Mr Dele Momodu, the publisher
of the Qvation magazine, was the presidential candidate of the National Commission
Party (NCP) in the 2011 general
elections. In this interview with Vanguard, Momodu speaks on the Buhari administration, the
elections of the leaders of the two chambers of the National Assembly and his
relationship with the National Leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress
(APC), Ashiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, as well as the late politician, Chief MKO
Abiola, among other issues.
You were, before the general
elections, one of the unofficial spokespersons for President Muhammadu Buhari, who was then the APC presidential
candidate. But of recent, your thoughts
about the president appears to be changing?
I am surprised at your comment because I have never changed.
I am the biggest supporter of President
Muhammadu Buhari today. All I have done is to tell the president what people
are saying outside, that is my job. We don’t tell our leaders the truth. I told
former president, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, the truth throughout his tenure. This
is detailed in my forthcoming book, titled,
‘’Pendulum, a book of prophesy’’. Everything I told President Jonathan happened. I owe that to our president too today.
Once you become the president
in Nigeria, people stop telling you the truth. They only tell you what you want
to hear. I am a stakeholder in this government. I wonder what would have
happened to me if the PDP had returned to power. I was already under constant
threat. I received threat messages. I
had to name all the numbers anonymous because they were all attacking me for
supporting Buhari. I didn’t support the president because I wanted anything
from him. I supported him because I believed
at this time of our lives, we need a father-figure, what I called the
Mandela- option in Nigeria. And I thought Buhari, as a man of integrity, of
impeccable character, fits that bill.
But, three months after the
election, Nigerians are getting impatient
because most of them cannot wait for even one second. I was the first to
write an article titled, ‘’In Search Of Patience’’, telling the people to
exercise patience with the man. But being patient does not mean we should
fold our arms indefinitely. There are things that can still be done. I found a
proverb some where which says ‘’the meat of antelope tastes very good, but
while it is cooking, we can still make do with groundnut’’.
While we are
waiting for that big action, some things must keep us going, whether pop corn,
ice cream or something. If the National Assembly, within some minutes, approved
about 15 Special Advisers; so, what is stopping us from picking our National
Security Adviser, if we have to change the one there now.
How about the Chief of Staff,
the Principal Secretary, the Secretary to the Federal Government. The longer it
takes, the longer the tension, and also the longer the pressure on Mr
President. I want the president to know
that if they begin to put pressure on him, things may begin to fall apart. Had
it been some things are already in
place, I am sure the tension would have reduced.
But things have rotten so much
so that many people support the president taking his time before making
any appointments.
No. I was once a presidential
candidate. Before a man says he wants to
be president, he must have his plans and blue print of things that he saw not
working properly. As such, he thought he had solution to them. Yes, you might not
have 100% solution to the problems, but
you have a fair idea of what needed to be done urgently. And you said you have
the answer to them before you offered yourself to serve. And there is nobody
more experienced than President Muhammadu
Buhari. He was there over 30 years ago. He also acted in other
capacities before now.
So, I expect him to be able to
know what he wants to do. Your principal staff, you will know who they are, and
you will appoint them. Even the ministers, by now, there is no law that says
all the ministers must be ready at the same time. The problems we have in
Nigeria are so big that one second is like eternity. I pleaded with people few
weeks back to be patient, but I am telling you that the public outcry is no
longer favourable to our cause. And I don’t want us to lose that moment to the
concerns of the people. It is like a plane that is about to take off.
The outcry, some have said, is
genuine but that people are not well informed about the enormity of the
problems at hand?
No one is crying foul. Don’t
let us misuse language. They are only asking for action. They have the right to
that. Their expectation was that of a magician. That was what I wrote in my
article. What the Nigerians expect of you is like that of Jesus Christ turning
water into wine, raising Lazarus from the
dead.
I wrote another article, ‘’Buhari and the burden of expectations’’. To
whom is given, much is expected. Nigerians saw him as magician. They believe he
has talismanic powers to transform Nigeria from penury to prosperity. You can’t
blame them. Nobody is blaming Buhari, we are just saying ‘please sir, time is
not on your side’. I am not one of those who will rush him.
I am just reflecting the mood
of the nation. I am a journalist. I gave him hints of what people expect him to
do.
I am not one of those who write
abstract nonsense. I write constructively as a patriotic citizen. I joined the
struggle since my days at University of Ife
in 1978. I have never stopped
since then. I also a country my children
can live in and live in peace. I want a country where no girl would vanish into
thin air for two years without any trace.
I want a country where young school
leavers would get jobs. I want a country where I will not spend all my money to generate electricity. I want a
country where the infrastructure meets international standard like other oil
producing countries. I want a country where our people will not be too distant
from their leaders.
Talking about sudden change,
you were known to be a friend and
admirer of the APC National Leader, Ashiwaju Ahmed Tinubu, but suddenly you
started supporting the Senate President, Senator Bukola Saraki, against his
party?
There is nothing sudden in that. From day one,
I supported Saraki for various reasons. I will say that, boldly, any where. And
I stand by it. I supported him based on empirical facts of what I know. One of
it…..
(Cuts in)But you are not a
member of the party?
Yes, that is the beauty of it
all.
So how come you are saying
authoritatively that ‘’from what I know’’?
I interact with people. At my
level, a 55-year-old man, I have friends everywhere. I have contacts.
I say
this with every sense of responsibility. I don’t know of anybody who worked
harder than Saraki, Amaechi and the rest of them for Buhari. Yes, so many
people worked for Buhari, but I am telling you that from my own stand point,
from my interactions, these people mentioned almost worked themselves to death
for Buhari. As a matter of fact, at a time, some people were saying it was better to have consensus candidate for
the party so that there won’t be rancour after the primaries; but some people
refused, saying they were not ready to step down for Buhari.
Saraki was one of the first
people who declared total and unflinching support for Buhari.
Amaechi adores
Kwankwaso. I know that for a fact.
Ameachi loves Kwankwaso to death. But because of Buhari, Amaechi refused
to support Kwankwaso. I don’t know if Kwankwaso will forgive him for that. But,
he was honest enough to tell Kwankwaso that ‘’I have given my word to Buhari, I
cannot turn back’’.
Same thing with
Saraki. I know for a fact that Saraki worships Tinubu. Quote me. Maybe our Oga
(Tinubu)does not know it. You know, sometimes, you don’t know those who love
you if you have a lot of crowd around you. But I am saying it to you that
Saraki, the Senate President, worships Tinubu.
Then or till now?
I am sure till today. Saraki
was one of Tinubu disciples. In fact, when some people were saying Tinubu
wanted to hijack the party by installing
his men, Saraki and Amaechi were
among those who said ‘no, we must give
our leader whatever he wants; we must
not humiliate our leader’, because they(new PDP) had the power at that time to
install their own candidate and they would have won, because the new PDP that
joined APC at that time was formidable enough. But, they insisted they must
defer to Tinubu. It is what I know, not that they told me.
There are people who may go
behind and tell the leaders lies, but I love Tinubu to the extent that I will
never tell him a lie. I will tell him only what I know. So, among those who
worked so hard day and night, gathered those who could support the campaign,
Saraki was one of them. Amaeachi risked his entire life for that campaign. In
an association of five or more political parties, I expected that immediately
after victory, all of you would have come together to decide which of the
parties in the association takes what. That was not the case.
My advice to those of us who
are close to Ashiwaju Tinubu is that people should prevail on him not to oppose
Saraki because he is one of his men. If you have children and you show one that
he is the preferred child above other
ones, they will be angry. I think Saraki felt betrayed. If I were Ashiwaju, I would have done what the
president did. I can almost bet my life that the President Buhari had a
preferred candidate even though we didn’t know who the person was, but he said
he would not interfere.
It will get to a stage in life
where two of your children are fighting for something, you stand back and let
them go to the field and whoever wins, you support him, not that you tie the
arms of one against the other. You have not even told us why you are supporting
one against the other. I have not read it anywhere. The only thing I have so
far read was that Senator Lawan is a ranking member, beyond that, what else?
Beyond that, nobody sold Lawan to us.
But the elections in both
chambers appear to be polarising the party?
Yes. That is what it will come
to if you supported one child against the other. I predicted it. Go and read my
article, titled, ‘’Let’s honour our heroes’’, in which I canvassed that we must
honour those people who worked for the party.
I saw this coming because whoever
knew a little bit of the rudiment of
politics would have predicted same. Don’t forget that the generation of today
is different, the temperament is different. The man’s(Saraki) life ambition was
to be Senate President, to, at least, go beyond what his father achieved of
being the Senate Leader. That is the dream of everybody in life, to surpass
your father’s glory.
That is why you had a W. Bush, and then, a George Bush Jr.
and then a Jeb Bush coming, if it happens.
You must know that a Saraki who
had that kind of ambition, you could not discourage him. If you are not going
to support him, don’t discourage him. That was my position.
I am not saying
Tinubu had no right to support Lawan or
anybody for that matter. But I know from
my interactions with the senators particularly from South- West, many of them were secretly supporting Saraki but
for the fear of Tinubu and the backlash, they didn’t come out in the open. And
when this was about to happen, I sent people close to Ashiwaju to tell him that
this was what was happening.
Whenever I met those South-West
senators, they would say, E ba ore yin soro(please talk to your friend), but I
can no longer do that, those days are gone. Today, if you go to Ashiwaju’s
house, it is like a market place. And in a market place, all human beings will
be there, and, most of them, for one purpose or the other. The reality is that
has Tinubu accepted Saraki as one of his
children and did not show any open bias against him? I am speaking facts, I am
not taking sides. I am one million times closer to Tinubu than Saraki. But I
will always support the under dog. That is me.
When General Buhari was going
to speak at Chatham House in London, contrary to
what the Fayose and co were
saying that it never took place and that the man was in air ambulance…. I was
in contact with Amaechi and Saraki. He was going to speak on Thursday, I left
London via Madrid on a Tuesday for Ghana.
I got to Accra in the evening. On
Wednesday, Saraki contacted me and said Buhari was going to speak at Chatham
House. I told him that I just got to Accra last night. He pleaded that whatever
I could do, media wise, to make the day successful, I should do.
So, I contacted an
international photographer and asked him to meet up with Amaechi while I took the next available flight back to
London.
Saraki was shocked and excited that I could return to London the
following day for the event. So, I knew the efforts of Saraki and Amaechi. And when you talk about party supremacy, yes,
the party is always supreme but not party dictatorship. Yes, the party will
advise you, but you too will have a say.
The party is made up of human beings. Even a father cannot be absolute. This is
democracy.
Why did the Senate South-East
caucus reject Lawan? Was it Saraki that rejected him? The party can make
recommendation but everybody must be carried along. It would have been
impossible to win that (Senate) election without carrying PDP along. What I
expected from our leaders from the South-West was to have accepted the voice of
God, whether it was controversial or not. Aminu Tambuwal emerged as Speaker
from the PDP, it was controversial. And he remained Speaker till May 29, PDP
didn’t kill him for that, neither was he called names. Tinubu is a
father-figure to all of them, I think that is the role he should be playing.
Are you Tinubu’s boy?
Tinubu is my mentor. And I won’t join those who mislead our
master. There is nothing wrong in being anybody’s boy. If you humble yourself,
God will lift you up. I will always respect Tinubu. He is older than me,
minimum of 10 years. So, if I cannot call him my father, anybody who wants to
disrespect his own father can go ahead, he is free.
You said the late Abiola has
more than 70% influence on you, it is like you are fanatical about this man?
Yes. I worked briefly in one of
his companies, Concord, from 1988 to 1990. Because of my visibility in five of
the titles on the Concord stable, coupled with my assistance in getting Shina
Peters to play in his house for a party he hosted for the Super Eagles at that
time, I became known to him and, from there, we became bonded. While a lot of
people were following him because of money, I was always going to see him, mainly
for mentorship.
I was a disciple of Abiola, I later became an apostle. I could
almost tell you how Abiola would react to any situation. There are two people
today in my life that affected me:
Abiola and the other one who
I call
a spirit you don’t see but you feel.
That is Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr. He is just incredible. I have learnt a lot
from these two men. You cannot be great
if you don’t recognise greatness in others. That is why I say that about 70% of
what I have learnt today is from the late Abiola.
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