Founding National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chief Chekwas Okorie, has said that President Bola Tinubu has shown that former President Muhammadu Buhari was a learner in the area of nepotism. According to him, the president’s attitude to the diversity of the country is the poorest since independence. He pointed out that ethnic sentiment is the greatest problem in uniting the country as a nation.
In an interview with VINCENT KALU, Okorie, a former presidential candidate of the United Progressives Party (UPP) in the 2015 election, was full of praises for the president’s reforms and the manner he is reviving the nation’s economy. He stressed that Nigeria is attracting loans because of its creditworthiness.
What is your view on the state of the Nation?
Nigeria is experiencing something quite different from what it has been in the past few years, even though it is the same All Progressives Congress (APC) government. But what we’re experiencing under the administration is in one way positively different, and very negative on the other side. The positive side is that I can point to certain policies of government that are really progressive and audacious as well. The issue of fuel subsidy removal and harmonisation of the exchange rates were things that shook the economy to its very foundation.
However, the president was resilient; he is determined to drive it so that at the end of the day we will get the benefit of a stable economy. I’m beginning to see the wisdom in what he did, not that we the ordinary people have started feeling comfortable, but there’s nothing as good as being able to experience stability so that even if you’re in business you can make some projections and your projections will not alter within a twinkle of an eye.
So, in the area of the economy, I can see efforts being made to promote agriculture, which is the key thing that is needed to put food on the table. I foresee an improvement in the prices of staple food items as you enter this planting and subsequent harvest seasons
In the area of security, huge funds have been allocated to the military and they are getting more audacious in their confrontation with the insurgents, especially in the north. Governors, maybe because of increased allocation of funds, are beginning to take certain responsibilities.
Still on that positive side, I’ve seen a government that is gradually without really calling it to what many people in the north would not want to hear, which is restructuring. He is gradually restructuring the economy, especially some aspects of fiscal federalism in the area of taxes and the VAT that follows. You can see the Customs and other revenue generating agencies are meeting their targets and improving on those targets. In the area of investments in infrastructure, I can tell you that the Minister of Works, David Umahi, who is a square page in a square hole, is leading a near revolution in road infrastructure in Nigeria.
There are many other positives. People have forgotten how long it used to take to have a Nigerian passport issued to you, but some changes have come that have made it seamless to use technology to overcome all of those bottlenecks that we used to experience in the past.
Now, on the negative side, honestly when you don’t have a sense of belonging, it tends to cancel every other thing. Like somebody who is in prison, nothing matters to you except to gain your freedom. So, even if they are giving you the best of three square meals and air conditioned room in prison, it does not matter to you. What you want is freedom.
So, President Tinubu has in fact surpassed his predecessor, Buhari in terms of nepotism; in terms of sectionalism. His attitude to the diversity of our country is the poorest since independence.
We have never had this bad that we now look at Nigeria as a Yorubanised country.