Chief Ayo Ogunlade, 83, is an indigene of Ilupeju-Ekiti, Oye Local Government Area of Ekiti State and a two-time former minister in the federal cabinet. In this interview with SULAIMAN SALAWUDEEN, Pa Ogunlade contends that Nigeria runs a costly federal system and opposes financial independence for local governments.
A brief introduction of yourself.
My name is Ayo Ogunlade, I am a thorough bred Ekiti man. My parents were from this local government area, Oye Local Government. I was accidentally born in Lagos on March 18, 1931.
It means on March 18, you will be 84 years?
Yes. At the age of two I sailed off to the Gold Coast, now called Ghana with my mother and I did not return to Nigeria until I was 17; that was in 1947. By the time my mother brought me home, I had started attending secondary school in Ghana. On coming back my mother took me to Christ’s School, Ado-Ekiti where I met with the late Chief E. A. Babalola who was the first black Principal and the first university graduate in Ekiti land.
What were your interests?
My interests were in the literary arts. My mother wanted me to be a priest while my father wanted me to be a lawyer. Fortunately, neither of them got what they wanted through me. I was neither a priest nor a lawyer. My first degree was in English and Literature, which I got from where we all now know as the University of Ibadan. Then, it was the University College of London, Ibadan. After finishing, I set sail abroad to Indiana University where I did my Master in Mass Communication, specialising in the Electronic Media.
How do you feel nowadays being an indigene of Ekiti State?
If it were possible to come back to earth I will like to be an Ekiti man.
Why?
We have a heritage of personal integrity and honour. That is the way we were brought up, but unfortunately our children don’t see it that way now because of this general loss of value.
So, the essence is reversed?
Yes, the essential Ekiti man is no longer there.
As an elder, would you say some of your unspoken dreams have been realised in this state lately, given the performance of Governor Kayode Fayemi?
The Hausa has an adage the Yoruba equivalent of which is “iroyin ko to af’oju ba, meaning being told about a development is not as gripping as seeing same oneself.” There is no doubt at all that Fayemi is working and he is working well by endeavouring to make a difference upon what he met. That is the essence of progress. It is to make a difference on what you have met. So, as far as I am concerned, Fayemi has made progress. Look at the roads, the dualisation in Ado, the state capital; education, health. People may blame Ayo Fayose, as they normally do, but the fact is he built upon what he met on ground. It was the bush path which Ekiti people called “ese ko gbe’ji” that he met to link Ado and Afao. He, Fayose broadened it and tarred it as well. Although the tarred portion were removing before a year or two, but the fact remains that the roads were broadened and tarred and it served people for sometime
Always let the next person strengthen whatever he meets on ground. No one is perfect. Even Christ. When somebody said perfect master, he (Jesus) replied that “no one is perfect except my father”.
Now, the opposition party is blaming him (Fayemi) for taking a N25 billion bond from the capital market?
Yoruba will say: “Owo la fi n’wa owo (You use money to seek money). When borrowings are judiciously applied on meaningful projects, in time it will begin to yield profits for the people; misapplied, they turn out to be a curse.
So, it is not wrong for government to borrow if it is meant for specific infrastructural projects?
That is what I am saying. For an agrarian state like ours we have no industry, the only industries that we have are the old textile industry and the Ire burnt bricks. IGR (Internally Generated Revenue) was too paltry then to allow for meaningful development. Borrowing is very reasonable and good if used for developmental purposes as the Governor Kayode Fayemi has been doing.
Politics seems to be the only way not just to get to power but also to affect society desirably, positively. What can we now say of politics of your time as against politics of today?
Politics at that time was service rather than what do I stand to gain as an individual or as a group. Today, I am sorry to say, most of the politicians go into politics as a means of getting wealthy, so to say. Politics is used to be for service; it is to serve the people. But the nitty-gritty of it is that, it is the glamour of the office and the benefits that come from it that are the focus of participants nowadays. Maybe, that is a broad generalisation. When you look at it, the system has become so monetised; everything, money, money.
Who is to blame?
You cannot place the entire blame of that on the politicians. The people also have some blame. It is actually becoming a vicious cycle. The people have no means of livelihood. They look up to government to do everything for them. They see the politician living high up there and so they vote for you not because of your pedigree or sincerity, but because of the pocket. What do you have to offer does not interest the people again. But there had been politics before the Europeans came. There was governance headed by people of integrity and honour, and there were certain families who were noted for their public services.
In a way, it has been like that even up to today, those who have at one time or the other attained power are still the same set of people ruling, broadly and generally.
Good. I’m glad you added broadly and generally to it. But somebody who is from a public spirited family, whose family is known to have served their community and their people selflessly, such can often be considered for public offices. Nowadays, however, if you come out to say I want to go to this place to represent you, I am the son of so and so, they will say yes, if you are from that family, your family has a record of public service already but they will ask what have you brought for us in money terms. That is the final approach.
Despite the family background, people will still need an accompaniment of cash?
Yes.
But, how can we have those who lack cash but have the heart of service in power?
It may be an over simplification of the matter but it is by de-monetising politics. There is no reason whatsoever to continue to do things the same way we are doing them now. Whoever nurses genuine intention to serve and affect society meaningfully must be able to attain power. Society must rise above such primordial penchant for cash. However, I must note the saying in Yoruba that: ”Bi eye ba ti mo beni ite re n’mo (the nest of the bird is the same as its size).” Our administration is costly.
How do you mean?
I mean our so-called presidential (federal) system of governance is too costly. There is nothing wrong with the American presidential system that we chose to follow but we should have moulded it according to our size as America did. You see, we adopted the American presidential system at the 1994-1995 constitution conference of which I had the opportunity of being a part. I was secretary of the parliamentary group with Alhaji Mahmud Atta as the chairman. We were then looking for a parliamentary system of government in which the party is supreme, but we chose to follow the presidential system which the army forced on us. I did a study of the cost of it – mindboggling! America’s land size is ten times that of Nigeria; the population of America is double that of Nigeria and her GDP (Gross Domestic Product) is 100 times ours (Nigeria’s). Also, they have 50 states and two senators per state.
Are you proposing the American system?
You are right. If America had wealth 100 times our own and a population that doubles our own, what is our logic for having more senators than they have? Is it because we have larger land or more money or more population? We should have tailored the American presidential system that we wanted to adopt to our size. But, we did not do that. We also talk now about equality of states, equality of local governments. The theory of the equality of man is supported neither by the creation theory nor Darwin’s Evolution theory which says all men are not equal; some are giants some are beetles. The trees are not equal, you have the grass, you have the shrubs and then you have the large Iroko trees. But we say all are equal. There will be hiccups. Whereas in the American system no state pays the same thing as the other state as remuneration to its political office holders. No governor earns the same thing with the other state. Go and find out, the Attorney-General of California earns more than the vice president of United States because California can afford to pay. This is federation working.
But is Nigeria truly a federation?
That is part of the problem. We are having the problem of all states being equal. We also have the policy of the Federal Government as the mother under which the entire chickens, the states, come. It is not like that in the American system. The states of America are not under the control of any federal arrangement. There is also nothing like exclusive preserve, apart from the military for the defense of the country. In America, if you find gold at your backyard you are at liberty to go to the banks, get expert to come and explore and confirm that it is available in commercial quantity and go on to tap it.
I know of some local governments the annual internally generated revenue of which is less than N12 million which is about N1million per month, but they get N50, N60, N100 million from the so-called federation account every month. How can you say that the chairman of a local government that generates N1million every month should earn the same salary and allowances with the chairman of a state that generate N20, N30 million? The kind of thing that happened to Lagos when the Federal Government said it must not create additional local government could not have happen in many states. Such a state would have completely expired. Therein lies the proverb that a bird will not extend its nest beyond its size.
What should be the relationship between the federal, state and local governments?
The relationship between the federal, state and local government is like the relationship between Iroko tree and the palm tree and the casarina and the cashew tree and the grass, they are all plant kingdom that is all.
Are you saying the local government should be left to the care of the state or should be scraped?
No, I am just saying that you should recognise that the difference between the Federal Government and the state is not the same as the relationship between the state and the local government. While the federal and state are and should be at different autonomous levels of powers in a federation, the councils do not and should not have such a distinct autonomy with the states!
What should the status of the local government be?
The relationship between the state and the local government is the relationship between a tree, its root, its trunk, its branches, its flowers, its fruits. The relationship between your eyes, your nose, your hands and your whole body. You cannot say that the branch of a tree is independent of the tree, or the eyes should be independent of the body, or a hand independent of the body. If you are walking in the street and you see a hand just swinging without the body will you stand? Or can you sit down here and someone knocks at the door and you say the eyes should go and see who is at the door. So I don’t know what they are talking about.
But the Federal Government once appeared to be in favour of taking the local government out of the control of states?
No. You see a local government independent of the state is an anomaly. That cannot work. It will only lead to confusion, and disjointed, disrupted and unmanageable systems
Will that not be reflective of the entire confusion which Nigeria has been become?
It cannot work. Financial autonomy without plans of what to do with the finance will worsen the situation as being experienced at the local governments. Why our local governments are not functioning now is that they don’t make plans. It is when the money comes at the end of the month that they will now say they have this and that, what are we going to do with it. No, every local government, as soon as you are elected, must present a short term and medium term plan with the budget as to what you are going to draw for the short term programmes and the medium term programmes. So that when the money comes it is applied to what is already on ground as the vision and the mission of the local government. I had the opportunity of implementing that when I was the minister for national planning between 1995 and 1998.
Do we have planning today at all?
We don’t again. John Kennedy said they will land a man in the moon in ten years and they did. The answer is not in giving N100 million to a local government in a month that generates N15 million in a year. It is in focused and genuine planning.
How can Nigeria regain her steps?
We need a serious surgical operation of the system of governance. Take another instance of full time legislators. How can legislators, from national to state and councils, be on so-called full time? Most of the 50 states in America do not have full time legislators. That is why I said we need a major surgical operation on our system of administration: executive, legislature, and judiciary. Why do we have full time councilors at the local government placed on salary and allowances? What do we need them for? What do they do on daily basis? How many bye-laws are passed by them? Let the university researchers in the social sciences do an analysis of how many legislations and bye laws emerge from national/state assemblies and the local governments.
Why are they insisting that it should be a full-time engagement?
Because that is the only industry that we have. Politics is the only industry that we have. We start to reverse the situation by massive de-monitisation of political offices; let those who don’t see it as their means of sustenance and living come in. That is when we begin to get it right.
Is that possible?
Yes. If we know what our objectives and goals are.
Is there anything in this country that makes an elderly man like you happy?
Yes, I am happy that anywhere in the world you go and you say I am a Nigerian, they will say “ah, the country with the largest concentration of blacks in the world”. I will still vote for one Nigeria any day because like Yoruba adage will say “agbajo owo la fi’n soya” (if you want to beat your chest and want the people to hear, you have to do it with clenched fist). It is preferable for Nigeria to remain one. In that is the hope for our eventual progress and development.
Are those advocating that Nigeria should be sundered entirely wrong?
I think they have the cause to think so. But, it is not entirely in the interest of Nigeria to scatter. There is no where you break the pattern after 100 years together.
