Talebearers

WHY WE SHOULD GO BACK TO REGIONAL GOVERNMENT

-Lagos Lawmaker, Mufutau Egberongbe

To say he is embittered is to state the obvious, Hon. Mufutau Egberongbe who is representing Apapa Constituency 1 in the Lagos State House of Assembly is not happy with the current arrangement in the country.

The seasoned politician is of the view that the nation should operate a true federal system of government and go back to the era of regional government, which he said would lead to better development.

In an interview he granted us recently, Hon. Egberongbe also faulted the current National Conference, saying that it will go the way of previous confabs and discussions in the country. He offered that the menace of Boko Haram would have been better handled by state and local policing.

We will like you to comment on the current fuel scarcity being experienced in the country, what impact would this have on our economy?

I wouldn’t know if it is artificial or otherwise because these days it is difficult to get accurate figures from the Federal Government as it is being seen on the issue of Boko Haram menace. Look at the number of persons that are dying daily because of the activities of Boko Haram. We don’t have accurate information on the amount of fuel we produce daily or the ones being stolen by saboteurs. The Federal Government has blamed the scarcity on saboteurs, but if adequate fuel is being given to the filling stations nobody will talk. Even we can’t find fuel at NNPC stations not to talk of other fuel stations. We cannot say if it is natural or not.

On the economy, most people are either self-employed or employed by private companies, and the hike in the price of fuel leads to increase in transport fares. Those in the small scale industries too depend on generators to power their offices and they buy fuel at exorbitant rates, which means prices of goods an services will increase and those that cannot afford the cost of production will close shops and this will lead to unemployment, which will invariably lead to social vices such as armed robbery, prostitution and others.

Unemployment means government too will not generate money since companies pay taxes, you have individual taxes like personal income taxes you pay taxes as workers. This will obviously lead to serious problems, and with the comatose nature of the economy, there would be serious problems. It is not until the country breaks into pieces via war or otherwise, but when you break into pieces economically, you are already broken up. The way it is, there is shortage in revenue, the National Economic Council is not meeting for about six months, it means you have something to hide. Prior to the alarm raised by the suspended Governor of the CBN, Malam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, Edo State Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomole said it that Nigeria was broke, but the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Okonjo Iweala said it was not so. Now, look at where we are, and where states are not getting it right, they would resort to loans, which is not good for the system.

Will it be easy for the components states in Nigeria to be less dependent on the Federal Government or what do you think is the way out of the economic situation?

The way out at larger view is to have a true federal system of government, where each state would generate its own revenue and bring a sizeable portion to the centre. The late Chief Obafemi Awolowo was able to run free primary education in 1955 as premier of the Western Region then, we had the first television station, and Liberty Stadium in Ibadan, Oyo State, all from money from cocoa, rubber plantation and human capital development.

The University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University was built from the same money. 50 years down the line, and even with the emergence of petroleum, we have not been able to achieve much. Let us go back to regional government, where each state grows at its own pace, pays what it can afford, and above all a true federal system of government encourages healthy competition. The western part is blessed with cocoa, the northern region had groundnut pyramid and we were doing well, why this over-reliance on oil. With the present system we are operating, no matter how we tighten our belts; it will still have effect on Lagos State because we are part of the states that make up Nigeria. When our currency begins to devalue, we don’t have a different currency, all the fiscal and monetary policies of the Federal Government would still affect the states. So, the state would still move, but it would move at a snail speed. Where adjourning states are not doing well, the fall out of the people moving from those states would affect our infrastructure and the state would be over-stretched.

There are fears in some quarters that with the way members of Boko Haram are perpetrating their activities in the north, the Federal Government does not have the capacity to handle them. Do you see an end to this siege in the north, and do you buy the idea of the United States of America coming to help Nigeria on the matter?

Government activities require sincerity of purpose, once the drivers are not sincere about the policies; the whole thing would still come to naught. Members of the Nigerian Army, and the policemen that were taken to the north do not understand the terrain, they don’t understand the locales, by the time they get there, most of the people there are stark illiterates, I even understand that most of them speak Arab Language. You get to a village, out of 100 people, 80 have been killed, remaining 20, you then begin to ask questions on how the perpetrators carried out the attack, they cannot understand you, some of the Boko Haram men might still be in the adjourning villages, but there is no communication. What I am saying is that nobody should be afraid of state police, or local police. Even when Nigeria was just growing, we used to have state policing. If we don’t have the police that emanates from the people, serving the immediate environment of the people, then we cannot be serious about Boko Haram issue. Somebody from an area would know the dark spots, the road that leads to the stream, the forest and all adjourning areas and can better police or provide information about the security of the area. I don’t see this government, on a very serious note, doing anything about it.

Few days ago, we were having killings in some places in the north including the children that were killed in Yobe State, and President Goodluck Jonathan was in Kwara State wearing PDP regalia to welcome some defectors into the party. The spate of killings would have caused some people to resign from office in civilized societies. He forgets that where politics ends, governance begins. It is surprising because the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Professor Attahiru Jega, said that this is not time for campaign or rally, what is the difference between that and what the President did in Kwara State. Children were slaughtered in the North East and yet they don’t care. I don’t know where the idea of the United States of America coming to assist Nigeria on Boko Haram came from. But, what aspect of our economy remains, which is not being control wittingly and unwittingly by the western powers. Is it the crude oil that we take outside to refine, just name it, what is remaining? Our own leaders have failed, the PDP government has failed, may be after the late General Sanni Abacha, this is the worst government Nigeria is having. The number of children that were slaughtered is enough to cancel the centenary celebration at least as a mark of respect to the dead. I know that if children of some of those that went to receive awards in Abuja had been slaughtered, they would have dropped their invites and would not have been part of the celebration and the president ought to be the father of all.

Former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Idris Kutigi, has been named as the Chairman of the National Conference and everything is set for the confab, do you see anything coming out of the discussion?

Honestly, without mincing words, the conference is another talk show that would take us nowhere, we had the Oputa Panel reports, white paper, green paper, and we are now tending towards red paper. But where is the implementation, have we ever implemented any talk show that we have had. I can tell you, if we had considered all the previous reports, there would have been little or nothing to discuss at this conference. Also, considering the time of electioneering, primaries and all that, I don’t see anything good coming from this discuss. At the beginning of this administration, the President canvassed for six years single tenure for political office holders, this was a very fundamental issue. As at the time he came up with this, did it not occur to him that there should be a national conference, where this issue of six years tenure would have been part of the things that would have been discussed? Ideas and policies are products of deep thinking, deep tinkering for you to come up with ideas; you must be able to see the road, where others saw a dead end. I have no apology for what I am saying now, how could he be doing this at the expiration of his tenure, election is not far away, we are having party primaries that are more keen than even the general elections. If we have failed to implement the previous reports, what are we going to do now. I understand that a whooping N7 Billion has been voted for the conference to influence people to come and join their party.