Though General David
Jemibewon (rtd) is no longer in active politics, he is still very much
concerned about certain developments in the country.
Speaking on the
sideline about the 2019 general elections, he expressed the view that the
opposition PDP would serve the interest of Nigerians better than the ruling All
Progressives Congress (APC).
As a former Minister
of Police Affairs, you pioneered the idea of community policing. In view
of the current security situation in the country, what would you suggest as a
way of strengthening citizens’ involvement in security and intelligence
gathering?
Of course, when you
talk of security, it is not just a job for the police alone. The police secure
the society, they secure the community. So, for security to be effective, the
citizens must be seriously involved. The Police Force is one of the
establishments set up for the purpose of ensuring security. The people must,
therefore, be at the centre of efforts to ensure total security. That is to
say, the citizens must be so organized that they collaborate with the police
and other security agencies. They must be prepared to give information to
security agencies; they must be prepared to give total support in whatever way
it is necessary to ensure that they are their own security. In this regard,
education, training, commitment, and so, on are very necessary ingredients in
ensuring effective security of the community. Therefore, members of the
community must be as keen, enthusiastic and as interested as the establishment
that is put up by the government for the security of the
citizens. As they say, charity begins at home. In other words, people in
the community must give support to the police and other security agencies. They
should be in theforefront of making their job easy.
Electioneering towards
the 2019 general elections is already on. What is the way to ensuring
that elections hold in a peaceful atmosphere?
One, violence cannot
be completely eliminated. Some reasons leading to violence may not necessarily
be political. But political electioneering provides the ground for people to
score points particularly if there have been disagreements. Two people will disagree
if they don’t see face to face. You could control such disagreement, which
often times extends to violence. But where they cannot meet, there is no way
there can be violence. The man is Sokoto cannot fight the man in Lagos.
Electioneering period provides opportunity for people to meet with people whom
otherwise they would not have met. This is why generally crises get out of
control during political campaigns. What I am trying to say is this: whether
there is politics or not, there will be occasion when there is insecurity
arising from arguments here and there. It is only that during political
campaign that it is more frequent. I think what will happen really is to call
on leaders to do it according to the rules. There are rules guiding elections,
let people obey the rules, let leaders show leadership by example, and by
educating their followership that politics is not fight to the finish. Those
who don’t win today may win tomorrow. Those who win must also realise that they
are occupying positions on temporary basis. So, education comes in.
People have been
campaigning for the emergence of Third Force in the political space.
Is there any new thing you expect this so-called Third Force to bring to the
table for the good of Nigerians? This is bearing in mind the fact that the
coalition may eventually turn out to be an amalgam of dissents from the two
leading political parties.
There will always be a
Third Force. And a Third Force may not necessarily be those forces you know
today. People who agree today may disagree tomorrow. I think that is what
democracy means; people having opportunity to belong to any political group of
their choice. Whichever force is in the position of leadership should do that
which is right, that which will please the citizenry, that which will please
the electorate. I don’t think there will be a time when people won’t
disagree. As they always say, it is good to disagree to agree.
And to say that Third
Force can’t bring new idea, I don’t agree with you. There are reasons people
hold certain ideas. And when those reasons don’t exist anymore, they
should be able to have the opportunity to change their mind. If, for example,
some people get together and decided this is what we are going to do when we
get to government and on getting to government they failed to do it, then those
that are not satisfied in that group should have the opportunity to opt out and
coalesce with people of like minds who are interested in promoting peace and
understanding which they believe will lead to progress and development. If
there is any effort to prevent such group from coming into being, that then
becomes undemocratic.
The nPDP who defected from
the original PDP in the run up to the 2015 general elections and
joined forces with other political parties to form the ruling All Progressives
Congress (APC) are now aggrieved, threatening to dump the party if certain
conditions are not met. As a former member of the PDP, did you foresee this
happening?
Honestly, I don’t
know. You know in a political situation, 24 hours is a long time. There are
three classes of politicians. There are those who are in politics for the
development of society and go into office to do the best for the country. There
are also those who take politics as business. For such individuals, development
of the country is not their priority.
Since they see
politics as an enterprise, they don’t really mind whether they kill or destroy
so as to win election. For them, politics is business and in business, profit
is the main objective. Then, there is the third group who has the belief that
politicians are not good people and so members don’t care whether the situation
changes or not. They believe whichever party is there, the result will be the
same. It depends on which of these three categories the people you talked about
belong. My thinking is that those who are out for the good of the society do
not see what is happening to be in conformity with what they are in politics
for and, therefore, decide to leave. I want to believe, subject to their strength,
they could make great impact. But their strength is very important. I just pray
that we salvage our country by getting men of good character.
The PDP is now better
repositioned with the new National Chairman. Do you see it in a good stead to
unseat the APC-led government?
To be honest with you,
I am not too sure that APC is better than PDP. There are good people on both
sides. But when you put the totality of the whole thing together and compare, I
am not too sure APC is particularly better than PDP. And I sympathise
with Buhari because, one, he doesn’t know the people he is working with. Two,
those people he is working with don’t believe in some of his major policies. It
is not like the military where you follow the leader. When you talk of corruption,
idea of his followers is different from his own idea. So, you could see the
conflict under his leadership. And it is not because of his incompetence. He is
a very highly competent person and incorruptible. But then, he doesn’t know
those who are working with him. These are some of the reasons we are not making
progress. If PDP is to do well at all, if PDP wants to make an impact, the
person I could see as having the potential for great things to happen is former
Vice President Atiku Abubakar. The best person under whose leadership we can
hope for a better performance is Atiku. It is unfortunate that the
man has been messed up. If there was no misunderstanding between Obasanjo and
this man, if we had followed a systematic succession plan, this country would
have been better than now. If PDP is given another chance, the leadership under
which there can be progress and peace is under Abubakar.
And my reasons are
very clear. One, he is a gentleman. At the moment, he is the person who can
talk to some people in the East, some people in the North, some people in the
West. Peace is very important in a country. You can’t just go and bring one
isolated person that is not known across the border. People need to have
confidence in the leadership.
And I think that man
has the quality. He has friends in the East, he has friends in the West, he has
friends in the North. Even though they gave him the tag of corruption, it has
not been proved. He has employed thousands of Nigerians. He has one of the best
educational institutions in the country. He has been involved in every sector
of the economy and the development of the country and he is comfortable. Nobody
has given me any bribe to promote anybody. But I think if there is any hope for
PDP, then they should vote that man. For me, if I am to stick out my neck
today, that is the only person I have confidence in.
Another person I have
in mind is the former governor of Jigawa State, Sule Lamido. For me, the best
for now is former vice president. Next to him is Sule Lamido. If PDP really
wants to win, it has to be one of these two people. If PDP can put its
acts together, the development of this country is better achieved with PDP
being in control of government.
But you seem to
disagree with former President Olusegun Obasanjo who has dismissed Buhari as
incompetent.
(Cuts in)…Obasanjo
must be judging whosoever he is judging against the criteria set out by him.
But I have just explained the areas where people may think he has not performed
up to expectation. And the reasons are very clear. One, Buhari is
operating under a democratic system. He cannot just go out and say this must
happen. He must convince his followership why what he says should happen. It is
not like the military. Two, they are probably comparing Buhari to when he came
as head of government through a coup. This is not military, this is a civil
government. So, even when he believes in certain things, he must convince those
who work with him to believe in what he says and to work towards the objectives
he set out. Three, when he was Head of State, Tunde Idiagbon was his deputy. In
the army, the deputy is actually the person who does all the jobs for the boss.
But the boss must make sure he sets out policies to be followed and once that
is done, everybody on line of leadership knows what exactly what to do. He
doesn’t need to be reminded. So, we have what we call standing order,
operational standing instructions. You wake up; you know what to do whether the
Commander is there or not. My assessment is that Buhari doesn’t have that
luxury. When Buhari came, it took him long time to get his ministers in place.
Even after appointing the ministers, the first six months he didn’t know the
name of some ministers working with him. He never knew them. Probably some
people recommended them to him. These ministers too didn’t know Buhari, they
didn’t know how to relate to him. So, it was not a smooth beginning. And when
you don’t start well, you don’t end too well either. Obasanjo has
opportunity to make comparison because he was head of state under military rule
and also served as elected president. So, they gave him total support. He knows
more than 90 per cent of those he called to serve and those people too were
prepared to give their best and they did give their best. Don’t forget people
like General Danjuma (Rtd), people like Bola Ige, you can continue like that.
Now, tell me, can you really count people with such great competence, people
who really came out for the good of the country in this government? So, Buhari
doesn’t enjoy the luxury that Obasanjo enjoyed when he came in as president in
1999. Go and do some research and look at the quality of personnel that
Obasanjo picked and compare them with the quality of those that are there now.
May be that is what Obasanjo is looking at.
Obasanjo’s Coalition
Movement has fused with ADC as a political platform to bring about a change of
government. How far do you think he can go with his change agenda?
Changing government
must be qualified. Changing government for the development of Nigeria is
necessary and desirable. But changing government for the sake of changing is of
no meaning. Assuming that change is successful, those who will take over
government will be Nigerians. Have those Nigerians changed? Are they not still
Nigerians? What are their objectives? To go to government to do what? To take
whatever is left or to build on what is left? So, we need to know whosoever is
changing. Whether it is Obasanjo or not Obasanjo, what is the objective of the
change? Sometimes the devil you know is better than the devil you don’t know. I
am not saying that the government there now is the best. When PDP was there,
everybody was advocating for a change, we have seen the change now. So, we must
modify this change. Is it for good or just change for changing sake? I cannot
foretell the future, but I am not too sure of the change they are talking
about. If it is Nigerians that will still be in the Third Force, are those
Nigerians ready to do the right thing? Like I have personally observed, each time
there is a government in Nigeria, people want a change. Once there is a change
of government, they start singing the praise of the previous government. The
new government will be worse than the one they changed to.
My question is: change
for what? Ten years ago, we complained that we were not comfortable. Today, the
situation is worse. Look at education sector, I have a small school and I found
out that parents didn’t have money for their children to return to school. This
is the time we should be thinking of what will happen in 20 year’s time because
the result of not going to school today will start to show in future. When we
had money during oil boom, we didn’t spend the money well. Look at the
insecurity, we don’t think ahead. We should be looking at the crisis these
little children in the North-east who are now being kept in the IDP camps will
cause in the future. What happens when they come of age? You have children who
don’t know who their parents are or where they come from. While we are solving today’s
problem, we must be looking into the future.
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