Engineer Babachi-David Lawal is the national vice chairman of the All Progressives Congress(APC) for the North East zone. In this interview with BAYO OLADEJI, Lawal expresses confidence that his party is waiting in the wings to take power in 2015.
What is your mission in politics?
It is to make a change for the better. You see as a Christian I have to be factual and fair. In Nigerian politics generally, I realised that fundamentally, there is something to contribute especially as regards the concepts of rule of law, justice, anti-corruption, and I thought I have something to contribute. In this regard, General Buhari was very instrumental in encouraging me to join politics.
Before the merger, that means you were a member of cpc?
Yes, I was a member of the CPC and as a member of the CPC, I was a member of the merger committee and subsequently I was a member of the interim NEC as an ex-officio. I have been involved in the birth and the nurturing of the APC from the beginning as it were.
To some people, allowing some PDP chieftains to join apc has removed the purity of the party. how would you react to this?
Idealism in politics is good. But in Nigeria, politics is still going to be played by Nigerians. You would not bring people from the moon to play Nigerian politics. If you look at the CPC, even in its formation, we came out of ANPP to form CPC.
I remember that ACN was also from AD. As long as you are a Nigerian, as you long as you are wanted to become a member of a political party, the constitution does not allow anyone to discriminate against you because of your tribe or your religion and other divide.
Really while idealism is good, the reality is we still need to play politics as Nigerians. And APC welcomes any Nigerian who wants to join our party; but when it comes to the politics of representation, we begin to start to discriminate, but as politicians, we cannot discriminate against anybody who wants to vote for us.
So, we welcome anyone into our party but morality comes into play in terms of representation. The APC Constitution makes it clear, if you are bankrupt, or an ex-convict and you have not been pardoned, obviously, you would not be able to stand in for an election but as for the membership, everyone is welcome.
As for those who came from the PDP, I don’t see anything wrong in that. They did not come in as a group but as individuals. They didn’t come as a political party.
How would you react to the allegation raised by Tom Ikmi was that because he was formerly a chieftain of pdp?
Chief Tom Ikimi was a member one of the co-chairmen. Alhaji Mohammed Ghaji represented CPC, Alhaji Ibrahim Shekarau represented ANPP, Annie Okonkwo represented APGA, Chief Tom Ikimi represented ACN.
He was gracious enough to host the merger committee meetings in his house. But we didn’t say Chief Tom Ikimi was from PDP, I didn’t even know he was from PDP. I thought he was from NRC, as the Chairman because he never let anybody forget that.
Now, when it comes to the issue that he was being denied, I tell you one thing; when the issue of who would be the National Vice Chairman for the Northeast came up, I was interested, when I went to the Convention ground, my name was not among the contestants and I had already purchased the form, I had undergone screening, and I was ready for election but they said the Northeast had settled for consensus and Alhaji Umaru Duhu was the consensus candidate but I refused.
I insisted there should be election, there was an election and I won. Now I don’t know the details of what Tom Ikimi went through, but if he had insisted, that he was going to contest like I did, I doubt it if anybody would have denied him. It was 10 minutes to the voting time when I saw that my name was not on the list.
I just saw a paper being circulated as consensus list and I saw that my name was not on the list, I insisted and I contested and by the grace of God, I am the national vice chairman. Anybody who said he was excluded or manipulated out of the position he desired did not have the determination to contest for the office.
Why do we now have crisis after the convention?
One thing I have known in politics, Nigerians are bad losers. They don’t want to agree that they have lost an election. And it is as a result of the sycophancy in our society.
People tell you what they think you want to hear. You are popular, you are this, you are that, even your wife who probably knows you are not going to win would not tell you, so when the result comes out, it shocks you.
In an election, only one person wins, if Nigerians could accept this as the bedrock of democracy, it would be better for us. I think from what I have just told you about my experience, it is evidence.
I learnt the man who lost the election against me petitioned that the election for the vice chairman for the zones should have been conducted in the zones. What a flimsy excuse. It doesn’t imply that the national vice chairman is also a member of the National Working Committee. The constitution does not indicate the type of the election and when the man lost, he has interpreted the constitution to suit his dream.That is a classical example of what Nigerians do when they lose election. They would not accept the result
My good friend, Dr Kayode Fayemi, has given us a good example to follow. The election had been conducted, and he accepted the result, other things might still come up later that the result was wrong.
But when your party says it would challenge the outcome, is that not against the action of the governor?
No, no, no. Our party is challenging majorly the process of the election. The militarisation of the election is one example; soldiers were not supposed to be involved in the issue of election, but they were overwhelmingly involved.
You would realise some of us were denied from entering Ekiti state for the final rally. The day before the election, even from Edo state, some of our members were not allowed to take-off at the airport. So these processes were not free and fair at all.
And if I understand it very well, my party wants to challenge the processes. Election is not just about what happened on the election day but what happened before, My party wants to challenge those processes and if there are other things that show that the what took place on the election did not make it free and fair, my party would contest it for posterity. Our goal is leave election matters to the police.
But people are saying that if you can be having soldiers in every state of the federation because of the internal security challenges what is bad in using them to complement the police during the election?
Well, it is part of the violation of the constitution. Soldiers are supposed to protect the territorial integrity of the country; internal security is for the police. I remember during the Biafra war, the first people to be engaged, were the Mobile Police. That was why the Mobile Police were created.
When you get to a situation where you know the regular police are incapable, then you bring in the Mobile Police. You can train the Police to do that. All over the world, military by their training are not expected to be involved in the civilian matters, they are trained to face the enemies, using force.
You would never hear soldiers firing a rubber bullet to a crowd, soldiers don’t fire to warn, so when you begin to bring soldiers to mount road blocks, you are looking for trouble; what they did to Governor Rotimi Amaechi would not stop.
Imagine a captain telling Amaechi, if you don’t go back I would shoot you. It is not wrong, because that was how he was trained. He considered him as an enemy. No policeman would do that to Amaechi. If a policeman goes to an assignment with bullets he must give an account.
When Chief Fani-Kayode raised an alarm that there is a plan to sponsor a muslim-muslim tocket, but some said he was raising a false alarm. But Chief Ikimi and alhaji duhu who contested with you have also said it. is this muslim-muslim ticket real?
I remember as a member of the registration committee of our party, I think we printed about 16 million registration forms, as at now, I can say that this party has registered not less than 16 million card carrying members.
If in the process, let assume that 1000 of them, to the reason best known to them begin hallucination, because that is what I would call what they are doing, they have prime motive.
Fani-Kayode he has gone back to PDP where he rightly belongs, he was a political jobber. Alhaji Duhu has been talking of him and his Ali Modu Sheriff defecting to PDP, I begin to think that their sojourning in APC was to achieve a certain goal, which they have done and they want to return home.
I am a theologian, I am a trained pastor, I went to ECWA Seminary, I came with a degree in theology. I teach Pastors in mission school. I can tell you that, it was because of General Buhari that I came into politics, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu has been my friend since early 1990’s but on personal basis.
Nigerians should focus on getting the best, even as a Christian, if you have a good government, there is no Christian road or petrol station. During the last election, PDP made religion an issue especially in the Middle Belt, they were telling us in my church, Goodluck Jonathan is a Christian, we should vote for him. We voted for him, see where we are.
Today, there are road blocks on the road to my church, they would screen me before I enter the church, they would search my wife’s bag, but the Christian President they said we should vote for has failed to provide security that we need. The Christian President they said we should vote for has not improved the economy.
But he has a vice president who is a muslim
Yes, we are talking of a Christian President.
But we are also talking of muslim-muslim ticket sir; are you saying we don’t need to consider religion again?
If Nigerians can eschew religion as an issue in politics, in government and in business, we would be getting the best. However, our convention was on the 5th of June, we just formed a political party.
The next stage now is the issue of candidature, but we are yet to get to that level. A that, we will look at the credentials of the candidates, what do they have to offer our party and Nigerians in general; the party will then decide, whether or not they are muslim-muslim or Christian-Christian.
What I want to say is that we must work hard to make sure that Nigerians vote for our party. We should be working to get the best, irrespective of religious persuasions.
But the party has never debated or considered the candidacy so far, at any level, I was at the Merger Committee, I was in the Interim National Executive Committee, I am now in the National Working Committee, there was never a time we have discussed it.
Some candidates who are interested have been going around building their own political structures but as a party, we have not decided on that. We have just had the first National Working Committee.
The Interim National Executive Committee was just mandated to register the party and conduct election for the substantive committee. We are drawing plans on how to move the party forward; nobody has the mandate to choose the candidate for now.
Does your party have a mechanism of reconciliation? i ask this question because the body language of some apc chieftains is those who want to go should go. if they go, what would be the fate of the party?
Right from the congresses we held, we have set up various committees, Appeal Committees and Reconciliation Committees at various levels, now the convention has come up, at our first national caucus meeting, a committee has been set up to reconcile those who are aggrieved because of the convention.
I have just spoken with Alimodu Sheriff, Fani-Kayode has gone back, Chief Ikimi has not gone; those who are still with the party, we would talk with them and reconcile them with the party but there is nothing we can do about Fani-Kayode who has gone back to PDP.
I know Chief Ikimi is not having problem with the state chapter, maybe he is having issues with one or two members at the centre, I don’t know, but as a party, we would reconcile with those who are angry or aggrieved.
We have more than one reconciliation committees. This is the very first Working Committee and we are looking seriously into the issue of reconciliation. Just wait till the PDP do their convention, then you would see bigger crises.
Umar Duhu said nobody nominated you
Before we went for the convention, the man everybody wanted as the National Secretary was me. Go and investigate. I am so popular in the party because I want justice. I stand for justice.
Go and ask everyone in the party. People value my principles. If he said the governors nominated him and the senators nominated him, why didn’t they vote for him?
What is the way out to the security challenges raging in your zone? your party blames the ruling party and the presidency, the governors in the affected states blame the president and vice versa.
The Federal government has abdicated its responsibility of security; for the governors in the Northeast, all their monies go to the security to compliment the Federal, the soldiers are doing their best.
I went to the Nigerian Military school, the riffles are old, they give them 60 bullets and Boko Haram came with bullets all over their bodies, the motivation is not there, their families are left unattended to,
The people of Niger Delta are saying the North is instigating the Boko Haram because of Jonathan; they are saying they should be left to be killing one another. Are we going to instigate our brothers to be killing ourselves? People are no longer going to farm because of Boko Haram.
You think we can do that because we don’t like Jonathan? Let me tell you, one of those kidnapped girls is well known to me, she is a widow, she left her children behind, returned to school in order to help herself now what has become her fate?
But it has been politicised. Do you know we have two ministers from Adamawa state, the Minister of Women Affairs and the Minister of Youth, the EFCC Chairman is from Adamawa state, Bamanga Tukur is from Adamawa state, do you think we can all sit down and say let us bring this unto our people? It is not true.The Northeast is under siege. To travel from Kaduna to my village takes 22 hours because of road blocks.
What is the way out?
First of all provide employment. Go into a programme or project that would give the youths jobs and as well provide education for the youths. So if anyone comes and tells you if you die, you would make paradise. You hear 300 killed, 120 killed, these are our youths. Until these people get employed, they would not stop
But did insecurity start today?
No
Then whose fault is it?
Our background as people is bad. Between Minna and Abuja is a single route, people believed Minna has produced two presidents but the road is not good. Because people think the resources of government in your hands is first to make you comfortable, them your relations, then your areas.
That is not a good value; but we must bring back our value, people should stop cornering money to themselves. Let us not say the aberration is now the norm. These are things our party will instill from 2015; APC has already won the general election. As far as we are concerned, we are the government in waiting.
Source: leadership
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