INTERVIEW: ‘Calm Down’, Yoruba Council Tells Obi, Backs Tinubu

The President of the Yoruba Council Worldwide, Aare Oladotun Hassan, has thrown his weight behind President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s re-election bid in 2027, while urging former Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, to “calm down” amid growing political tensions.

In this interview with THE WHISTLER‘s Ikenna OMEJE, the lawyer and socio-cultural advocate speaks on the Council’s position on national unity, insecurity in the South-West, constitutional reform, and the future of Nigeria’s democracy.

Hassan, an Ife prince and long-time voice in socio-political advocacy, also outlined efforts to unite Yoruba communities globally and promote the Omoluabi ethos as a model for national development. Excerpts:

Can you briefly tell us about your upbringing and educational background?

My name is Aare Oladotun Hassan, the Global President of the Yoruba Council Worldwide. I am an Ife-born prince from the Ogboru Amodo Royal Compound in Ile-Ife, Osun State.

I serve as the Secretary-General of the All Nigerian Ethnic Nationalities Council Worldwide and the Convener of the Nigerian Coalition Group. I am also the Convener of the Nigerian Youth Coalition and National Stakeholders Forum, and I sit as Chairman of the North and Southern Leaders Council.

I am a former Chairman of the Eti-Osa Bar Forum, former Secretary of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Epe Branch, and a former member of the NBA National Security Agency Relations Committee.

These (roles) have greatly expanded my experience, not just as a lawyer but also as a social justice advocate. I was born and raised in Lagos, where I attended Methodist Boys’ High School. I later proceeded to Lagos State University to study Law and subsequently attended the Nigerian Law School. While at the Law School, Kano Campus, I served as the Social Welfare Director.

My life has been a journey, both in my legal career and in social-cultural movements. I am happily married with children.

The Yoruba Council Worldwide positions itself as a global umbrella body for Yoruba people. How would you assess its impact so far in uniting Yoruba communities across Nigeria and the diaspora?

The Yoruba Council Worldwide, also known as Igbimo Apapo Yoruba Lagbaye, is the apex umbrella body for all Yoruba indigenous people globally, both at home and in diaspora.

Meaning, we have (a) core commitment to protecting the rights, privileges, and liberty of all Yoruba people anywhere they are on the face of the earth, particularly in the southwestern region of Nigeria. Our commitments have been based and predicated on promoting the Yoruba cultural heritage and values, particularly the Omoluabi ethos and values, which has been a big one of our commitments.

When you look at what Omoluabi represents, Omoluabi means God’s own begotten child, meaning we are made after God’s own image and likeness. That is who we are as a Yoruba people.

We are renowned for excellence, wisdom, integrity, hard work, and perseverance. And these are the ingredients that encapsulate what (the) average Yoruba son and daughter are interpreted to be.

In Yoruba land today, I acknowledge our impact from different spheres. From a political point of view, our commitment is based and predicated on Awoism credos—that is, Chief Obafemi Owolowo’s vision of good governance, delivery of dividends of democracy, social justice, the right of the people, and absolute welfare. And that has always been our core commitment and our principles, wherever and however we make impact into governance and how we shape opinions in the public domain in terms of protecting the liberty and right of the people, ensuring rule of law and constitutionalism.

At the core of our belief, we have always been at the forefront of promoting the entrenchment of a new people’s constitution, whereby the current 1999 Constitution is an aberration, considering its military fiat of Decree 24 of Abdulsalam (Abubakar) that created the constitution, and after being made for and on behalf of we the people of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, where we never had such conversation.

Even when it was a hard-earned fight of democrats, like the present president of the country, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, they were all in the trenches alongside Professor Wole Soyinka, Shehu Sani, and a large number of people who fought for the democracy that we are currently enjoying. If their sweat and sacrifice (had translated into a constitution that truly guarantees the freedom and welfare of all Nigerians), we would not be where we are today. But because of the opaque nature of our constitution, it has really thrown us over 100 years behind.

Rather than force, you know, having a frontal future whereby we have a people’s constitution that guarantees a rotational system of power from different regions on equality and equilibrium, and ensuring that all languages—the constitution is interpreted in all major languages that the country is renowned for. Meaning a constitution that is unknown to the people is an unknown law. So there is a need for the constitution to be interpreted in (indigenous) languages for Nigerians to understand.

That is one of our common thresholds in the Council worldwide—that we believe that only Sharia cannot be (in) the constitution where all other ethnic cultural laws, principles, and traditions are omitted. Because if Sharia is a transplanted religion, we equally have a homegrown culture too in the southwest, which, if we have to be guided, we have what we call Isese. It ought to also be protected under the law because Yoruba too has a system of governance.

The Igbos have a system of governance. We can as well review and rebrand it whereby we remove the repugnant aspects, and whereby when the law is repugnant to good conscience, we remove it, and we will have principles that better enable the lives of our people. That would have guaranteed an indissoluble country.

We understand that the current president is equally going towards restructuring, but we cannot be reviewing our constitution haphazardly. We need a constitution whereby people can vote anywhere they are with e-voting. Our electoral laws—all these should be encapsulated within our constitution because the more we have a reviewed electoral law and we have a different constitution that guarantees who becomes the president and what is the qualification, it is a mix of confusion.

So the electoral law ought not to be separated from the constitution. It ought to be within the constitution. It should not be a separate law because election and electoral matters are the real foundation of democracy.

If what is the ingredient of democracy is left out and is being tinkered with a cherry-picking method of review, we pick what matters most and leave other aspects that matter to the entire people. We should not be talking about 8 million voting when we have over 240 million. If by virtue of a people’s law we have a sworn unified social security number, all Nigerians ought to be voting immediately once you get to 18. You do not need to go and queue again at 18 to be looking for your voter’s card.

If by virtue of a people’s law and we have a sworn unified social security number, from your birth to death your citizenship is guaranteed. It will omit the incursion of foreigners into our national base without proper scrutiny. It will reduce threats.

It will even promote our security and guarantee security of lives and property because the number one thing is proper administration of the people. You do not have their demographics, you do not know the population. When last have we done our census? To be able to do a census in Nigeria is a big threat to our national stability because of the experience that we have had before of underage counting, or counting animals, or counting anything as far as we are concerned.

We cannot be living in the past. So those are (the) grundnorm of what the Yoruba Council represents.

We represent one united Nigeria, and we believe that the dividends of democracy must reach everyone.

What are the most pressing socio-cultural or political challenges currently facing the Yoruba people, and how is your organisation addressing them?

One fundamental albatross of the Yoruba people today—which did not just start today, but has always been the biggest disadvantage—is the lack of unity among our people. This has really been a very huge stumbling block to our progress.

Even in the days of Awolowo, what divided them more was the lack of unity that threw us back. We ought to have left the shores of our underdevelopment many decades ago. But because of our lack of unity of purpose, that has really drawn us back.

And that is still one of the cardinal divisions or divisive tendencies that we are having. Our council is making a great effort in that regard, and that is one of the reasons why we mooted the idea of the Omoluabi Day.

We mooted the idea of promoting the Omoluabi identity scheme, which was launched by His Imperial Majesty (HIM), Oba Adeyeye Enitan Babatunde Ogunwusi, Ojaja II, the Ooni of Ife, and Co-Chairman of the National Council of Traditional Rulers of Nigeria, who equally chairs the Southern Traditional Rulers’ Council of Nigeria. So we believe in his capacity. He is the head of the entire Yoruba race.

He has guaranteed that mission of peace and unity. Although, regrettably, the infighting and conflict from all around the various clans of Yorubaland—especially the Oyo lineage of Ife, because Oyo is a lineage of Ife, just as every other town is a lineage of Ife—remain a concern. However, we have a large space for all Yoruba people.

Yorubaland is not restricted within the South-Western map of Nigeria. We have extensions to Niger State, Kwara State, Kogi, Delta, Edo, and all the South-Western states. We even have extensions as far as the Caribbean—Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago, Brazil. You can also mention Ghana, Benin Republic, and Dahomey. We have Yoruba spread across the globe—over 70 million inhabitants. So this fundamental issue is one of our core interests in bridging the gap.

We have done quite a number of programmes aimed at uniting the kings under what we call the Yoruba Obas Conference—the only organisation to have done so.

The maiden edition was held on the 7th of November, 2024. We were able to host a programme in that regard, which was a huge success. We are now planning the second edition to bring all Yoruba Obas together. We are equally planning the Omoluabi Games to unite all Yoruba people.

The Omoluabi Games is more like an Olympic of the Yoruba people. It is to represent each clan according to their towns and palaces. So, whereby we have a football competition between the Ooni of Ife and the Alaafin of Oyo, do you think we would still be talking in the manner we are? It would have united us more. It would make us develop. The English Premier League you are watching today is more of inter-town matches that grew into a global phenomenon.

So, the same thing we are promoting as we speak. We have football, table tennis, and other modern sports, all matched together in terms of global civilisation, and in promoting homegrown grassroots sports to unite our people.

Aside from that, we have a whole line-up of programmes—from primary schools to secondary schools, and to the youth—under the Omoluabi School Club. Through this, we are developing Omoluabi vocational training centres across all secondary and primary schools within the South-Western region. This is to ensure that it is not just academic learning alone that makes you a distinct Omoluabi, but also how well you are equipped with vocational skills—whether in welding, tailoring, hairdressing, plumbing, mechanics, regardless of qualification.

We want our growing children and youth to be properly engaged, even in AI and IT development. These are core focal points of the organisation.

We have equally developed the South-West Agricultural Economic Development Zone project. This is to ensure an amalgamation of all our lands across the region for agricultural production. What we are renowned for in Yorubaland is agriculture. Cocoa House was not built from oil.

Cocoa is a strong symbol of our agricultural viability. Aside from poultry, cocoa is just one example. During the Awolowo era, we had silos and were able to build Cocoa House with cocoa proceeds. If we focus on exporting cocoa alone under a South-Western or Yoruba programme—bringing all Obas together to commercialise and build a strong, viable economic structure—we can achieve significant growth.

We have already structured what we call the Yoruba Chambers of Commerce within the same framework of our renaissance struggle. This does not mean we are separating from Nigeria. We believe in the indissoluble unity of this country, but we also believe that development must begin from within.

Our focal point is to ensure unity among our people. Every year, we plan the Omoluabi Day Festival. Omoluabi Day is observed every 1st of May, as approved by the Ooni of Ife and endorsed by the Alaafin of Oyo—who are the two principal royal stools. All other Yoruba Obas are equally aligned with what we are doing.

It may start small, but we believe that in the coming years, it will grow significantly. We have also developed the Omoluabi App, which every Yoruba individual can download anywhere in the world. Through the Omoluabi database, we aim to monitor and connect Yoruba people globally, ensuring they remain good ambassadors of character.

Because it is not something of pride when you look into Yorubaland and see prostitution as another Waterloo, cybercrime being promoted, and ritualism—none of which are part of the Omoluabi culture. These are the issues we are addressing within our capacity.

We believe that the Omoluabi identity is not restricted to the Yoruba people alone. The concept of Omoluabi is a cliché that every Nigerian should imbibe. We are even pushing for its adoption at the federal level as a symbol of good Nigerian character.

Once you are properly identified, it reflects who you are. That is why we encourage the idea of adopting “Omoluabi” as a prefix—so that it becomes part of one’s identity.

So, to us, we believe in unity, development, and the overall progress of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Afenifere recently expressed concern over what it described as the growing activities of terrorists and bandits in the Southwest, urging governments and security agencies to intensify efforts to restore security. What is your perspective on this? Do you believe the Southwest is under significant threat?

The basic effect is the fact that the issue of security is not restricted to the concerns of Afenifere alone. Thankfully, Afenifere is one of the vocal voices that we have in Yoruba land. Quite regrettably, the disunity and the factionalisation have really brought us into a lot of chaos.

But that notwithstanding, their concerns are one of the basic parameters that the Yoruba Council Worldwide has equally been working on for some years now. We drafted what birthed Amotekun in Yoruba land today, which we called Folumo (Operation Sweep). But it was rechristened Amotekun, and we are proud of the Late Governor Rotimi Akeredolu (former Ondo State governor), who took up the fight when no other governor was awakened to see the reason of protecting lives and property through local efficacy security structures. Beyond state policing, what the Yoruba are renowned for is local community policing strategy, and that has always been our protective lifeline. That is what we reintroduced, and we projected that the governors should unite together.

Security is not a one-man business. It must come through deliberate intelligence sharing, and these are factors that we saw that made us propose to the President to establish what we call the National Joint Security Network. We know they have created the Forest Guard; it is not enough. You must have an amalgam of all recognised socio-cultural organisations, security-related organisations, and bring all of them together under a Joint National Security Network.

We cannot continue to lose lives on a daily basis to these throngs of terrorists who are just coming in without any resistance from the people. The only best way we can achieve resistance is once you empower local community policing strategy with very good, well-armed volunteer youth. You cannot just say people should come in—volunteerism is the best way you can force support active security. Most people will support if there is volunteerism. If they call for volunteerism now in any community, there is no way you will not get more than 5,000 youth; at maximum, you get 10,000. If 10,000 youth in every community are brought together under a local government, you will be reaching up to about 500,000 youth or 1 million youth in every local government. Now merge it together, and they are now working under a strict command operation—you can proudly say we have over 10 million youth that are well-structured and involved in the security protection of their community.

It does not stop the police, it does not stop the DSS, the military, from working in tandem with them, but without proper legislation to ensure the kind of arms they should be entitled to, training, the steps, their vehicular support, drones and body cameras—a lot of things are involved. The legal department, intelligence department, and the media department must also be protected. So this is one critical area that we are projecting. We must give kudos to the President while we are working on the need to establish state police—that is a success on its own.

Because once every state can guarantee security of life and property, and they have the supreme powers within their state to ensure that they can buy armouries, protect their people, and secure their borders, it will bridge the gap of insecurity that we are currently having. It will reduce insecurity, ensure that people can properly carry out intelligence sharing, and ensure that every policing structure within every state will be properly manned. The way the Nigerian policing structure is being arranged can never achieve a holistic success, because once a policeman spends two years here, you transfer the policeman to Kano where he cannot even deal with the locality. This kills morale and does not even project unity.

So, for you to have a proper, solid structure of policing strategy, transferring of policemen should be stopped. If you are within a particular state and your recruitment is done in that state of your convenience, that is where you should stay, except you have a proper advancement and promotion to take you to the headquarters. Aside from the headquarters of the police, you should maintain where your service of recruitment is, so that you can be able to manage the locality you are given. If a policeman spends an average of 20 years in a locality, he will always know everybody in that locality, and crime would have reduced by 80 per cent because you know every network within that area. You can be able to say, okay, this is who you can communicate with when there is a breach of security.

So this strategy must be imbibed into whatever they are forming now, so that as we are growing as a country, the amount of investment we ought to be making into security is sustained. Once we have jobs, once our youth are properly empowered, everybody will always take security as a side hustle to ensure that, yes, all of us are involved. When it is at night, the volunteers will be entitled to proper arms and ammunition—not pump action—because when the terrorists come, they do not come with pump action, but AK-49, AK-47, GMG, and you that are confronting them are only using cutlasses. That is inequality of security protection, so you can never achieve any solid success in that regard.

For the police and the military, their salaries should be motivating. We have advocated that an average policeman should not be earning less than N1m —that is a constable; the military, N1m —because for you to maintain your life at this present economic stage of this country, you need such motivation. So this and many more will ensure proper security of lives and property.

President Bola Tinubu’s administration has faced criticisms over rising insecurity and economic hardship. All indications show he will be seeking re-election. Would you back him for a second term?

Definitely. We don’t just give endorsement on the face value of endorsement. Just as I’ve already said, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu was one of the pivots that fought the military for the democracy we’re enjoying today. No matter what, the worst of military regime can never be compared to a democracy.

That democratic freedom we currently have — that freedom of expression, freedom of association, freedom of press, freedom of everything everybody’s doing today — could you imagine if it were under the military and there is a decree signed that you should not say or mention the name of the military general (Head of State)? You dare not breach such an edict or decree of the military.

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu stood alongside all other renowned democrats of this country. Having watched his antecedents, in 2023, we gave him enormous support, because at that period not every Nigerian saw the future — that Nigeria can remove fuel subsidy, we can be talking about foreign direct investment, we can be talking about currency, we can be talking about the student loan, we can be talking about the local government autonomy that is presently one of the best things happening to us. The tax system revitalisation that we are currently seeing now — taxing is not a killer syndrome; taxing is part of what makes a society grow.

The 2027 that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is going for is, to us, to consolidate on those landmarks, because if he doesn’t finish what God has sent him to do for us, it’s not yet Uhuru. We just have to give him that full benefit of doubt, and that’s why I want to calm the opposition. The Peter Obi of this world should calm down. It’s not abusing a president that will make him the best man to do the job; it’s not by condemning every aspects, like Atiku (Abubakar) will always go to the media.

Sometimes, for the good work of the president, you go and salute him and give him a handshake. People who value you will see that you don’t just hate the country. The way some of these opposition figures demarket Nigeria, at the expense of wanting to run and govern the country, somehow even reduces politics to ethnicity, and that will not give the right vibe of democratic ethos.

So, to us, we believe President Bola Ahmed Tinubu will have the credentials of excellence to guarantee democratic values, and we hope that Nigerians can continue to entrust their interest in this man. We don’t just say, he’s a God-sent democrat, well experienced. It’s not just any person that can be the president of this country and remove fuel subsidy.

He first of all dismantled importation. Today, Nigeria, which was at the height of imports of petroleum products, is now exporting (refined petroleum products) to the U.S. We are now one of the major oil-producing exporting countries. Though we are among the few oil-producing countries, we didn’t have value, because all our refineries had been killed by the cabals. Dangote wouldn’t have functioned if there was no support of the federal government.

So it’s a synergy between public and private sectors to ensure that Nigeria is stabilised, because we did not have that leg to stabilise. By the time we are talking about BUA and all other refineries that are coming on board, from Ondo State to Cross River and Akwa Ibom, by the time Nigeria becomes a hub of petroleum exploration, we will be far ahead of Dubai. Nigeria is the future of the world, so we cannot earn that future with a haphazard political structure.

We need to bring everything to work together for good. So for a man who listens — and today we cannot say we’ve had a prolonged ASUU strike — he will always attack the issue from the root. He gave ASUU an assurance that he will pay all their pensions, and he’s doing it.

He’s walking the talk, silently. In fact, he’s not even promoting his achievements to the reality and scene of all Nigerians, and that’s what I want to encourage Mr President to do. The ministers cannot say it the way he will tell us the story.

Let him be given a daily, or per-minute, or weekly, or bimonthly explanation of the state of the union, so that we can know to what extent we have progressed, so that the kind of misinformation and lies being spread to tarnish this government will not succeed. The government is trying. I’m not saying everything is perfect.

It doesn’t mean there is no corruption within the corners of government from the states, because I can tell you, this president is the only one — to me — no other president has done it before — who gave the governors all the gains of the removal of fuel subsidy. If people say we don’t see the removal of fuel subsidy being rechannelled, he deliberately divides the resources and ensures that local governments are receiving huge amounts of money.

Some local governments in Rivers State are collecting monthly allocations equivalent to what we had under Buhari, Jonathan, Yar’Adua, and even the Obasanjo era. That is what a local government is collecting now. The states are collecting times ten of those resources.

It will only behove us that these states and local governments, having such resources monthly, should now go back to the drawing table and ask critical questions. Why is this man working for progress and 36 governors and 774 local government chairmen are dragging him behind with rocks of corruption on the ladder?

That means Nigerians must face whoever is standing in the gap of our progress and ask questions. That was why Mr President told the media practitioners, when he had a meeting with them at the breaking of the fast, “Don’t harass me alone; harass the governors and local government chairmen too.”

Let them be accountable to the people. He has distributed this wealth to them. He has made state governors more empowered financially to do projects.

States are now the Shylock, and he’s begging them — he can’t do it alone. It doesn’t mean they are of his political party. He’s the only president that relates with every governor with equal sense of responsibility.

That is why I want to bet it to anybody — Tinubu didn’t beg all these governors to decamp. They saw a star in him. Every governor works with the president; he treats everybody equally. A father who treats all his children equally — even the child of his neighbour will come back and adopt the name. That is why APC is gaining more.

Not because APC as a political party is campaigning for those governors to join, but the good works of the present administration have made many governors come in. When Buhari was there, it was a carcass, locust years. We all went through hell.

Tinubu needed to fight and fought for his ticket to become the APC flag bearer. So he’s a democrat par excellence, and a man well prepared to be president. So he’s performing that duty.

Today he’s in the UK. Who would imagine a president of this country being given such a rousing welcome in the UK? Because they know his value. He’s going to every country not cap in hand. He’s going there to source for investors — not to beg them, but showing them records that we have a stable economy that can attract investment.

Things cannot be stabilised in one day. There will be pains in the growth of development. But those pains have a time lapse, not an eternal pain, because those things are already manifesting.

That’s why I’m imploring — don’t see Tinubu as a Yoruba man; see him as a democrat, as a big fish we all need to rally around. He’s an elephant that all of us must protect, because with him, he can guarantee a lot for all of us.

We need to pray for the president. Nigerians should shun the habit of cursing and abusing their leaders, especially the one we currently have. Others may have taught us a bad line of motive, but he’s a president with a human face.

If you have a question, he’s ready to challenge you and give an explanation. Many of our past presidents didn’t even give room for questions. How many media chats did Buhari host? You can look at the past too.

We know that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is well deserving, and that is why the Yoruba Council Worldwide, at this year’s Omoluabi Festival, come 1st of May at Obafemi Awolowo University, will be celebrating and endorsing President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for a second term.

It’s not because it’s political, but because we believe in the struggle — struggle for democracy and survival is collective. That’s why we have tagged it Feedback Endorsement 2027 to critically analyse his Renewed Hope Agenda. Where there are fault lines, we mention them; where there is need for improvement, we highlight it; where there is progress, we give a pass mark.

So we are not just saying this to predict. We are telling Nigerians — let’s stay on course. Let’s stay in line with this developmental stride. Don’t be distracted by political vampires who just want to take advantage of the situation.

Not because when they had opportunity they performed excellently. Some of them, their records show their character. Look at people like El-Rufai — you cannot tell a good story of Southern Kaduna under his watch. These same people now present themselves as democrats.

Look at Atiku, a former vice president — he chaired the privatisation committee. What was the achievement? The problem of Boko Haram today that was not curtailed came as a result of their carelessness.

So to me, I’m not just here to say Tinubu is the best man for the job, but this is not the time to waste our votes. Let’s invest our vote in this man, stay on him, pray for him, and challenge him to deliver.

We are his employers, and he must do the job we elected him to do. He must be properly guided along that line. That is why I say President Bola Ahmed Tinubu deserves continuity and should be re-elected in 2027 as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Does Peter Obi stand a chance against Tinubu if he wins the ADC presidential ticket?

To me, the biggest albatross and pain that Peter Obi is carrying on his neck—and it’s not helping his political visibility for Nigerians to see him clearly as a true democrat—is the Obidient Movement, and he doesn’t have control over that movement. He himself doesn’t even have control over his political lifeline.

You cannot be a leader of a party like the Labour Party whereby you needed to hold (it) strongly in their days of adversity; you left them (and) jumped to ADC, that doesn’t even have a solid footing. You can see what is happening to them. They cannot, on their own—if not for imposition—democratically resolve issues, even within ADC.

Now they have a faction because there was no proper merger of interests. Everything was just done overnight with monies, and everybody found themselves—like (Abubakar) Malami and others—just bringing themselves in, just like enemies of progress merging together.

Quite regrettably, Peter Obi finds himself among them. Look at the fight: Obidients fighting Atiku and saying that it must be Peter Obi. It’s not even democratic for you to say Obi must be the flag bearer by all means—by hook or crook. No.

Your popularity does not determine that you are a true democrat. You can be popular by opportunism. Obi came to limelight as a result of the quagmire and the pains Buhari brought us into.

Obi ought not to be among the first ten when we have people like Osinbajo, Charles Soludo, Dora (Akunyili)—if Dora were to be alive—and the present WTO DG.

When there was this IPOB struggle, he (Obi) was more supportive of IPOB. To me, it’s not the penchant of an Igbo man to just become a president. That’s why I said earlier that we need to review our constitution to guarantee rotational presidency for all regions on an equal basis, so that when it comes to your region’s turn, you won’t be fighting for breath, just like when Jonathan was given a breath of fresh air. No, we need a collective bargaining principle.

Nobody says he (Obi) can’t be the president, but this is not the best time for him to come and fight a southern man and we’ll now be divided.

Obi’s votes in 2023 were divisive votes. The North stood behind Atiku in the 2023 election. That was the game plan.

Obi was just more of a divided vote to divide the Southern votes. That was why Atiku came second. Obi did not come second.

If Obi were to be fighting that he won the election, Atiku would not have been second. But Atiku came second because there are 176,000 polling unit agents and polling monitoring officers. Obi only had less than 30,000 polling unit officers. In an election, you don’t have full coverage and you are relying on social media trends, thinking maybe by bullying you can be pronounced as the president.

Things don’t work that way. We’ve gone past that era. If you want to really lead a country like Nigeria, you have to be open-hearted, not religious gimmicks of Christian/Christian, or maybe calling Christian pastors to fight against Muslims.

You can’t be a good president if you hate one religion at the expense of the other. And that’s why I salute President Bola Tinubu. He has a pastor as a wife.

He has his vice president as a Muslim. He has a National Assembly. He is not a religious fanatic.

So we can grow beyond the sentiment of this dead grease of hatred, religious animosity, and political annihilation into a proper democratic nation. The opposition doesn’t need to be fighting tooth and nail to kill the government in power. If the government in power is performing excellently, sometimes you rally around them. You can see Charles Soludo of APGA (Anambra State governor), the governors of Imo and Enugu States—all of them are doing greatly. Tinubu did not look down on any one of them. He is giving everybody equal free time to shine.

Governors in this era are in their best of times because they are all shining. And they are shining because somebody is bearing the pain, and President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is the man. Obi should relax ahead of his own time. But at the moment, he shouldn’t be used as cannon fodder between the North and the South.

Even if he is given a vice presidential (slot) to divide the Southern votes, he will not become a good democrat. Sometimes you look into the future. It’s not about your political self-interest alone.

The South-Eastern people have been given the Southeast Development Commission—no government has ever done that. He (Tinubu) has given almost every region an equal fair share in national commitment.

So, to me, I don’t see a situation whereby we should kill the chicken that lays the golden egg. We need to protect the golden egg. We need to protect the chicken.

Outside of your official duties, how do you like to relax or spend your free time?

I’m a man of many parts. I love my children. They are my best friends, and I live with my family. I believe that having a great time with your family is one of the good things in life.

I go on vacation sometimes to South Africa, or to countries where I can just have time to study and reflect on how far we have come.

Although, realistically speaking, my leisure time is almost always working time for me, because I am constantly meditating on the progress and development of our people. I love Nigeria, I love the Yoruba people, and I love the fact that Nigeria will become a first-world country.

That is my ambition: to ensure that this country is united. As I have told you, I am not just a regional person with Yoruba interests only. I serve as the Secretary-General of All Ethnic Nationalities in this country and as convener of various youth bodies and national coalition groups. We believe these are structures of voices to ensure that governance and the interests of the people come first. Nigeria comes first, and that, to me, is a thing (source) of joy.

I still take time to go to the beach. I am not a football fan; it is only when Nigeria is playing that I enjoy the game. So I believe I am a proud Nigerian Super Eagles fan, without a club. This is who I am.