Why I submitted minority national confab report ? —Asemota

Asemota

The National Coordinator, Ethnic Nationalities Movement, Solomon Asemota (SAN), who submitted  a minority national conference report to the Presidency, in this interview with ALLWELL OKPI, says the conference will be incomplete if all ethnic groups in Nigeria are not represented

Prof. Ben Nwabueze nominated you to replace him at the Presidential Advisory Committee on National Dialogue. Can you tell us about your experience in that committee?

 First of all, there is a misconception here. When Prof. Ben Nwabueze was appointed by the President, he was in London, undergoing medical treatment. So, he recommended to the President that I should take his place. This was not possible because he is from the South-East, while I’m from the South-South. Therefore, it was Prof. Anya Anya that was appointed to replace Nwabueze. What happened was that one of the two representatives of the South-South in the committee resigned and I was invited to join the committee.

 After the committee submitted its report, we heard of a different report – the minority report – that was authored by you. How did that come about?

 I’ll like to say that I was a member of the constitution review committee some 25 years ago and was also a member of the constituent assembly. So, when I became a member of this presidential committee, I had experience and background knowledge. I knew that after 25 years, there should be a change. The world has changed tremendously; but I discovered that the method adopted by the presidential committee was similar to what we used 25 years ago, when we came up with a draft constitution, which did not see the light of the day because it was never passed into law.

  Also, before I got there, I had been a member of The Patriots for almost 20 years. I’m also the National Coordinator of the Ethnic Nationalities Movement. With my background knowledge and experience, I thought the conference should be ethnic-based; not the way the military did it many years ago.

 Was that why you developed the minority report?

 Yes, that was what led to it.

 Was the minority report solely your idea or were there other members of the committee who subscribed to it?

 There was one other member of the committee, who shared my viewpoint but I didn’t press her to sign the document. I was the only person who signed the document. And the reason was that I envisaged that had any other member of The Patriots or the Ethnic Nationalities Movement been appointed to the committee, he would have reacted in the same way I did. The only thing is that we need a change and the method, which we had adopted before without results, should not be repeated.

 Can you highlight the main recommendations of the minority report and how they differ from those of the report the committee submitted?

 I would rather you get both reports; read them and make up your mind. Fortunately, some of the views we expressed have now been reflected in the nomination of those who should attend the conference.

 What is your opinion on the modalities for the conference?

 We, The Patriots, will hold a meeting on Friday (February 7) and the Ethnic Nationalities Movement will have a conference in Abuja on Tuesday and Wednesday. We have invited all the ethnic nationalities, about 389 of them. I don’t want to pre-empt what they will say. At the conference and after the conference, we will make our views known. I’ll like to say something here. You, I and every Nigerian, were born into  families without our making; so also were we born into our ethnic nationality or tribe without our opinion or choice. Therefore, if we are all grouped together in one country called Nigeria, and the larger ethnic groups get very large representation, while some cannot get one representative, then they are being discriminated against on the basis of the circumstances of their birth. That is not justice; it is not fair. What we are talking about is a constitution that will bind us for the future; therefore the input from every sector and every ethnic nationality is important. That is the point I’m stressing. Over the years, people thought that Nigeria was made up of the tripod; the Igbo, the Yoruba and the Hausa/Fulani. It is a British creation. The reason the British did that was because of what they called indirect rule. They didn’t have the manpower and enough expatriates to go round the country. They hoped the three major tribes will assimilate the rest of us so that Nigeria will be easy to govern. They wanted to have a Yoruba West, Igbo East and Hausa/Fulani North. But it hasn’t quite worked out like that till today. I find it a bit uncomfortable when people say we don’t know how many we are. I know that in our tradition, you don’t ask a man how many children he has, but I’ve not seen a country that says it doesn’t know how many ethnic nationalities it is made up of. That’s why I said we should get rid of this talk about Wazobia. We are 389 ethnic nationalities not three. Do you feel inferior or superior to any other Nigerian? No. So, why should it be Wazobia. We should look for one thing that will embrace everybody.

 People have complained about the proposed three-month duration for the conference and the fact that the resolutions will be sent to the National Assembly for ratification. Do you think the exercise will succeed?

 The first success that we have already is that we are going to come together to talk. On the question of three months, I don’t think that is sufficient. It should have been a little above nine months, definitely not three. My suspicion is that it may be adjourned and then, they can continue after the elections, but I don’t see them completing it in three months. Then the issue of the resolutions going back to the National Assembly; you need to understand why we have this problem with the National Assembly. When the military decided to hand over power to civilians, they had what was called security clearance. There is a suspicion that what they did was that those who are in the position to challenge them were excluded. So, it was their nominees and friends that got there. Therefore you find out that what we are getting from the National Assembly is not encouraging. They were doing their own constitution review. Now, you say people should take resolutions and give it to them (lawmakers). I don’t think that is logical. Apart from the amount of money that was spent on their part and now, another N7bn is to be spent and the outcome will be referred to them again. I don’t think that is fair. So, the position we have taken is that whatever the decision of the conference, it should be subjected to a referendum. All you need to do is to bring the one approved by referendum and the same day you abrogate the 1999 constitution, you immediately promulgate the new constitution, so that there is no vacuum. That is the only function that is expected of the National Assembly.

 You said there was something wrong with the method the presidential committee used, could it be said that it did not do a good job in terms of collating the views of Nigerians?

 I will not criticise the committee. I was part of it. I don’t think it is decent to do that. It’s just that I have very strong views and I’m a bit experienced. I’ve been a senior counsel for about 29 years.

 There was controversy over whether or not the minority report was submitted to the Presidency. What is the situation now. Has the presidency acknowledged receipt of the report?

 I was a member of the committee and I handed over the document, for which it was receipted for by the secretary of the committee and the object of the exercise was for it to be transmitted to the President. In the main report, everybody signed except me and that was because I had my own report, different from theirs. In the areas I agreed with them, I put them there and in the areas I disagreed, I listed them out and stated why I disagreed. The President has the right to receive advice from members of the committee collectively and individually. There was no question of saying it has to be collective. That is why I wrote mine. I believe the President would have read my report because the government’s white paper has taken some of my points into consideration.

A recent article of yours narrated the relationship between you and the late Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu; how will you describe the relationship with the late Biafran warlord?

 He called me ‘my brother.’ May his soul rest in peace. Anytime I visited him in Enugu, when he was still hale and hearty, we talked till midnight. We belong to the same generation, more or less. He was in the army; I was in the police. We had a lot in common. We grew up in the North. He grew up in Zungeru, while I grew up in Jos. I speak Igbo, Hausa and Yoruba. So, when I talk about Nigeria, I know what I’m talking about. And you would be surprised, I learnt how to speak all these languages in Jos. Then we were Nigerians. Some people will wonder why after being Nigerian, I’m now talking about ethnic nationalities. Yes, it’s because of the foundation of the country.

 We need to know all the ethnic nationalities; who they are and where they reside. We had colonialism and the British did not teach us democracy, they did not teach us anything. Those of us who took over from the British merely continued what the white men left. We used to call ourselves black-white men; then military came and they never taught us democracy. I think the times that we really practised democracy was between 1960 and 1966 and then in 2007, because I consider (Olusegun) Obasanjo’s eight years in Aso Rock a continuation of military rule. It was after he left that real democracy and disagreement started. So, what is happening now to President Goodluck Jonathan is healthy; it is freedom. If people disagree and they move around, it’s acceptable. We’ve had democracy now for less than 10 years. The longer we stay, the stronger we become and I’m sure most of our problems will be solved.

 You also wrote about ‘Lugard’s divergent policy,’ the marriage of the ‘northern well-conducted young man’ and the ‘southern lady of means.’ What did you mean by these?

 It was the Secretary of State Lord Harcourt at a civil service dinner in 1913 that made the famous speech that he had released the well-conducted youth of the North from the apron strings of the treasury. This was because while the South was able to look after itself, the North was subsidised by the British treasury. So, the purpose of amalgamation was to use the money which accrued to the South to take care of the whole country, without subvention from British treasury. The money of the South came from gin importation. We were importing a lot of gin and the duties from the importation were sufficient to keep the administration in the South running. Another thing is that there were two divergent policies for railway in the North, and the South. The amalgamation made it possible to have one railway policy to bring goods to the coast and take imported goods to the hinterland.

 Apparently, amalgamation has remained a contentious issue, 100 years after. But the government has said it’s a no-go area at the national conference. What do you think?

 My personal view is that to say there are no-go areas is military mentality. They believe  they know better than us. They believe they are our godfathers and they can tell us what to do and what not to do. I believe this is the 21st century; we all know the advantage of coming together. You can see the European Union. The Germans and the French fought themselves so much but today they are together in the European Union. I don’t think it was necessary to say there are no-go areas because if you don’t discuss everything, it is like sweeping some things underneath the carpet. But the government has taken the decision and we will abide by it.

 Many believe the North, more than any other region, wants the status quo maintained. Do you agree?

 It’s only natural. In revenue allocation, landmass is a condition; population, population density are conditions too. First of all, land is an asset, human beings are assets. They have them in abundance, you pay them for it; you allocate money to them to keep. Isn’t that an advantage? If you were in that position, would you want to lose it?

 The North has always acted as one political unit, even with its different ethnic nationalities, why is the South not that united?

 In the beginning, it was North and South. Then in 1939, it was split into North, East and West and it was because of the indirect rule the British employed. And the North remained the way it is because most of the colonial officers came from Sudan to Nigeria. They had a special relationship with the Muslims. They also enjoyed polo and so, a large number of them came to the North and that endeared them to the North more than the South. If you look at Lord Lugard’s paper in 1914, he talked glowingly about the system of the North as opposed to the one of the South. He regarded people of the South as savages, except for few areas where there were empires, like the Benin Empire. The British clearly had more affection for the North. Let’s be honest too. The Emirs had ruled for so many years. They understood what they wanted. The British came and strengthened them and some traditional rulers in the South. The place where traditional rulers were not powerful was in the East, Igbo land. The Igbo were more republican.

 Were you already in the police before Independence?

 I was a cadet inspector before the Independence. In fact, I was the most senior police officer at the Ikeja Airport in 1960 before Independence. On the eve of Independence, I came home, picked my younger brother, who was living with me at number 111 Agege Motor Road, and my mother, and we drove to Race Course, now Tafawa Balewa Square, to see the Union Jack lowered and the Nigerian flag raised. We drove back home and by 5am, we went to open the airport.

 How was it being a police officer then?

 When the Inspector-General of Police  said Nigeria was not ripe for local government police, I laughed. I was the Chief Officer Local Government Police for Ekiti, Akoko and Owo divisions in 1962. I was only an assistant superintendent of police. So, we were ripe in 1962 and unripe in 2014. It is a little bit illogical. I react uncomfortably when anybody says Nigeria is not ripe for anything. We are ripe for everything. We are ripe to go to the moon. We are ripe to do nuclear physics. We are ripe to do open heart surgery and anything. It is a colonial language and it hurts me.

 As a lawyer for decades, can you talk about the state of the judiciary today, compared with what it was in your early days?

 I made my first appearance in a magistrate court in Ikeja in 1960. The chief magistrate, in the famous dog bite case, sentenced a white man to jail for getting his dog to bite a mallam. Over 50 years, one has seen the evolution of the law and where it has gone. At one time, Nigerian authorities could be cited anywhere in the common law jurisdiction. When we started having the mixture of the common law and Sharia, the judgment became a lot more difficult for pure common law countries to accept. I don’t want to say more than that.

There are insinuations that President Jonathan proposed the national conference for some political reasons. Do you see it from that point of view?

  I don’t see it from that point of view. President Jonathan has the right to have his own reasons. I also don’t think it is important whether he is sincere or not sincere. This is an opportunity; that is why I choose to be part of it. I’ve been offered appointment, which I declined, but I decided to be part of this. If those, who are saying that about the President do not want to attend the conference for any reason, they should not sit down and blame the President for the opportunity.