2015: I don’t care where the next president comes from – Ciroma

Malam Adamu Ciroma, 80, has been in politics since 1978. He’s been Minister of Agriculture, Industry and Finance at various times. In 2011, as a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), he insisted that the North should produce a replacement for the late President Umaru Musa Yar’adua, in line with the PDP’s constitution. Malam […]

Malam Adamu Ciroma, 80, has been in politics since 1978. He’s been Minister of Agriculture, Industry and Finance at various times. In 2011, as a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), he insisted that the North should produce a replacement for the late President Umaru Musa Yar’adua, in line with the PDP’s constitution. Malam Ciroma’s effort didn’t yield the desired result. Since then, he’s not been active on the political scene. In this interview, he spoke on why he dumped party politics, his encounter with Jonathan over Chibok girls, the insurgency, and, of course, the politics of 2015.

It’s the height of the 2015 electioneering campaign, but we can’t find any poster in your house. Why?
That doesn’t mean anything. I’m not running for any election. I have not been very active since 2011. In 2011, when Yar’adua died, I was one of the people who believed that we should operate the process of zoning and power rotation in the PDP because PDP formally agreed to a policy of zoning and rotation during the Obasanjo period. That is the policy that allowed Chief Obasanjo to do two terms. He tried to extend it, but we all refused. So rotation and zoning based on two terms for North and South were the basis of the PDP policy. In 2011, PDP leaders, including Obasanjo, argued that the Vice-President should replace Yar’adua. I was one of those who said PDP must learn to stand by its words, and that somebody from the North should continue and complete the period allocated to the North.
The PDP, in its operation and convention, decided that the current president should replace Yar’adua and I didn’t I agree with them. From that time, I stopped participating in party politics because if we formed a party with people you think you can trust and in the end they did something different, then there is no basis for thinking that that party could organize collective policies that are intended for the good of the electorate or for the good of the country.
I’ve not been participating in party politics since 2011, and I took a position that whenever there are elections, I would vote for somebody who I can rely on, who is likely to stand by his words, who is likely to act in the interest of the public. That is why you cannot see the poster of any party in this house.

There are 12 presidential candidates of parties. Based on this criterion that you would vote for somebody who you can trust and stand by his word… have you seen such a candidate?
I’m waiting until INEC confirms the list of the candidates. Then, I will seriously examine them and vote for one of them.

But there are two major candidates  –  Jonathan and Buhari  –  and most people are choosing between the two. So have you seen one of them?
I’m not voting in public. If I choose anyone now it means I’m voting. But once INEC confirms those who are the candidates, then I will choose one of them.

What do you think should be uppermost in the minds of Nigerians as we approach this election?
I am hoping that Nigerians have learnt quite a lot from 1999 to today (2015). I hope people have learnt a lot. Number one, you have to realize that security, law and order are things which governments have got to really work to ensure they exist. These break down when leaders of government are fair to just their supporters and are not being fair and just to everyone, so that everybody will feel relaxed and not endangered, not cheated by anyone.
Three, people in government must know that the purpose of government is to improve the condition of the ordinary Nigerian. You have to look after their interest and not just your personal interest. In fact, if all or most of the politicians agree that the interest of the ordinary Nigerian takes precedent over everything, then the only difference between them will be how to implement it, and I’m hoping that we’ll reach that point where people would agree that the interest of the ordinary person is paramount. I am also hoping that in the elections coming in February, people will vote to ensure that they choose the people who can do the right thing, those who will promote the unity of the country.
As I talk to you, genuinely I don’t care where the Nigerian president comes from. Whether he comes from Central, North, minority of the South, the Yoruba… it doesn’t matter to me. What I want to see is someone who does the job of governing effectively, who cares about the interest of the ordinary people, who would ensure that government is not ridden by corruption. I would like to see that happen again so that everybody would feel that the government cares about and promotes his interest.

It is expected that some PDP or APC leaders would have come to you to appeal for your support, since your silence. Have they?
Oh yes, they have come. PDP leaders have come; APC people have come. They bought my view about how things ought to be done. I was there from 1999 up to when I left, so I’m not strange to politics. But I’ve taken a position, honestly believing that the interest of the ordinary people must be paramount. I’ve been in politics since 1978 and I’ve been in government. I have run the ministries of Industry, Agriculture and Finance, two of them at least twice.
The Ministry of Agriculture was the central concern of the National Party of Nigeria government under Shagari. I was moved from Industry to Agriculture, to handle the most vital proposal of the party. I did it under Shagari, and after we ran for election, he promoted me to become Minister of Finance. It didn’t last long, because the military came back. When Abacha came to power, he appointed me Minister of Agriculture, and I was there until I resigned. President Obasanjo appointed me the Minister of Finance.
I was there for four years and I decided on my own to resign from the government. Now, I can look back and I can tell you that the Ministry that I found most interesting and which I believe I contributed most seriously to in this country is agriculture. Agriculture, first of all, is the number one source of employment in this country. It’s the number one economic producer, and you can know what you’re doing to help the ordinary farmer. We bought them tractors, ploughs and ox-driven ploughs, which we distributed to agriculture people, and we ensured that the seeds were really the latest, modern scientific ones. We ensured that science was applied to agriculture.
In a normal government system, the Minister of Finance is a senior minister, and I was given Minister of Finance by Shagari. I was again made of Minister of Finance by Obasanjo in the first four years of the period. I insisted that things must be done according to law and order, and that government had to realize that it is the National Assembly that had the power to appropriate money that the executive spends. Nobody else!
Today, we have reached a point where nobody knows what is in the budget. This is a disgrace! Normally, in this country the budget is a concentration of policies and monies approved to be spent by the executive and the policies to be pursued by government. All these are laid before the National Assembly, and when they are being laid, everybody in this country becomes aware – the difference between this year and previous year and what is likely to happen in the next year. Now, nobody knows what is happening.
This is a very serious matter. This development is probably an indicator of how the process of government has been allowed to be run down in such a way that nobody knows what government is doing. We have to go back to doing things in a way in which people in this country are involved, and they care about it. If you don’t know about your budget, then what do you know? We have to go back to the correct way of doing things, and it is for the electorate to decide who they can trust with this duty.

Many of us see the fall in oil prices and the devaluation of naira as an indication that the next administration will face a difficult time. As a former Minister of Finance what does this portend and what should we do as a country?
In 1975/76, the price of crude oil was about $20 per barrel. The war in the Middle East between Iraq and Iran raised the prices of petroleum products. From that time it kept on rising. Now, it has gone down again.
So, there’s nothing new about what is happening. This takes us back to what is important in the Nigerian economy – it’s still agriculture. We’ve benefited from oil prices; now we have to live with the current pricing which is less than $50 per barrel. There is nothing new about this, and it is not the fault of Nigeria. It’s not the fault of the Nigerian government. But the Nigerian government must know how to handle the fall in prices. It’s not Nigerian government alone. There’re countries that have no oil, which are poorer than Nigeria. They have to deal with this problem.

How should it be handled?
Our problem now is to choose who is going to lead. When you see the man who is going to do it, you can tell him, this is my suggestion. It’s no use for me to tell you what government can do. I’m not the government. I don’t want to be in government. But if somebody in government that I can talk to comes, I can tell him my view.

In 2014, elders from the North-East, including you, went to the President to suggest how to end the insurgency. What did you tell him? What did you suggest and how has your advice been implemented?
It’s true the leaders from the North-East – Borno, Adamawa, Gombe, Yobe visited the President. We drew his attention to the fact that leaders of Borno had written him papers suggesting how to ensure the return of security. The president had appointed Tanimu to head a panel on security and many people had offered suggestions.
We told the president to look at the proposals which these various committees and individuals had done. He should look at the recommendations and pick recommendations that are likely to lead to the desired result. At that time, the Chibok girls had been abducted. We drew his attention to the dangers involved. How can a government allow so many school children helpless? We discussed with him how the powers of government and security systems and assistance which other countries had promised should be used to ensure that the ordinary citizens’ interest are protected.
There were about 50 of us who went to see the president. Our recommendations were based on the collective recommendation of these people. I made the presentation on their behalf. After making the presentation, the president rose to make a speech and said, yes, there were so many recommendations but he did not see any of them as being capable of dealing with the problem.
At that time, the president didn’t believe that the Chibok girls had been abducted. We knew his view before we went to see him. We told him what we believed were honest views. And he maintained he had not seen among all the recommendations what would be useful in solving the problems. In a dismissive manner, he said, ‘maybe, Mr Ciroma and SGF, you can go and look at them and advise.’ It meant he was not serious about what he was saying.
Believe me, all of us were highly disappointed. After the meeting with the president, we held another meeting and everybody was really upset. We then on our own decided to create an organization to assist the people who are suffering most from the effects of Boko Haram. We decided to raise funds to help them.
You know, businesses had gone down; farmers were not allowed by Boko Haram to do their farm. They are scattered everywhere. We decided to help those people who suffer the most. We started to raise money. Then government appointed his own committee headed by General Theophilus Danjuma. That meant our own proposal had been overtaken by government action. But, still, the problem is there. Everybody knows T. Y. Danjuma as a serious person. He uses his own funds to assist people in various ways. When he was appointed the Chairman everybody knew it was a serious matter. They collected a lot of money, but nobody can tell what is happening to the funds.
I’m talking to you based on my own feeling, observation and experience. I don’t want to look like somebody who is there to criticize President Jonathan. I don’t go to him, I don’t meet him, I’ve no contact with him, I don’t dislike him because he’s from the minority, I don’t care who is president. I only want someone who is going to do things right.
But the man who is there, unfortunately, he has to get involved, and there’s nothing you can do about it. From the day that the plane-load carrying dollars landed in South Africa and was detained there, I really felt Jonathan had lost the right to be president of this country. How can a president send a plane-load of dollars to buy arms? What kind of people are these?
I know that the president defended this scandal. The people around him say it happens in government. But It doesn’t happen. A president must know how things are done worldwide and in his own country. Nobody is going to do things differently. From that day, to me, he lost the moral right to be the president of this country.
Normally, in this world, military equipment – guns, aircraft, etc – are transacted always with the government of the producing countries. It’s the governments who sell the materials to other countries. But in this country, we go through Pastor Oritsejafor. He said he has nothing to do with it, that he had already leased the aircraft to some other party. If the aircraft had been caught carrying Quran and other Islamic books, would Oritsejafor have said he didn’t care? People are just doing the wrong things in this country!

You were minister of Finance under Shagari and Obasanjo. Were you buying weapons for the army?
At that time nobody would know because the security situation was not like this. Nobody complained that weapons were not being bought or the military was not being trained because security was no problem. But now, security is the number one problem. Some people think that insecurity is a problem in the North East, but I tell people it’s not about any one region, but an issue for all Nigerians.
What happens in Borno affects people in Lagos. Look at, in Kano, girls are being used for suicide bombing. Some people thought it was northerners who were trying to make the country ungovernable. What kind of rubbish! Imagine, someone tells his daughter, ‘you want to enter paradise? Blow up yourself.’ It’s a northerner doing this! What kind of people! Now, it’s fashionable, every week in Maiduguri, some women would blow themselves up. In fact they don’t know what they are doing. They are not in control. Girls blow up themselves and kill 20, 30 and more people.
When I go home (to Yobe) I ask people, what is happening in this country? Why don’t people worry for the lives of other people?  It comes to a period when a father tells his daughter, ‘do you want to go paradise’? Now, this father has enjoyed this world, he’s older. He should go to paradise first. But he sends his daughter to ‘paradise’ and got some money from it. I believe he got some money. A man who can send his daughter to paradise and gets money in his pocket is not normal. It’s the ordinary Nigerian who is doing it.
But the ordinary Nigerian needs moral leadership. Moral leadership comes from leaders. This is not there. Unless we are able to establish a good leadership, what do we do?