Ministerial List Gives Flicker Of Hope — Ekekwe

Former Dean Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Port Harcourt, Prof. Eme Ekekwe, told Kelvin Ebiri, that the ministerial nominees gives a flicker of hope, based on their political pedigrees.
What is your assessment of the first batch of ministerial nominees presented to the Senate by President Muhammadu Buhari?
From the names that one saw, I think it is positive. I think they are people who in one way or another have proved themselves. There are things we can point to and say these are the things they have done, for those of them that are past governors. In societies such as ours, it is difficult to find anybody who has one hundred percent scorecard. It is not possible. So, when you see somebody who has seventy or eight percent, we can say the person has tried. I think generally it’s a good beginning.

Did the list warrant the four months delay since the nominees are all known politicians?
I don’t think quite frankly that the delay was worth it. I think that list could have been released earlier. There are really no surprises as such. But it is also surprising because it took that long on the account that this is a party that has not been in power before and the configurations within the party are not clear.

It is not like the pervious party where more or less, the lines were clearly drawn. Here you have people who are still angling for presentation to the public, people who are angling for certain position within the party. And the president is not the kind of person who would just go out there and take somebody because the person was presented to him. So, it took him some time to think through them, but I think he took too long time to come to this point.

Due to the numerous political and socio-economic challenges facing the country, does the ministerial list meet your expectation that change is imminent?
It would have been difficult to say the list met my expectation because I didn’t know what I was looking for personally. When the president said it would take some time, I expected him to take some time to look at the background of people and say they are people that when given any portfolio, will perform. I think generally, we have met that, but I am not sure it should have taken this long to identify those same people. I have heard comments like oh; we should have seen new faces.

That, in my opinion is a wrong comment. We have gone through a period in this country when we said we want to see a new generation of leaders. That new generation we craved for was under the military and that was one thing General Ibrahim Babaginda did for this country. We saw where the new generation took us. If you give me an old generation, but somebody with a proven track record, I will take that than somebody who is coming to try.

Nigeria is not a place to come to try and anybody coming to any office should have had some record of performance somewhere. That is part of what is wrong with our system, especially at the governor level. There are people who are coming in, who did nothing before that. You go to your Houses of Assembly and National Assembly; there are people with no record of achievement anywhere, except that they were apprentice to some persons. Granted, there comes a time when they will now gain that experience and begin to do something. That was how some of the people now nominated as ministers, came in, but at least now, we can see that they can do something. So, I wasn’t expecting that they would be those I don’t know.

Though there are those in the list that I don’t know, but when you read something that they have done, you will say there is a record. I don’t expect that any president will come and bring persons you and I don’t know. If he brings new face, you and I will also worry, if they will perform. This is a very difficult country and it is the rulership that has made it a difficult country. You bring somebody into government, yet you don’t allow him/her to work unless they work with our own particular parochial interest. When you have people who are able to stand on their own, take objective position, develop policies that are oriented to benefit majority of the people, to me that is most important.

Not those who have come to satisfy patronages. We have seen some of those and we know they didn’t get us any far. For me, that is the kind of direction I will like to see them go. It was one of the Senators who said he thought he would bring people from outside. If he brought people from outside, we would have been the ones to complain. He had to bring people from the material that is already here. And unfortunately, that material is not the best in the world to work but he is trying to pick what is possible in that pack.

What relevant qualities should the Senate consider in individual nominees during screenings?
They should look for integrity. Are they the people who you think can serve this country creditably? Are they the people who have the qualification to be in the cabinet? Now, it is the president’s prerogative to assign particular portfolio, but it is the business of the Senate to confirm that they understand the politics and economy of Nigeria.

Those are factors that will be at play when they come in. Technical knowledge is not really what you are looking for because the civil service provides that. But you need to have a group of people or in each ministry somebody who provides leadership, vision, who can use whatever platform of the party in power.

When you don’t deliver and the next election comes, you are going to run into difficulty convincing the populace. Let us keep in mind that these people have been talking about “Change! Change!! Change!!!” he (the president) has to look for people who can deliver on that change, people who are dynamic in their thinking, people who are national orientated in their approach to issues, and are passionate to see Nigeria a better place than they met it.

The Senate has agreed to accept petitions against some of the nominees, would this not further delay the constitution of Buhari’s cabinet?
I presume that before those names came up they had gone through some security checks and nothing at this point precludes any of those people being dropped, nothing that I know, not even when they become ministers. But being accused is one thing; the law says until you are proven guilty, you are innocent. The Senate President has a case in court.  We don’t say he ceases being Senate President because of that. So, the Senate is very mindful of the kind of precedent it sets. If they say there is an allegation against you, therefore you cannot be a minister, they will be pointing other fingers at themselves.

Considering the geopolitical dynamics of Nigeria, has this list really addressed geopolitical concerns?
The President has very little choice in that in the sense that there is a constitutional provision that a certain level of representation must be evident in the cabinet. So, he cannot avoid that. It is difficult to conclude because he told us, and the letter read out on the floor of the Senate was very clear on that, that this was a partial list. We expect to see another list to come in. This is not the full cabinet. We cannot be categorical on that to say it is a fair representation or not.

Are there critical national issues that you expect the new cabinet to tackle?
Those problems are already obvious. For me in the order of priority, the first and most urgent is security. And I am not just looking at Boko Haram; important and very deadly as that threat is. I am also looking at armed robbery and high level of kidnapping in the states. The fact that people have difficulty sleeping well at night is a source of concern. These things make it difficult for economic development to take root. Because if you want to invest any money, there must be certain assurance of security, and in any case, security is the basic function of any State and it must be able to provide that to the citizens.

Most people live in fear of kidnappers and armed robbers. These are the things for me that should be given very high priority; otherwise, they will impact negatively on any economic policies that you bring. Then, corruption; corruption is deadly and it is not just at the high level but the lowest level as well.

Do you support the president’s intention to act as the substantive minister of petroleum?
In my opinion, I don’t think it is right. Other presidents did, I didn’t think it was right then and I don’t think it is right now. I appreciate where I think he is coming from, there is so much rot in there and that sector of the economy is very critical to the overall picture. And so he wants to pay personal attention. I think he could do that by appointing in his opinion the most capable hand in that sector and still keep a close watch, without him taking on the responsibility to say he is the minister.

It is not right. When I saw the name of the Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, I thought it was possible that the president has had a change of heart?  Is it possible that he is going to remove this man from NNPC to give him ministerial responsibility for that sector? I don’t know. But for him to be the petroleum minister to me is wrong. If I were him I won’t do it. He is not the best petroleum mind in the country.

He brings integrity, determination and passion, we agree. But he can infuse that passion to any sector of the economy. He does not need to restrict himself to one ministry. It is true he has been there, but with due respect to the president, the past is very different from the present.

Do you have reservations about the ministerial list?
One will always have reservations. If I have performed today, is there a guarantee that I will perform tomorrow? There is none. I can only go by what I have seen of me this day and hope that that is also what I will try to maintain tomorrow. My reservation is whether these people will really perform? For now, yes I think they can. But this is Nigeria. I have been in this country when people we thought would never mess up were given responsibilities and they messed up. I pray for them that they don’t fall into that trap, but in this country, it is a very easy trap to fall into by the time you start listening to your friends, to some parochial group that come around you, and sometimes the party makes demands on you that are totally unnecessary. The party wants you to bring money into their coffers instead of going to raise money from their membership. They expect those they have sent forward to be the ones to fund the party. Those are areas I will fear for them and especially in a country where the supremacy of the party is taken for granted. If you go against the party, you have gone against the gods that be in the land. To me, that is the banana peels on their way!