it will negate all the principles of African Peer Review Mechanism that is entrenched in NEPAD, that the international community will not take us seriously. He ignored me and said which one is my business in it. That was exactly when I started to think he wanted to go the way of Eyadema. He told me, he wanted to go ahead with the third term and that he needed my support. But I told him no, that I fought for democracy and that as a beneficiary of that democracy, I was not going to do any thing that would truncate or even weaken it. Therefore, I advised him to toe the path of Dr. Nelson Mandela and become a true statesman of this country.

But the same Obasanjo, when the third term dream crashed, told the world that he never wanted to go for third term; that if he wanted….

(Interrupts) He never fooled any body. He did not fool anybody because before the eyes of diplomats in this country, the Ambassadors in the country, where did the money, the N50 million that was shared to every member of the National Assembly, where did it come from? A man who was fighting corruption at this time, a man who once accused the former Senate president of corruption and then money was being shared to the members of the National Assembly, both in the House of Reps and Senate, N50million each. Where did the money come from? Why didn’t Obasanjo ask the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to crack down on those that shared the money, if he was not part of it.

Was he not a beneficiary of that project? Has anybody asked that question where that money came from? Why did he sit back? If somebody carries an illegal exercise on your behalf, will you not shout and tell him to stop it, or ask the police to arrest him? Was any body arrested for sharing N50million? Those who cried out at the National Assembly, were they not victimised?

The unfortunate thing is that those who stood by Obassanjo, he abandoned all of them. So the story that he was never interested in third term, only succeeded in fooling himself and not the international community, not Nigerians. Nigerians knew exactly what happened. You journalists were part of it. You all wrote against it. And you were shouting, you knew where the money was coming from, you knew those distributing the money and you said so in your papers. I commend the journalists because they stood firm for democracy in this country.

So will it be proper to say that Obasanjo lied over the botched Third Term issue?

You have just said it. You have just said it. If he didn’t mean it and you didn’t believe him, then you have said it.