NEW TELEGRAPH
…Wants Governors to Consult Him to Restore Security in S’West
Iba Gani Adams, the Aare Ona Kakanfo of Yorubaland (Yoruba Generalissimo), has said that Nigeria should not continue its current hardships, saying that the government needs to take urgent measures to ameliorate the suffering of the people. He emphasised the need for the government to grant more authority to traditional rulers, noting the dire consequences of the prevailing economic conditions on the less privileged. As the leader of the Oodua People’s Congress (OPC), Adams also urged the Governors of the South West region to strengthen the Amotekun Security Outfit to enhance security in the area. In an interview with OLADIPUPO AWOJOBI, Gani Adams shared his views on other matters. Excerpts:
What do you think the government should do urgently to address the issues of kidnapping, banditry, terrorism and other forms of insecurity in the country? And kidnapping is also rampant in South West…
The government needs collaboration because the issue of security is not for them alone. They need Non Government Organisations, and security experts for intelligence and collaboration to complement the efforts of the security agencies. On the issue of security in Nigeria, all hands must be on deck. If the government is ready, we are ready to complement their efforts. I have written letters to all South West Governors and those of Kogi and Kwara States and I have copied all the traditional rulers on the basis of Council of Traditional Rulers. I copied the Ooni of Ife, HRM, Arole Enitan Adeyeye Ogunwusi. Basically, if they allow me to join their war on fighting crimes and criminality, I assure them that within six months the issue of insecurity would come down in the South West drastically.
I am not talking of only the Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC), we are talking about 13 different groups called; South West Security Stakeholders Group that we founded about four years ago and they have structures in every nook and cranny of Yorubaland including Kogi and Kwara States. If the government wants to reduce crime rate, they should involve us so that in a little way we can work together to stop the menace and embarrassment in our region.
People have suggested that traditional rulers should be empowered by the government to actually handle some of these issues of criminality, what is your view on this?
They have roles to play as the heads of their communities and they have their own structure of governance in their communities. They would be more useful in the area of intelligence by giving them some security votes too. If the state governments are being giving security votes, local governments and the presidency get security votes, the traditional rulers too are a tier of government and are an integral part of the government. Even in Yorubaland, we call them “Ijoba,” which means the gathering of rulers. They deserve some stipends as security votes too so that they will know that it is their duty for their communities to be secured. From the paramount rulers to the first class, second class, third class obas, the gov- ernment has the right to structure the money. It might not come from the local governments, it can come from the states directly so that they would know that they have a responsibility to make sure that their communities are safe. If there is any shortcoming, the government can query them on the basis of the security votes they give them.
So, they have a lot of roles to play. Also, spiritually, they have a lot of roles to play because security is not only physically. If you don’t secure your community spiritually, you cannot secure it physically. Also, culturally, they have a role to play be- cause through culture you can know the enemies within the community. When you see a strange person that his way is alien to your own, you will know that he is an intruder and in that process you can question him or her and you can refer the person to the relevant authority. There are a lot of ways traditional rulers can be useful on security.
Talking about Amotekun Security Outfit, what kind of collaboration do you think they can have with the mainstream security outfits for effective security in the South West?
Actually, Amotekun is not well empowered, the stage they are now they operate just like an ordinary security outfit. When Amotekun makes an arrest, there is a limit to their level of interrogation and they cannot charge a suspect to court. Also, they are not allowed to carry sophisticated weapons such as AK47, AK49 or modern riffles, so they cannot confront hardened criminals. If they allow that and with our collaboration with Amotekun, a lot of things will happen. Moreso, some states are not funding Amotekun very well. Only Oyo and Ondo States fund them properly. Ekiti, Ogun and Osun States have not found their feet on Amotekun. Oyo State comes first on the funding of Amotekun. Almost every six months, the Oyo State Government buys vehicles and increases the number of Amotekun operatives. There are about 2,000 personnel in Oyo State Amotekun, whereas a state like Ogun does not have up to 700 personnel.
Ondo has a strength of about 1000 or so. Oyo State has bought Hilux buses, Pick up vans and I heard that they have patrol cars for the outfit. I also heard that new recruits earn between N70,000 and N75,000 in Oyo State Amotekun from about N40,000 that they were earning. The superior officers could earn up to N250,000 and others like N200,000 and N150,000. This would enhance security and give the officers more determination and they have a board for Amotekun. If other states follow suit and allow me as the Aare Ona Kakanfo with my affiliate groups, the South West Security Stakeholders Group to complement their efforts, the issue of in- security would reduce. Even within Amotekun, they should create a forest guard. There is nothing stopping Amotekun from creating a forest guard department. They can recruit good people in the villages who know the forests to be in-charge of the forests, and give them vehicles to patrol the forests.
I have told the governors to call me that I have a lot to do on security. I am not saying I want to take over your security or be there totally, I want to comprehend what they are doing, not even collaborating with them alone. So, they should not have any fear, or allow their security advisers confuse them because they don’t want another people to be in the system. I don’t want to be there totally, the office of the Aare Ona Kakanfo is too big to go and stay in any state government’s office. But I will have my trusted people that would work with them and there would be a proper monitoring of the office.
The issue of Yoruba nation has been on ground for many years, how do you think this can be approached in view of the current happenings in the country?
My approach to that is restructuring and regionalism. Allow the geo-political zones to be federating units. You can call them provinces or regions. My own position is that we should have a federal state with the regions or provinces with states and local governments. It was when we practised this that we had effective governance in Nigeria. That was the time we had checks and balances. Even in this kind of system that we practice now, when you blame the federal government, you also blame the state governments because most of the resources going to the states are not going to the local governments the way they should. In the beginning of our democracy, the local governments were in-charge of primary schools, markets and others, but most of the revenues of the local governments have been hijacked by the states. So, in one way or the other, if we don’t overhaul our constitution, not the way the National Assembly has been reviewing it because they won’t touch the main issues that concern restructuring Nigeria.
They would just work on some policies that are not even effective. The constitution needs serious overhauling because the 1999 Constitution given to us by former head of state, Abdulsalami Abubakar, is killing this country everyday, it’s ruining this country everyday, it’s putting us in trouble everyday and it’s making us a laughing stock in the comity of nations everyday. So, the constitution has to be overhauled so that it can give us a true federal. It would give us a good structure to allow the federating units to build an effective economy and develop at their own pace. It would give us a structure for a better policing with federal, state and local government police. A true federalism would allow competitive policies, innovations, and initiatives from the three tiers of government and investors would know the right place to go. By the time investors work with some regions and there are improvements, other regions would follow suit. If you marry one wife, your soup might not be sweet enough, but when you have about two or three wives, there would be competition about how they would please their husband and you would eat the kind of meat you have never eaten before, eat the kind of soup you have never eaten before and you will have a different kind of reception on the dinning table.
So, Nigeria needs to go back to the 1960 and 1963 Constitutions that we had after Independence. This will enhance good governance and put an end to the bad governance we have had that has put the economy in a coma. Today, naira is about N1,600 to a dollar. Going to Europe on economy class by air now is about N4 million or more and how will you go on holidays with that? What of those who go there for medical check-up about twice a year and they will pay for hotel accommodation, and drugs are becoming highly expensive with about 400% increment. People are dying everyday. Anyone from 45 years and above take drugs almost everyday, it is only people that are blessed that would be 65 years and above without minor sicknesses that they are managing. You can imagine those who do not have money to buy drugs or good food, what would happen to them.
We cannot say because of bad economy we would be losing our people. Nigeria should not be a laughing stock for nations within the Francophone countries that their currencies were not up to 20% of our currency 10 to 12 years ago, now their currencies are about 150% higher than our currency. All the livestock that are produced in the North are being taking to Francophone countries because their currencies are better than naira. So, if you want to buy a cow in Yorubaland, you must have up to N500,000. Definitely, we are in trouble if we don’t do the right thing at the right time on the basis of restructuring. If they don’t restructure, Nigeria might break in the future because the hardship would get to a stage that the people would revolt. The earlier the better for the political class to listen to the words of wisdom, to listen to the voice of the people, which is the voice of God and restructure this country to federating units before they burn Nigeria into ashes.
Do you have any advice for President Bola Tinubu?
It is for him to restructure the country, he should not waste time about it. If he wants to write his name in gold, he should restructure Nigeria, he should be fast about it, he should not play politics with it. Yorubaland is very funny, Yorubas will review your tenure when you leave office, the Igbos might not do that in their own region, the Northerners might not take it seriously if you don’t perform. But the Yorubas will say it, they want to see you perform. If you perform, they will turn you to an everlasting hero. They will glorify you, they will worship you and put your statue everywhere if you perform like what happened to the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo. So, everybody should be thinking along that line, let people remember your name on the basis of hero or heroine.
THIS INTERVIEW FIRST APPEARED IN NEW TELEGRAPH
