Chief Martin Agbaso is the Acting National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA). In this interview with TONY AKOWE, he speaks on the leadership crisis in the party, which may affect its preparations for the November 18 governorship election in Anambra State.
Recently, you held a meeting with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and it is believed that the meeting had to do with your party. What is the outcome of that meeting?
As you are all aware, the High Court in Enugu under Justice Ozoemena on May 22, 2017 gave an Order of Mandamus, compelling INEC to recognise me as the Acting National Chairman of APGA. When that order was given, a letter was duly written by our lawyers compiling a compendium of what transpired in the court and sent to the INEC.
Prior to that time, on October 5, 2016, the National Working Committee (NWC) had suspended Dr Victor Ike Oye, then National Chairman of APGA, for various offences he did not have answers to. In accordance with the party constitution, a seven-man committee was set up to investigate the matter. But, all efforts by the committee to meet with him to address most of the issues proved abortive. APGA took the matter to court in Abuja asking INEC and the police to stop Oye from parading himself as the national chairman of the party. Oye petitioned that the court lacked the jurisdiction to hear the matter. The court ruled that it had validly dealt with APGA matters in the past, adding that it is in the same court that Victor Umeh and Chekwas Okorie’s case was decided. Oye challenged the decision of the lower court at the Appeal Court which was adjourned to December 14 this year. Shortly after the case was instituted, the then acting national chairman, Ozo Nwabueze Okafor took ill with colon cancer, and eventually died on January 8 this year. In accordance with the constitution of the party, I became the acting national chairman. Before then, I was the Acting Deputy National Chairman. Under APGA constitution, with the demise or suspension or expulsion of the national chairman, the next highest officer from the zone he came from replaces him. That was what I did. All these documents were sent to INEC for information and recognition. After waiting for over one month for INEC to react without hearing from it, the APGA vice chairman in Enugu where I was nominated as the acting national chairman went to court in Enugu, praying the Court to compel INEC to recognise me since we had given INEC the documentations of the series of meetings and the party processes we followed to arrive at nominating me the acting national chairman. The court went through all the paper works and the processes before issuing the Order of Mandamus asking INEC to recognise me immediately. It also ordered the police and the IGP to do same. We expected to get reactions from INEC within 48 hours, but unfortunately it never reacted. In the mean time, the parties had gone to the Court of Appeal in Enugu to vacate that Order of Mandamus, the court sat on July 10 and upheld the order of the lower court which compelled INEC to further recognise me. It is those documents from the rulings that we finally took to the INEC headquarters to do the needful. The good thing is that we had very fruitful meeting with INEC. But I don’t want to pre-empt the action the Commission will take. I want to emphasise that I am very satisfied with the meeting. We will wait to see what action INEC will take in the next couple of days. However, INEC does not have to give us a letter since an order of the court has been given. Our action is just to put INEC on notice.
What is the arrangement for the party’s primary and congresses or will you give automatic ticket to Governor Obiano?
We have issued 21-day notice to INEC for the conduct of our party primary and congresses scheduled for August 17 and I can assure you that we are ready to kick-start the processes leading up to the Anambra governorship election. The speculation of a plot to stop Governor Obiano is absolute rubbish. How can we plot against a governor who has done very well, a governor we are all proud of? There is no truth to such rumour and propaganda. Asking whether we will give automatic ticket to the incumbent governor is a question I cannot deal with now. However, all I can tell you is that our party will showcase internal democracy. That question was an unfair one. Confirming that the party will give the governor automatic ticket means that we will be very unfair to other five to seven aspirants contesting for the position. All we can do is to ensure internal democracy. However, when you have a sitting governor who has done very well, there is nothing to worry about on whether he will be nominated again. Let me add that the dreams and visions of the founding fathers of APGA is to build a party that will give impetus to those that don’t have the opportunity to partake in the governance of this country and to also take advantage of the widespread Igbo residence in other ethnic groups. We want the downtrodden and the very poor in the society to look up to APGA as a party full of opportunities, a party to fulfil the yearnings of the people and provide good governance. These exactly are the vision of the party for the country. What has happened so far in Anambra with the governors under APGA really met the vision of the party. The eight years of Peter Obi set Anambra miles away from other governments in the region with physical responsibility which saved much money. The governor embarked on the provision of infrastructure, rebuilt the education sector, overhauled hospitals, created due process in every aspect of governance and made governance open. He ensured level playing grounds for those who have the capacity to perform. In reality, it was eight years of successful administration. We have now had three and half years of Obiano who has continued with the template set up by the Peter Obi administration. He has equally done reasonably well. Anambra under APGA is a model case for other states in the southern regions. APGA has no fear in the forthcoming Anambra governorship election because it will be a testimonial for the good work the party has done. Given the fact that APGA has done well in Anambra State, we have so much to take to the electorate and expect that the party will sweep the votes by November.
How would you describe your relationship with Obiano and other major stakeholders in the party?
APGA has become a major institution, yet Nigerians have continued to talk about individuals. We are still struggling to build an institution which should last beyond and above individuals. We cannot be talking about Victor Umeh for instance whose tenure expired after serving as the party’s national chairman for almost 10 years.
APGA as an institution remains strong and my responsibility is to make it stronger when I leave in the next four years or so. What should be our concern should be what the institution stands for, the template we have offered to the people, opportunities we created, how we put Nigeria back to work and how we can restore the confidence Nigerians had in the country.
Do you regret making Rochas the governor of Imo State?
By my nature as a Christian and as a catholic, I always put most of my actions before God. I won’t tell you whether I regretted any action I took in making Rochas the governor because at the time I took the decision, it was the best. Some people have expressed disappointed that I supported an Orlu man instead of an Owerri man. But the reality was that no Owerri man informed me of his interest to contest. I stand to be challenged. Rochas was the only person who asked for my support in a most humble manner.
How do you intend to restore the confidence of your supporters, especially your state chairman, who has declared loyalty to the Oye faction of the party?
I want to remind you that each time a man’s position is threatened, he fights fiercely. It is the situation facing my state chairman because he must have seen the tsunami coming to blow his position away. I am not going to join issues with him because I was very instrumental to that seat he is occupying now including paying for the office complex and the furnishing. However, I am not coming to sack anybody but to heal and unite the people. I don’t hold any animosity or anger against him because I know he will change soon. Anybody still in doubt whether my people are solidly with me should refer to the reception accorded me in Owerri recently.
What is your assessment of the threat from other political parties over the November 18 governorship election?
I don’t see the challenge from other political parties as threat because there is no state in Nigeria where the incumbent is allowed to contest election alone. Candidates must jostle for political positions during elections. Again, you know that Anambra is a very dynamic state, full of many people with the capacity and eminently qualified to contest. However, what is going to stand out is each person’s antecedents. I want to add that APGA has done incredibly well with Peter Obi laying a solid foundation.
The country is still in recession and the government has made several promises to take the country out of recession very soon. How do you think this can best be achieved.
We are a country of over 170 million people. We need over 17 million skilled persons to drive an economy of this size. Unfortunately, we don’t have up to one million skilled persons in medical science, ICT, commence and industry in this country. Our education is in comatose. These are the concerns of APGA as a party. We must do something to improve the curriculum we teach our children and the level of encouragement and remunerations we give to our teachers. It is true that people still die of malaria in this country, a disease that can be cured with just N1000. This means that there are people who stand between them and death because their lives are not worth N800. We have 65 per cent of Nigerians operating under zero economy, meaning a situation where a man does not have N1000 income in a month. To come out of recession, we must begin to look at our receivables and payables. How much is our income, what do we have to spend to run government, provide infrastructure and how to block the huge gap created by our reliance on oil and oil related transactions. Government must quickly look for ways and means of generating additional income to cushion the effect of the income and expenditure gap. Yes, the first approach would be to tighten the loose ends and leakages in the system. But we must find a way of earning additional income. We have to also add value to those other avenues of earning income so that we can create jobs that will lead to disposable income. When many have disposable incomes, consumer confidence will rise. There will be capacity to buy and be able to pay. We must understand that it is a cycle that keeps recreating and regenerating money. We must have skilled young, dynamic, proactive workforce to create the wealth. We have many gifted young Nigerians. Look at what is happening at the computer village and job centres like Aba, Ibadan among others where young Nigerians are creating all manners of technological-driven businesses. There is no magic or shortcut to our coming out of recession other than doing the right things and taking the right decisions. Government must cut the fats in the expenditures like blotted salaries, allowances among others which we can no longer afford. We must also look into contract pricing for roads, bridges to save cost.
