INTERVIEW: South Deserves Presidency After Buhari’s 8 Years In 2023 – Former Rep Daramola

Former House of Representatives member and governorship aspirant in Ekiti State, Bimbo Daramola, in this interview with THE WHISTLER speaks on the protracted crisis in APC and how it could impact the party’s fortune in the 2023 election.

What are the chances of APC in the current situation in the country with the ruling party in crisis, unemployment, insecurity, bad economy?

Some people got together and decided that whatever the PDP represented must be stopped at all cost and by all means. That was based on what was happening regarding governance.

That resonated with people to the extent that people began to drop their ambitions and then felt how best they can plot the graph to change the tide of governance for the better.

Of course, with the touted 12 million votes of president Muhammadu Buhari, everybody felt that with a few people working together – the ACN, the PDP breakaway, the APGA, and CPC – if they can consolidate the numbers, will give us the victory.

Because at that point in time everything was going wrong – everything was blamed on the institution with questions being asked how do we get to the point of prosperity.

So, I will have thought that now that the government, even if the government will not do everything that we want, the president will use that opportunity to have a party that is driven by clear court ideologies; that will make our party become an institution and a reference point. That is becoming the reference institution with a political culture. So much so that a young man growing up coming out of university already knows what PDP means and what APC means.

These are the kind of things I was thinking that would have happened. But here we are today. Honestly, as a member of the party, I honestly don’t know. And I’m saying it, I don’t even know what is going on anymore.

You have a troubled country, a troubled party but the president is the leader of the party. What does this tell you?

The President is the leader of the party, but I am not too sure it is couched in the constitution of our party. I’m not too sure there’s a clause in our constitution that says the president is also the leader of the party. In that context, we defer to the president because it symbolises and signposts the collective sovereignty of the 18 million people that elected him.

Apart from the party people, who invest heavily and voted for him, some other persons also voted for him.

The crisis that rocked the party with a governor declaring himself the chairman calls for concern. I don’t know on what authority he did that but we do not have safety valves to quickly plug into before going forward otherwise we run the risk of fifth columnists within or without to throw our party into disarray.

And don’t forget that at this point in time, we’re working on a very tight rope. You would see that INEC has already finally communicated those who are eligible to contest the framework for the election, the timeframe and all of those things.

It would appear as if by that recent bill that became law that the President assented to, it will appear as if INEC has done whatever they asked them to do, and then the rest is left for political parties.

Do we still have windows to be able to escape and navigate quickly amidst all of these things? Those are the kinds of fears and they are legitimate fears so that when we go through elections, we’re not afraid of the sword of Demacles.

Do you support the clause in the electoral act which prevents appointees from being delegate to vote and be voted for unless they resign? The controversial clause 84 (12)?

As a former lawmaker, one of the things that we know is that if there is no law that expressly defines something, you can almost do something by interpretation. You can have recourse to interpretation if there’s nothing that expressly says you cannot do.

I am not sure that we have seen anything like electoral act ever in the political history of this country or political management of political parties. I’m not sure. I want the leading lights of our party to also be mindful of the fact that all of these things happening, people are looking for loopholes to take our party down. I hope we don’t play into the hands of people who are waiting in the wings, working in cahoots with other people to take our party down. We may not ask, we may not be as invincible as we think, particularly for people who are looking forward to take our party down.

To the best of my knowledge. I know the President means well. I believe that the President and the people around him, the leading lights of our party, and all of these people in high flying positions would need to be mindful of the fact that this is the pedestal that we have. More than anything else, members of the party are also trusting that that decision will be in the ultimate interest of our party, party faithful and indeed Nigeria.

Don’t you think with the crisis in the APC, the party may fail to produce a candidate in the 2023 election, especially if the party fields ineligible candidates regarding the controversial electoral act?

I would have wanted a situation where we don’t even want to run the risk at all. We go into that election without any form of threat either imagined or proceed. That would be my preferred. But the more we get entangled into scenarios that will give legal complications and subject whatever we do to arbitration or interpretation, then we’re already working in a balance.

We cannot at this point in time afford to walk without ensuring that everything that we’re trying to do also falls within the law. I don’t know if it’s legal, If we’re not going to run foul of any law if we have legal service. We should just avoid anything that will give us some legal complications.

There are accusations that President Muhammadu Buhari is dictating for the leadership of the APC like his personal business without subjecting the party to democratic process, what do you say?

I said before, first and foremost, I believe speaking about the president, I think the President will mean well. I believe so. I am not too sure that the President will endorse anything that will either rip the party apart or put the party in a situation that it will have to wriggle out. But in the midst of all of those things, we’re getting to a time where a whole lot of people have permutations of people who are interested in becoming president, so many vice presidents.

People want structure, people want control. Everybody else will realise that President Buhari is almost serving out his term. And so this is the battle for the future of this party. But is that battle altruistic? If the control that people are seeking of the party structure or the entire party machinery is not borne out of altruism, then it will be self serving. And if it’s self- serving, it will self- destruct. If you have your own self-serving motive, and I have my own self- serving motive, and this man has his own self- serving motive and 6 of us have their self-serving motives, there will be a conflagration because mine will contradict yours, yours will conflict with mine.

And then we will begin to look for all kinds of permutations of what will take us anywhere. But what I think is the corporate interests of the party. And that is why I believe that ultimately, whatever we do, must be altruistic. And the only thing that is altruistic at this time is whatever promotes party and allies with the interests of the Nigerian people.

To be able to institutionalise our party, as a party that will be so attractive, that people freely and voluntarily will want to be a part of, that’s the altruistic path. But if ultimately what people are doing is about wanting to get control of the party for self-seeking and self-serving means, then we will continue to run into this kind of problem.

You spoke as though you would have deferred from your colleagues if you were still in the National Assembly as a lawmaker regarding the electoral act 2022. Clarify your position, how would you have voted?

I’m not sure that I would have voted it differently. I’m not sure. I think of what is just. I believe that it depends if i feel very strongly that whoever wants to run for election should stand down from the position that he is holding. I think it’s to promote equality, fairness, justice. Don’t forget that engineer Segun Oni took Dr Kayode Fayemi to court because he ran that election as the Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, which people believed also offered him unfair advantage at the expense of the others.

You have the instrument of state; you have every other appurtenances of state can be put in support over and above everybody else. Everybody else coming at us will be deficient and deprived. How do you run against a sitting minister?

Even if people like you so much, but you have a sitting minister who has funds to spend, can make a board chairman, there is money there. There is power there. He has access to the Villa. So, I think in the wisdom of the National Assembly, they try to provide a level playing ground for everyone to be able to say okay, fine. You want to be governor, alright, no special advantage that will be conferred on you by this kind of position that you are holding. Go into that election and win on the merits of your ideas and your personality and your reputation.

I think that is right thing to do, otherwise, people can go into the election with advantages that their positions confer on them, which other people will take as a disadvantage.

Southern agitation for the president is getting louder? Do you hold the view that it is the turn of the south and that political parties should zone their presidential tickets to the south?

As Bimbo Daramalo, I have campaigned for people since 1999. I’ve been campaigning for presidential hopefuls. From 2018, I ran my own campaigns for governor. As Bimbo Daramola, I know that your thoughts or dialects or where you’re from – Geography – does not confirm competence. Your journey, geography, your place of extraction, the tone, the way you speak, and all of those things do not confer capacity, competence, capability.

So, for me on the crossroad that Nigeria is today, many of us have travelled on planes that we know the pilots? People get into aircrafts and fly into their destinations on the basis of the fact that the pilot is competent.

They just hear his voice, all you are telling your God is that God please let me get to my destination. And that is kind of situation that we’re in right now. This is one side of the story. You know, capacity, competence, capability, to me remain the best option.

I think it was preceded by some who said that we have competent and people with capacity spread across the country. So my first intention would be to vote for competence. How many of you have gone to restaurants where the chef is your brother? You just want good food. And then we are hungry, not even restaurant but we are hungry. Let’s talk about the base limit. A man who is hungry does not care who is in the kitchen. He just wants food. So first and foremost, at the centre of whatever agitation of fairness or justice or inclusion, all of those things, there must be the capacity. There must be evidence that this man can do the job.

Because President is not just a title, it is a job. You know, if you want to service your car now you don’t carry your car and go and give it to a tailor.

I was campaigning in the last election for somebody and I said, Will you give your wedding dress to your cousin who is a trainee tailor? You won’t. So I believe that now as strong as issue of competence, capacity and capability will be, I also believe very strongly that issue of inclusion, sensitivity to justice, to fairness and all those things, are also key ingredients, to continue to keep a country that is diverse ours.

No one section must feel alienated. I believe that we have had back to back eight years of President Obasanjo and then President Musa Yara’Adua and then Jonathan. I believe very strongly that it would make for good sense to respect that sensibility that our country recognises our diversity is our strength, but we cannot afford to sacrifice competence, capacity and ability to do the job. But we can marry the two together because like president Obasanjo said there must be a good person who can discharge the job of the President in any of the zones in this country.

But moving on from there. After eight years of President Muhammadu Buhari, it will be fair enough for the power to go south. Because we have straight years, so it will be fair to go to south, let southerners – Southwest or southsouth or southeast, now begin to struggle for it.

Would you specifically key into the argument being advanced by the Afenifere, Ohaneze, Middle Belt Forum and others for micro-zoning of the presidency to the South East?

We’re funny people in this country. We have these coinages that tend to just justify everything. Now there is micro-zoning. Then we should micro-zone by gender. Or further micro-zone by disability. It will never end. It gets to the point where we will micro-zone on the basis of the car.

So, first and foremost, let us look at the big picture. Our country needs to be fixed. While we are expecting justice, fairness and inclusiveness, at the centre of it is the ability to get the job done. Because at the end of the day, when you turn over your inauguration speech, the next thing that faces you is the job.

So I believe very strongly the issue of micro-zoning, by all means. There are good people from the southeast, why not? But we cannot go and say okay, when you go to the south, you now say okay, let us further micro-zone it – Anambra, you say ok Anambra has had it, take it out of it. And then you say micro-zone to Abia or micro-zone to Imo or Port Harcourt.

When will this micro-zoning end? Okay, meaning we will get to mini-micro zone. What I feel is that once there’s a broad consensus that’s based on equality, justice or fairness, which must be a spirit that we must internalise and that was what the drafters of the constitution saw, we can move forward from there.