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Former Governor of Lagos State, during Ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo regime, CHIEF BOLA TINUBU was in Arewa House during the remembrance, and launching of the Sunday Awoniyi Foundation. He spoke to JOHN EWAOCHE GABRIEL. He said, he was not part of Obasanjo’ regime, since they were elected on different dates and different platform. He accused Obasanjo of using a cohesive authority to intimidate his political enemy. _______________________________

NNW: How do you describe today?

TINUBU: Well, it’s a great achievement, today is a historical event, historical because we lost our illustrious son in person of Chief Sunday Awoniyi. Late Sunday Awoniyi is not only for the Northern Nigeria, but for the entire country as a whole. Late Sunday Awoniyi is a great achiever, a philosophical person, a gentleman, elder statesman. We are remembering Sunday Awoniyi today because of what he had achieved not only for himself, but for the generation yet unborn. Late Sunday Awoniyi can be compared to the like of late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, late Sardauna of Sokoto, Premier of Northern region, Tafawa Balewa, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe. These great men have done a lot of things for the people of Nigeria.

Late Sunday Awoniyi is a straight forward man, you can see what other people are talking about him; both politically, historically, his life background, he is straight forward that every Nigerian would like him because he stick to his word. Whatever he says he cannot talk about religion or tribalism. These are the caliber of people we need in our country, people who are ready to support, or even die for the course of ordinary Nigerians. You discover that Chief Awoniyi had the accident that led to his death on his way from meeting with the stakeholders in Kaduna on the way forward.

What message/advice do you have for the Nigerian elite who keep wealth to themselves?

I will advise Nigerians to buy his historical books, learn from his wide experience, and build upon that experience so that they can move forward. We learn and emulate people’s character through reading, watching and rehearse what the great men did. I will advise the political office holders in this country to start emulating those that have fought for the common interest of this country. Not Chief Awoniyi alone.

Chief Awoniyi is a man with sincerity, focus and even in politics, he talks straight, and even in his ideas, he tried as much as possible to send his idea to you. Our young Nigerians should put the country in their heart, what they do, they should remember the less privilege ones. Which ever position you are today, keep away from sentiment and tribalism. See to it that we are all one Nigerian.

Do we have the type of Sunday Awoniyi in Nigeria today?

That is why we are calling on our young Nigerians to start emulating the legacies left behind by our great men. Not Sunday Awoniyi alone; we have people like late Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Chief Awolowo and many others. Our elders and young Nigerians should try as much as possible to emulate these people.

The problem in the country today is about food crisis, and Nigeria has allocated 80 billion naira to import rice, what is your view about this?

Oh, that is a very short time and immediate approach to food shortage and food crisis in Nigeria. But it would not do the magic, it would only reduce the prices initially. But that will not help us in the long time. You should know that God has blessed us with everything that a nation would desire, the land, the human resources, that is, the population and the vegetation. However, we have to use the God given human resources so that Nigeria could move forward. But this has not been so because those gifts from God are poorly managed. In other words, we have to tackle the problem of farming and food security head-on from what it should be. Should we continue to import rice, fertilizer and do procurement agriculture? Why not make the fertilizer available, and set all commodities exchange and agreed on the so called ‘corporative’ and buy directly from the farmers so that they can grow more in this way, you put the money in their hands, every great nation has made the priority of feeding its citizens. But not this procurement activities that is so corrupt, if you look at how many years of this fertilize importation, that this country is embark upon, and how many years of cassava, yam, and other items including the grains you will be grossly disappointed because the middlemen procurement of fertilizer and the contract approach will never solve the food problem. Put the money directly into the hands of the farmers, once they know they will make more money from the yield of their labour, they will be very happy, and in return make the food surplus for the nation. You can subsidize that, you need the subsidy but put it in the hands of the farmers.

You are part of the administration of Obasanjo regime, what where those things you should have done for the country, if you were allow more time in the office?

I was not part of the Obasanjo’s regime, because Obasanjo was elected differently. He was elected the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on different dates, I was elected in April and on a different platform. I was not part of the administration of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. I can only say, we served at the same time, when he was a president, an imperial president, and that period I regretted. The short of probe that is going on in the country, is good, but it’s not effective. It will serve as a blue-print, the high level of forensic analysis of where our money goes, what happened to the NLG, resources from the gas, what happened to the per barrel progressively increase. What happened to the oil blocs, how many oil blocs were allocated within one period, and what happened to all those huge projects? This cannot be enacted by the National Assembly you need a strong National Assembly. However the present National Assembly can send the blueprint and worksheet. In this case, a real investigative analysis could be made out of it. That is the only way because as I have only said, Obasanjo is a trained intimidator. He has used a cohesive authority to intimidate his political enemies.