An elder statesman from Adamawa State and a retired Director of Studies at the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS), Professor Emeritus Ibrahim Lawal Bashiru, speaks with IMOLEAYO OYEDEYI on the state of the nation and why former President Muhammadu Buhari should not be blamed by the current government for the country’s problems.
AIDES and supporters of President Bola Tinubu have been blaming the current economic challenges of the country on the past Buhari administation. What is your take on it?
It has always been usual with Nigerians to cast aspersions on previous governments for their failure. But governance is a continuum. So, you can’t separate Muhammadu Buhari’s government from this present regime, particularly given the role President Tinubu played in Buhari’s regime, and the role his candidate, whom he gave to be accommodated in Buhari’s cabinet, played as well. However, what brought us to where we are today, which significantly is the removal of the petrol subsidy, was mooted during Buhari’s time. But the former president vindicated himself when he told a BBC journalist who asked him why he wouldn’t take the World Bank’s advice. And he said, no, that though the World Bank’s advice was the right dose to take to address our ailment, he is not convinced that it would solve our problem. And that’s why the former president left the subsidy issue intact. So, I don’t think Buhari can be blamed for this. Why didn’t Tinubu first study the situation and then put together a team of his confidants to look at the issue and address it appropriately? But on the contrary, Tinubu, on the day of the inauguration, took the issue hook, line, and sinker without looking at its implications. And the impression this gave was that the president was just dancing to the gallery without knowing what that would do to Nigeria socio-politically. Now, look at where we are.
No country would want to remove subsidies at that time when Nigeria does not produce anything other than crude oil and the crude oil money also goes back to the Western world as we buy all kinds of things from them. And Buhari said, no, he was not going to do it. But when Tinubu came, without any serious decision and serious consultations with the people, he pronounced the removal of the subsidy, right on his inauguration day. And so, we have this problem that we have today, such that the naira has completely sunk deep via-a-vis the dollar. So how can you cast aspersion on the Buhari’s government or attribute today’s failure to the previous administration? Buhari had avoided the issue. But Tinubu said, “No, that is cowardice. I am going to take the bull by the horns.” And he took the bull by the horns, and found himself on the ground, knocked down by the bull. This is where we are today. When going into the subsidy issue, he should have first found out who and who were being paid the subsidy. Can’t Tinubu go after these people, if there are human beings behind the subsidy scandal? Mind you, it has been documented and it is even viral on social media that some people collected the subsidies. Why didn’t the government first go after these people and get the money from them or sell their assets and address the problems that this country is facing today? So he is just passing the bucks. And, unreasonably, he can’t blame Buhari for what is happening today. This is because Buhari avoided doing the same because of its implications.
But one of the huge blames Tinubu’s supporters have thrown at the Buhari administration is the excessive foreign loans it took, which cruelly plunged the country into a severe debt crisis. Aren’t they correct in this regard?
You see, taking loans is not a crime. What becomes a crime for a country that takes the loan is whether or not the loan has been judiciously used to improve things and lay a foundation for a solid economy. I am not holding brief for Buhari. But if you look at some of the gigantic projects that Buhari executed during his regime, and the cost of such projects, you can say, yes, a lot of money went into them. And they are projects that have long and sustainable impacts on the Nigerian economy. Take the Second Niger Bridge for instance: how much did it cost the country? What of all the roads constructed and the rail projects that the government delivered? How much did they cost the country? So Buhari definitely has something to show for the loans. Assuming there was nothing to show for them, then, we can say Buhari was something else. Mind you, I am not saying that the former president was not careless, because indeed, he was careless by taking the loans to the extent that the servicing of the loans amounted to three quarters of our national revenue. No sensible leader would do that kind of thing. But Buhari did it. Though he did not do it alone, he did it with a team. So, if at all, we must blame someone for this failure, it should be the entire Buhari government, including his team, and not just Buhari alone as a person.
The Buhari administration only made provisions for six months of subsidy payment. There was nothing for the remaining six months of the year. How then can Tinubu be blamed for pronouncing the removal of the subsidy when it was widely known that his predecessor had strategically removed it?
And do you know that it is the six-month withdrawal of the subsidy that led us to where we are today? If Tinubu feels the Buhari’s government did not pay for the six-month subsidy, the question he should have asked is: where is the money meant for the payment? He should have asked where the subsidy payment for the remaining six months is. This is because Buhari couldn’t have gone out of power with it. You see, what we need to do in this country is to put our problems into proper perspective by finding out where the money goes. Believe me, there are a lot of explanations to be made. People talk about oil stealing and corruption in real terms. We have heard people getting away with billions upon billions of naira in their accounts. Yet, the government doesn’t have the guts to go after these people. Why can’t we? It is the responsibility of the government to make sure that the state under their care is protected from all kinds of vices.
In Nigeria, we have the devices of corruption and we know those behind it. But yet, no leader wants to get at these people. Why? Is it that they are untouchables? Tinubu knows; he has the documents and records of the Nigerian money with these people. Some of them are still alive. So why can’t the government go after them? So, it is an illicit conspiracy against the masses of Nigeria. For instance, look at what Godwin Emefiele did to this country. But people are not talking about the former CBN governor; they are simply blaming Buhari. Of course, Buhari was his president and he can be rightly accused of being careless and irresponsible to have allowed Emefiele to do what he did. But the person who stole the money is alive, and yet, we are not doing anything. Meanwhile, Tinubu was a principal character in Buhari’s regime. Whether he likes it or not, that is the fact. He was a principal character, and there were many things that Buhari did, which I am sure he consulted with Tinubu either directly or indirectly by listening to his voice. So how can he exonerate himself from the blame? So let’s put all these things in proper perspective for us to know the problem as it is said that knowing the problem is having the solution.
And what is the solution?
The solution to Nigeria’s problem is a total institutional change. What do I mean? The American presidential system is too expensive for us and too bogus for one person to carry the loads of responsibility heaped on him as the executive president. If you get an executive president who is reckless, he can easily destroy the country. And the much power concentrated on him without in terms of the finances and fiscal responsibility of the country is such that there are so many loopholes created which have been exploited by the corrupt politicians around our leader.
The Executive Presidency as a system of governance is not the best for us, first because it is too expensive especially with bicameral legislative structure in which all members, their personal expenses; salaries, allowance etc constitute heavy burden on the state. Financial responsibilities amounting to staggering resources that can provide social services to the citizenry but unfortunately after the expenditure on the Legislature, coupled with corruption, which is rampant among these legislators, there is hardly anything much to address the uncountable challenges facing the citizenry. Corruption in the Executive, Legislature and Judiciary in the Executive Presidential System that we practice leaves nothing to provide the critically essential social services that our people need. It is the same with security, which threatens the very existence of Nigeria. In addition to all these, the power concentrated in the hands of our political leaders makes them drunk with power to cow the citizenry into their dictates. There is more that can be said about the unsuitability of this system to countries in our category in the committees of nation and why we should all discard it and go for the parliamentary system which is less cumbersome, expensive and more equity conscious to guarantee all inclusive development.
Emefiele did his own. He was a governor of the Central Bank, answerable to only the president. The president (Buhari) also is not clean in this respect, because as an executive president, he should have cautioned Emefiele to stop all that. Everything didn’t happen overnight. It happened over a long period. Aside from Emefiele, what of the ministers that [allegedly] stole billions, even the Abacha recovered loot went into the hands of the corrupt politicians. And they made away with it. So is it that we cannot do anything about them? So, my dear, there is a need for institutional reforms and restructuring. Let’s forget about the executive presidency with a bicameral legislature. The House (legislature) matter has become a major setback to Nigeria’s socio-economic development because it is full of corrupt people. And if we now want to do this institutional reforming, it is the same people that are going to stop us, simply because it will either expose them or deprive them of the privileges that they are enjoying. But there is no harm in trying. Let’s do it. It can be through a referendum as long as the judiciary, unfortunately, which is corrupt, can do the right thing. So whatever it is, we are in a terrible shit.
You, young people, should maintain a balanced perspective on this country because it is on the precipice. And it will be the same unless we do the right thing, which is balancing and not blaming or passing the bucks which won’t take us anywhere. As I have said, the fundamental problem we have gotten into is the type of governance that we run. The American presidential system is too expensive for us. It is too sophisticated. Once power is grabbed by certain people, because of these existing executive tendencies of the presidential system, it is mostly cornered for negative purposes. So the others outside are left out. That is one.
Secondly, how can you have a set of national assembly people who will be daily living on the ticket of this country continuously for every day of their lives, while the people [masses] are suffering? In the parliamentary system, that is not done. You are simply invited for a legislative sitting with paid allowances after which you are expected to go to your house till you are called again for the sitting. But here, we have permanently over 360 people living on the poor Nigerians. Aside from this, the legislators are very corrupt such that they embezzle the amount they are being given to spend for Nigerians [their constituencies] in terms of projects. And that was why I said the Tinubu’s government should go after those that have stolen from this country. Buhari tried his own, but he couldn’t. So let Tinubu, a businessman, go after them. One thing I like about Tinubu is that he has a business approach to governance, which is good. But he has his problems, as he can be bullish, thinking that he has the executive power and at the end of the day, the results come.
But I appeal to the youths not to agitate for protests, because Nigerians are not truly ready for a revolution. And if the people think having a revolution equals protests, then we are making a terrible mistake, because once the protests set in, there is no guiding principle. There won’t be any leader to lead it and everybody will just take the law into his own hands. What happens at the end of the day is rampage, and killings which is what anarchy is. And that is what we are inviting in this country, which is not good at all. The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) also doesn’t seem to be doing its own work. The labour seems to be flexing his muscle against the executive. But that is not the way to do it. Let’s sit and talk about how we move this country forward.
