Anthony Sani is the current Secretary General of Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), the quasi socio-political organisation that is supposed to be the mouth piece of the North. Before his current position, Sani served for several years as the National Publicity Secretary of the organisation. In this interview with TONY AKOWE, he speaks about the controversial ruga settlement scheme, the fight against corruption and other issues of national interest.
THE decision of the Federal Government to create ruga settlements across the country has generated serious debate across the country. What is the position of the ACF on the controversy?
We have noticed that the same groups who opposed open grazing by nomads as a way of taming trespasses that bring about clashes between herdsmen and farmers are the same ones opposed to government’s intervention in the establishment of ranches on grounds that ranches are private businesses. They are also vehemently opposed to ruga which was meant to encourage sedentary settlements away from nomadic habit in the hope of improving not only volume and quality of livestock production but also to improve security by way of surveillance and monitoring. And now that the Federal Government has been very sensitive enough by suspending ruga in order to calm frayed nerves, and given the trite that suspension is not one and the same thing as solution, it is our hope that critics of ruga would seize this opportunity and proffer solutions that are acceptable to majority of stakeholders.
And as they do so, they must note that herdsmen are landless Nigerians and farmers of livestock who are also entitled to support by government, especially in areas that border on public good like improvement of security and volume and quality of livestock. I say this because governments have supported farmers of crops and trees by way of building river basins, dams, subsidies of tractors, fertilizers and agricultural inputs. Governments have also bailed out industries that are either too important or too big to fail through socialization of losses and privatization of profits.
The President has appointed new ministers to help him in his second term in running the country. What are your expectations from the new crop of ministers?
The agenda for the new ministers are in the campaign promises, to wit, consolidate on the fight against insecurity and the fight against corruption which constitutes sand bags on the path of socio-economic development such as the diversification of the economy. The government should note that it cannot afford to take the confidence of the voters who voted for it to improve on its performance in the last tenure for granted.
There are concerns about the rising cases of insecurity in the country, especially in the north. Is the ACF not concerned about this?
You would note that this regime inherited a situation where the insecurity was so bad that CIA predicted the country would reach the tipping point by 2015. The attacks by the insurgence were across the whole north and the FCT. There was a time when one attack could claim hundreds of lives. That happened in Kano. In 2012, one attack in one village in Plateau State claimed hundreds of lives, including that of a serving senator. And in the next one week, another attack of a neighbouring village claimed another set of hundreds of lives. Happily enough, the prediction by America did not come unto its own because of the efforts of the government which have tamed the insurgence and consigned their attacks to the fringes of North East. As a result, the overwhelming fear in the North has started to give way to confidence and hope in the region.
And now that a new set of challenges have been posed by kidnapping, banditry, cattle rustling, clashes between herdsmen and farmers and have hyped soon after the last elections, most Nigerians are concerned and disturbed about the development and calling on the government to step up efforts in order to put an end to the challenges. The President has assured the nation of the regime’s resolve to put an end to the ugly phenomenon. And it seems the efforts are yielding result, considering that there have been less reports about attacks across the country recently. And it is our hope that the President would deliver on the promise of the regime’s electoral mandate in order to justify the confidence reposed in the regime by voters.
A lot of Nigerians have criticised the anti-corruption fight of this government. What is your own assessment of it?
The APC government rode on the back of discontent brought about by insecurity and corruption that combined to steal our collective empowerment, our opportunities and our future as well as distorting societal value of senses of what is right and what is evil. As a result, the economy could not take root and thrive. The fall in the volume and price of oil in the international market did not help matters. The regime has confronted the monster of corruption with unity of purpose and ferocity. But it seems corruption is fighting back vigorously by painting the picture that the fight is selective, as if the fight is not work in progress. I believe the government has made some progress which has driven the fight into popular consciousness.
As a result, the attitudes of cash-for-peerage is taking root and making way for honesty and integrity as cherished values. What one expects those arraigned for corruption to do is to defend themselves in the courts and not to say they are not alone who are corrupt. This is not to suggest that the regime should ignore criticisms of its strategy and approaches in the fight against corruption. Since the government alone cannot put an end to corrupt practices in the polity, it requires the support of most Nigerians to succeed.
Ahead of the 2023 elections, the issue of rotational presidency and zoning has begun to resurge. While some believe that it will be the turn of the South to produce the President, others are of the view that zoning should not apply. What is your take on this?
I believe the practice of rotational presidency is to help manage our diversity for development by some form of inclusivity in order to promote national solidarity. It is also an admission of failure of leadership which has made communities to believe that access to national and state resources should be turn by turn. Since we are in a multiparty democracy, I believe politics of zoning should be left to political parties which are at liberty to develop their winning game plans. This happened in the immediate past elections where about seven presidential candidates came from the North and about 70 candidates came from the South. I just pray that those political parties which include politics of rotation in their winning game plans would note that merit and rotation are not mutually exclusive.
Another issue that has occupied public discourse in recent years is that of restructuring. What is your take on this?
This country has been restructured several times. We started from a confederate arrangement of three regions with a weak centre, which became four regions until the coup of 1966 abolished it and supplanted it with unitary system with a stronger centre. The counter coup of the same year reversed it, but this time around introduced a federal system. With national government being balanced by appropriate state level power, the states have progressively increased to the current 36 states.
As to the form of government, we started with the parliamentary system which works in Britain, then military dictatorship that has worked in other climes and now we are in presidential system which works in America. The only one we have not tried is a combination of the two which is successfully practised in France. On the economic side, there was mixed economy through Structural Adjustment Programme to the last privatization exercise which has replaced the economy with government’s monopoly with individual monopoly. One can see that the nation has been restructured several times, be it political, geographic or economic.
More troubling is the fact that restructuring has taken many dimensions depending on who is hankering. We have those who hanker for true federalism, considering that there are no two federal systems that are self-same; we have those agitating for fiscal federalism and those clamouring for resource control. That may explain why some of us believe that any further restructuring of the country may not be necessary and not helpful. But given the view that restructuring is a continuous process, it should be undertaken democratically. That is to say, political parties which wish to restructure the country should include it in their manifesto and use it to canvass for electoral mandate needed for implementation. In the ensuing campaigns, voters may be enlightened and make informed judgment during voting. That is how multiparty democracy works. It is not for a select unelected few who profess to be a jaunty face of democratic values to try to foist their preferences on the rest of the country outside the tenets of democracy.
The rising cases of unemployment in the country are a serious cause for concern. How do you think this can best be tackled?
The rising cases of unemployment is largely a result of faulty system of education which makes graduates believe they are trained for white collar jobs only. We churn out hundreds of graduates without the corresponding generation of the white collar jobs. Our planners need to change the system of education. But meanwhile, the government may consider adopting the New Deal by President Roosevelt which effectively dealt with the recession of his time.
What do you expect from Buhari’s second term and his next level plan?
The regime has been trusted by the voters who have renewed the tenure in the hope that he would improve on his previous performance and put the nation on the right path of socio-economic development. This was based on his past performance and the campaign promises which he is expected to live up to at his next level in the second term. He should coordinate the government lest a situation where he presided over a divided presidency in the first tenure rear its ugly head in the second tenure. He should improve on his governance by impelling progress through multiplication of his strength through his subordinates or cabinet. Motivation is the instrument and social skill is the requirement.
In the first four years of the Buhari government, the National Assembly was largely blamed for most of the things the government could not achieve. Now, the leadership of the legislature is fully in the hands of the APC. What are your expectations?
For Nigerians to vote the ruling party to form majority in the NASS suggests most Nigerians know what they want by way of aspiration, vision and the nature of governance. To that end, the NASS cannot afford to disappoint Nigerians. This is because there would be no filibustering when executive bills are presented for passage. Nigerians therefore expect more because to whom much is given, much is also expected.
In all, what is your message to Nigerians?
My message to Nigerians is for them to exercise more patience with the regime which inherited a situation that has been in a shambles through failure of leadership by past regimes. And to take the nation out of the woods would require consciously directed efforts to make desires possible and then actual. Nigerians should learn to be distant runners by forgoing some part of their today’s comfort for the good of tomorrow. This is because diversification of the economy is not a day’s job.
Nigerians should support the government in the difficult task of putting an end to the insecurity posed by insurgency, banditry, kidnapping, cattle rustling, armed robbery, clashes between herdsmen and farmers, cultism and ritual killings across the nation. One way of doing this is to avoid giving ethnic and religious coloration to purely criminal activities. They should help the intelligence community to identify criminals irrespective of tribe and creed, and treat them as such.
The situation is not beyond redemption. This is because if President Reagan in his 70s could make America feel young again with promise of glory days ahead, President Buhari can also do it for Nigeria. Where there is will, there would be a way. During the elections, we made judgments we felt were the best for the country. Now that majority of Nigerians have spoken by giving the regime a mandate for the next four years, let Nigerians come together and become one in support of the regime until the next round of elections when they are expected to go back to the trenches. That is how multiparty democracy works.