Senator Rufai Hanga was pioneer National Chairman of the Congress for Progress Change (CPC). He represented Kano Central Senatorial Zone from 2003 to 2007. A businessman and administrator with over 25 years in the corporate world, Hanga talks of the commitment and determination of his party to ensure that the proposed merger plan with the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), among other parties, becomes a reality ahead of 2015. In this interview with Assistant Editor, LINUS OBOGO, he also faults President Goodluck Jonathan’s performance, describing him as ‘Baba Slumber’.
The Sultan of Sokoto, Muhammed Sa’ad Abubakar III, has blamed the Boko Haram and other security challenges ravaging the North on the region itself. What do you make of this open indictment of the region by the Islamic leader?
The Sultan was absolutely right about what has become a source of embarrassment to the region. It is the result of long years of bad leadership and injustice in the region and at the centre. The region has not done enough to bring the scourge to an end. It is a result of long years of deprivations and exploitation by the leadership.
The Boko Haram sect proposed a dialogue with the Federal Government and it has yet remained unrelenting in its attacks on both the security agencies and Christian institutions. Do you think the militant sect is desirous of peace to warrant the Federal Government to take their dialogue overtures seriously?
I recall that the sect had proposed a dialogue with the Federal Government, but surprisingly, it was rejected. The position of the government then was that the dialogue option by the Boko Haram was in bad faith.
On the other hand, the sect was equally suspicious of the government. But whether the sect was sincere or not, I cannot say because I do not even know them. I do not have much knowledge about the character and composition of the militant group. The only thing I know of them is what I read in the papers like any other Nigerian. I cannot lay claim to have sufficient knowledge of the Boko Haram and their motives as to arrive at a judgment on their insincerity or otherwise.
We are being taken along the path similar to what we witnessed during the late President Umaru Yar’Adua’s era when he disappeared from governance radar for months without transferring power to his vice-president. Some governors have been out of office for months on the ground of ill health, yet without their deputies functioning in an acting capacity. What does this say about our brand of democracy?
Today, the governors have become part of Nigeria’s problems. They are selfish and wicked. They are no longer in office for their people but for themselves. That explains why they seem to be afraid of the unknown. They do not trust anybody, not even their deputies who are supposed to be their closest allies. They are self-centered and selfish. They are more concerned about themselves and their families alone. That is why they would rather guard their office so jealously.
With that being said, I want to say that what is happening to them is not of their own making, but an act of God. They did not swear an oath to fall sick. Illness is something that comes naturally.
However, the culture of not wanting to delegate or transfer power under a situation of ill health is undemocratic and unfair.
When this similar scenario played out during the late President Umaru Yar’Adua, some of us made our position known that it was not the best practice in a democracy. So, it will not make a difference if I maintain the same position now because I had said it before and I am saying it now that it is wrong and unfair for not wanting deputy governors to hold the fort when they are sick.
When you say that the governors are Nigerian’s problem, how exactly do you mean?
I say it with all sense of responsibility that the governors are our problem because they always want things their own way. It is rather unfortunate and unfair. Whenever there is an issue that should agitate their minds, that is when you will hear of the Governors’ Forum. I have not seen or heard of this anywhere in the world where governors have a forum and constitute themselves into a cabal. They constitute themselves into a forum in order to manipulate the system and serve their selfish interest. There are so many issues like unemployment, insecurity and corruption confronting the country which the governors ought to concentrate their energies on tackling. They are not doing that, but rather, forming a forum to protect their interest. They are busy fighting for the control and pillaging of local government fund. That is why I said the governors are our problem.
Could this be the reason why they are alleged to be working hard to frustrate the aspect of the autonomy of the local councils in the ongoing Constitution Review exercise?
This is one of the ills that the governors have become, which is why I said they are part of the problems of the country. They control the local governments and House of Assemblies of their states. The governors know that they are part of the two-third requirement for any constitution review or amendment to be effected, that is why they will have a forum to arm-twist any process that will bring about the autonomy of the local governments. They will want to see that this does not happen.
The local governments should be autonomous. If the federal government is not controlling the resources of the sates after the sharing exercise, why should the states control that of the councils? Are they doing it simply because they are the senior partners in the state/local government relationship? Why should the state control the joint account of the councils?
The constitution provides for the autonomy of the federal, state and council tiers of government. They are supposed to be independent of one another. Today, as we speak, there are states that have not held local government election in the country. What happens is that they will constitute a caretaker arrangement for six months as allowed by the constitution and dissolve them and reconstitute them after two months. This is part of the manipulation that goes on at the state level, which is why no election has been conducted in some of the states. It is in bad faith and it is rather unfortunate.
How can the governors’ overbearing control of the councils be checkmated?
The only way is to ensure that there is an intense pressure from concerned stakeholders and civil society groups on the governors to give in to the demand for the autonomy of the local councils in the ongoing constitution review by the National Assembly. We must stand up as a people and ensure that there is a provision in the reviewed or amended constitution for the autonomy of the local councils in Nigeria.
Governors, including those who are serving their second term, must be told in clear terms that they cannot aspire to be the next president or senators when it is not in their interest to allow local government councils to be autonomous of the state governors. We must fight the governors and wrest the independence of the councils from their vice grip.
After your first term in the Senate on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), you could not make it back for obvious reasons. Was it that you were edged out or the excitement was no longer there?
I did not attempt to go back to the Senate this time around because I am the National Chairman of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC). I may still go back to the Senate. After all, I am still in politics. It is not the end of me yet, so, anything can happen. I will never be tired of lending my voice to issues of national concern. Tomorrow is still pregnant and we cannot tell what it will bring.
Your party, the Congress for Progressive Change, is about going into a merger discussion with some political parties, how optimistic are you?
I am highly optimistic because all the parties to the merger are ready to surrender their certificates to INEC and fuse into one party. The ANPP is willing to surrender its certificate, same as the ACN, the CPC.
It is just a matter of time and we will all surrender our certificates and come out on one platform and as a new party. The last time the alliance did not work because we were in the eve of an election, but it is not going to be like that again as we are going to collapse into one big party.
Nothing is going to stop me from surrendering the certificate of CPC to INEC in a bid to forge a successful merger. As I speak, the certificate is deposited in a bank and I have written a Will stating that if I die, my children should collect it and hand it over to INEC for the purpose of a merger.
In Nigeria today, we know that the strongest opposition party is the ACN, which is why I told my son that if I die any moment, he should give the certificate to Asiwaju Bola Tinubu to surrender to INEC for the purpose of forming a merger. The merger is already a reality and nobody can stop it now, not even the PDP.
Do you think that with parties merely surrendering their certificates of registration, it guarantees the presidency or ensure a defeat of the PDP in 2015?
We are going to have a single candidate as soon as we fuse into one party. And what that means is that all the supporters of the three or four political parties will yield their votes and support to a single candidate to emerge from the merger exercise. There will be a strong synergy as all the different candidates that hitherto contested on their individual platform will pool their followers for a single and strong candidate.
The whole North will never vote for the PDP this time around. When the entire South West, South East, vote for a single candidate, you can only imagine the kind of landslide that will be witnessed. Come 2015, the PDP will become the smallest minority party in Nigeria, you just wait and see. From their claim of being the biggest party in Africa, they will become the smallest party in Nigeria.
With most of the parties being deregistered, PDP will crash from being the biggest to the smallest party in Nigeria.
Some section of the North and particularly their leaders, have in recent times, been in virulent opposition to certain issues that affect some other regions in the country, like state creation, derivation formula, the Petroleum Industry Bill, among others. What do you think is often at the heart of such leaders like Governor Rabiu Kwankwaso of Kano State and his ilk?
On state creation, the argument of the likes of Governor Kwankwaso has been that you just do not create states for the sake of it or on the basis of regions or zones simply because you want to satisfy some people.
There must be criteria for creating these states such as population and land mass. Let me give you an instance, while you can traverse the entire South East and South South in just one day, you cannot traverse one state in the North West in one day.
Secondly, a state like Akwa Ibom has 31 council areas, yet the entire population of the state is not more than two million people. And if you put the population of the entire South South zone together, it is not up to that of Kano State. Again, the entire land mass is not up to Kano State. That is just the simple argument and so, you cannot go about creating states on the basis of regions, ethnicity or zones.
You will also agree with me that it is grossly unfair to have one senator representing just two local governments, while one senator will represent about 16 local governments in the North. The same also holds for one senator representing one million people while elsewhere, five million people have one senator representing them. That is the argument Kwankwaso seems to be making. Sincerely, I think there is a sense in it.
You cited land mass as one of the criteria for creating either state or council area. Would you or Kwankwaso be comfortable to have desert with no human beings mapped out as states and council areas, when the so called land mass is just a vast stretch of sand dunes with no human habitation? And have you forgotten that the so called population you touted has for years been manipulated in favour of the North by Northern officials in charge of census?
Well, I am not arguing in support of his position, but that is what I perceive him to be saying. However, I agree with you on the issues contained in your questions and the fact that nobody is living in the desert and it is a vast stretch of sand dunes. But let me remind you of some of the censuses conducted from 1960 to date. I am from Kano and I will speak from that perspective. 80 per cent of people from Kano have three or four wives and their wives bear a lot of children for them. Each wife is capable of bearing ten or more children. So, if one woman has ten children, multiply ten by four wives. That gives you 40 children.
Meanwhile, my university mates from the south of Nigeria, who got married to one wife, would end up with either three or four children. Yet he is a husband of one wife. Will his practice of one wife and three or four children help in increasing the population of his zone? The answer is capital NO! We met after about 30 years of graduation as ‘Old boys’ and I asked them how about their families? Some of them told me they were married with three kids and others with two.
For some of us from the North, we have four wives with each of the wives have eight to ten children. This is very logical to me as a sound argument. However, I do not intend this argument to generate bad blood. I remember telling a senator colleague of mine back then when argument like this came up.
So, you are correct on the issue of desert with no human being but when you come to Kano, you will understand what I am talking about.
Well, having said this, I want to make it clear that that is just the governor’s argument and not mine. What I am interested in is the unity of this country and the common good of Nigerians as a whole. I believe in justice, equality and equity for all.
How would you rate the performance of the PDP government in Kano and at the centre?
As a matter of fact, there is no PDP government in Kano. He does not believe in PDP. He merely contested on the platform of the PDP, but he is not of the PDP. What we have is ‘Kwankwasiya’ government. Even the PDP members in the state know that as much. ‘Kwankwasiya’ is a philosophy or a movement and he acts as the group head. He runs the state as ‘Kwankwasiya’ and he does not believe in the PDP anymore.
He is executing a lot of projects for the people and at the same time stepping on toes. He is taking on the ‘big men’ in the state, the aristocrat and the rich. But he is doing a lot for the masses.
As for President Goodluck Jonathan’s government, while people said Yar’Adua was ‘Baba go slow’, I will describe Jonathan as an abysmal failure. It is true that Yar’Adua was ‘Baba go slow’, Jonathan is ‘Baba slumber’. For me, Jonathan’s scorecard will definitely read as ‘poverty, unemployment, hunger and insecurity’. That is Jonathan’s performance index in his three years as President.
