A former National Legal Adviser of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Dr. Muiz Banire, has warned that the country must not allow a second wave of violence, looting and youth restiveness in the country. With a benefit of hindsight, the former commissioner for transport in Lagos State also believe that there is much poverty in the land and that the old generation should allow the new generation to take over governance in the country. He speaks on these and other issues of interest in an interview with OLUDOTUN OSHUNRINADE in his office located at Maryland area of Lagos State.
How would you describe the burning of public and private properties and massive looting in Lagos State and other states in the country by hoodlums in the last few days and would you say youths are angry with the leaders of the country?
It is hunger, and hunger, nothing else. People are hungry. This started with some youths protesting against the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) of the Nigeria Police… It is still the same thing, if the people are hungry, they become desperate and they vent their hunger on the nation. At the end of the day the whole thing collapses, it is a function of poverty. Some people see the looting as attack on present and past public office holders and some insinuations made against them as part of the game for the 2023 general elections It is common in Nigeria that anything that happens to a politician is linked to their ambition. That is no news at all. Any politician will tell you that everything done against him or her is about his or her ambition. We heard such in Edo and Ondo States. Even the Majority Leader of the Lagos State House of Assembly said the same thing recently. So, it is normal in Nigeria, but the reality is that people are not happy; they are hungry, simple and straightforward.
But does this hunger have anything to do with the current government?
No, it is a product of years of neglect. It didn’t start with this administration, it is something that has been happening for long. It’s not new. It seems to have got to a level that it is intolerable. That is the problem.
The looting across the country seems to be continuing; how do you think we can address this kind of issue and solve the problem once and for all?
The problem with Nigeria is that we are still glossing over the fundamentals. I wrote an article that I titled “Egungun Be Careful” and you would see that when these people get to a warehouse where food items are kept, they don’t burn it down, they carry the food there. These people warned us about five years ago during a protest about fuel scarcity during the era of former President Goodluck Jonathan that a time would come when if they don’t find anything to eat, they would start eating from rich people. We should have learned from that statement. I told people then that a time would come when they would not care who owns what and that they would pick anything they see. The issue now is not even about the rich and the poor, it’s about the fact that you are more comfortable than me and why should you be more comfortable than me because I too I am working and I cannot eat, but you are feeding better. That is what we are saying. It is a fundamental thing. I know our country, we will gloss over it and go to bed. Like I wrote in my last article, I said if we are lucky to get out of this one there might not be a second chance if we don’t address the fundamentals now. The Central Bank of Nigeria has been releasing funds under one guise or the other, where are the beneficiaries. We want to know the people who you have been given the money. Agric funds have been going on and in I’m enlightened enough to know where the money is coming from and I have not benefitted from it. I heard that they released N600 billion for some farmers, who are the farmers? You see a lot of farmers that are dying off all over the country and you say you released money to farmers, which farmers? We are deceiving ourselves.
People have been talking about state police before now; do you think the time is ripe for it now and that it would solve the problem of police brutality?
It probably will make it better, if each state has its own police and make them comfortable; it will make it better.
Do you think Nigeria should be thinking of restructuring now?
I don’t know about that at all.
Do you think we should go back to the report of the Constitutional Conference organised by former President Goodluck Jonathan in 2014?
I agree; I love the report.
People are talking about generational shift and that the older generation should give the younger generation an opportunity to rule the country, what’s your opinion?
I agree absolutely and that has been my advocacy. I believe that once you are 60 years and above you don’t have any business in governance. I believe that the younger ones have more stake than the rest of us. So, let the younger ones take over and the older ones should leave the stage for them. They are no longer leaders of tomorrow, they are leaders of today and their time is going already. So, I strongly believe that the older ones should leave the stage for the younger ones now.
How would you describe the government of President Muhammadu Buhari?
I always challenge them to rise to the occasion. There are so many issues to handle and if I want to write I will write a whole book on it. There is so much that going on around the government. I cannot even place the government. So many things are happening that you don’t even expect to happen at all. A lot of people have been talking, the National Assembly has been talking. There is a level that you get to that you cannot do anything again.
Is this not an outcome of the presidential system of government that we are practising in Nigeria?
I don’t even like the Presidential System of Government. It is too expensive for a nation like ours. We should go for Parliament System of Government.
People even say that we should have a unicameral form of legislature
I agree, unicameral legislature is the best for us.
So, what role do you expect our National Assembly to play?
They cannot even play any role with due respect to the people there. I know some of them, but so many of them don’t know why they are in the government. I am not expecting anything better from the National Assembly.
Let’s look at our electoral system. We had elections in Edo and Ondo States, where the PDP and APC won respectively. People are talking about electronic voting; do you think we need a reform of our electoral system?
Our electoral system is flawed. It needs a lot of rejigging and overhauling. Let us start somewhere. For instance, on the spot declaration of results has helped us, let us improve on that. We cannot go below that standard. Look at the apathy in the system as everyone has lost hope in our electoral system. An average Nigerian believes that his vote does not count. I tell you, a majority of the people that vote, who determine the president, the governor, the legislators in this country are largely uninformed people. They don’t even know why they are voting or the people they are voting for. People that know the people they are voting for would not even go near it because the elites do not see any reason they should suffer themselves and at the end of the day their votes do not count. So, we need to work on our electoral system. I must commend the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), they are struggling to improve.
Would you agree that the government of President Muhammadu Buhari has been able to fight corruption?
I don’t. I have a very different view. Corruption is not about loot recovery, and that is not fighting corruption. Corruption is a complex issue and we are still very far. Also, what they have done is to eliminate impunity. People don’t come out now to show that they have stolen. They have now found a better, smarter way of dealing with it now than before.
People believe that it is the turn of the South West to produce the President of the nation in 2023, do you agree with them?
I don’t believe in that. I don’t believe in power shift, I believe in meritocracy. Just forget it; as far as I am concerned, the best candidate should emerge. It is not about who is he or where is he from, things would not work well like that. When former governor Babatunde Raji Fashola was in Lagos State, nobody wanted him to leave, we would have preferred him to be the permanent Governor of the state. That is the way I see it. I am not in the class of those who believe in rotational presidency, federal quota or federal character. I don’t subscribe to it.
The President once said that our youths are lazy and it seems that is the truth…
If you say youths are lazy, who made them lazy, is it not we the elders that made them lazy? Do they have capacity, who did not give them capacity and we don’t want to admit that we failed. You find a situation that somebody graduated seven years ago and he has not secured a job, and I told them at a zoom meeting recently that I have someone who graduated 11 years ago that has not secured a job till today. It is the area boys around them that are feeding some of them, will that not attract them. If a yahoo boy is feeding you, will you not join yahoo?
Someone like you has been in government from just above 30 years of age, you have been special adviser to the governor, commissioner, lawyer and lecturer, and you have enough experience; what do we hope to see from you in 2023?
I am not interested in anything governance. The best I can do for them is to give advice, where they seek for it and where I feel I should give them otherwise I am not interested. I have never been interested in elective office because the nature of elective office in Nigeria is something else. The way they go about it in Nigeria is not such that one would be interested in. It is the believe in Nigeria that once you are in a public office you are a thief. So, I cannot see myself in that kind of situation. I am not inclined to that at all. I just believe that we should allow these youths to take over. Let us see what they can do; the elders have been doing it all along and we have not seen any progress, so let the younger ones do it.
Would you say Nigeria is a failed state?
It is appearing so. I pay some of my staff here N50, 000, but I would love to increase it if we have enough earnings. There is increment in the prices of goods and services, increment in fuel, food, house rent and the rest. He cannot even feed a wife from the money. I once analysed it in my article that with N50, 000 income in a month, the man would pay N20, 000 monthly for a room in Ota, Ogun State, in Mushin, a room is almost N50, 000 per month. He would pay for electricity, pay vigilante fee and another N20, 000 is gone and the balance of N10, 000 is not enough for his transportation to and from the office. He is not going to eat or pay for health and you say he should not bother. Even in my house, I know how much I pay for electricity; for fuel for my car alone I am spending about N300, 000 a month.
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