Chief Modestus Umenzekwe, a Chieftain of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in this interview speaks on some critical national issues including the festering crisis in Rivers State.
The year is coming to an end, what is your advice to Nigerian leaders as we approach 2024?
I am not setting agenda for them but I will advise that Nigerian leaders should pursue peace because when you have peace, you have God, when you have God, every other thing shall be added unto you.
The President Bola Tinubu-led administration is roughly seven months in power, are you satisfied with its actions so far?
I will say that the administration is still young to assess. Tinubu is trying his best and most of the challenges the country is facing are inherited, he didn’t create them, so let us give him some time. I believe the steps he is taking now will yield results soon and will ameliorate these situations. When the administration was inaugurated, Nigerians were applauding it in the first month that he was taking the right decisions, and he has not reneged on those decisions. So why not allow those decisions to permeate into the system in order to elicit the desired results?
What is your take on the brewing political situation in Rivers State and the recent defection of some lawmakers to the APC?
Defection has been part of our democracy from time immemorial. I don’t know the genesis of the problem in Rivers State, and I find it very difficult to analyse because I need to get information from the lawmakers or Governor Fubara or Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike.
The only thing I can say is in terms of advice, is that there should be peace. There are notable leaders in Rivers State like Dr Peter Odili, whose wife coincidentally is cerebral and has been in the temple of justice. I think they need to consult President Tinubu because he is the only person that can make a statement without being ignored. I would appeal to Dr Odili to consult Mr. President on what is happening in Rivers State. I don’t want to apportion blames to anybody.
People are pointing at the Minister of Federal Capital Territory (FCT),Nyesom Wike as the architect of the crisis in the state, what do you think?
I never said it is Wike, I never said that. From the beginning I said, I cannot blame anybody now because I don’t have the details. I have not heard from Gov Fubara, I have not heard from Wike or any member of the House of Assembly, that is why I said they should consult the president, who I said is in a position to quell the crisis. The much I know about Rivers State is that Dr Odili is respected; he is a father. Gov Fubara, Wike and all the members of the House of Assembly, are his sons and daughters. He should call all the elders together to find a solution to the crisis. I don’t judge people like that, if it is the governor, something is fundamentally wrong why he is behaving like that; if it is Wike, something is fundamentally wrong why he is doing that. I am appealing to our Asiwaju to intervene in Rivers State so that we can have Peace.
Some people say the elders lie in the presence of their children, and that the country is going down because judgements are no longer rendered on the basis of law but on technicalities. Do you see any light in the dark tunnel Nigeria is in?
Let me borrow a word from the former Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Raji Fashola, who said that in talking about your country, you don’t rubbish the whole system. As a leader, when you are leading the country or you want to lead, you don’t castigate the whole country but do what you are supposed to do as a person. Unfortunately, people go out there and run the country down, everybody must not japa, because I have been hearing that lately. If all of us run out, who will stay here and correct the errors, let that correction start with us.
Everybody is looking at the Federal Government, State Government, Local Government and all that. They may have erred or got it wrong somewhere, but all of us that are condemning all of them completely, are we doing what we are supposed to do in our various vocations that would help those people? If I am doing it right and you are doing it right, the other man is doing it right, at a stage if the man at the head is not doing it right, he would change. So everybody is involved, both young and old, man and woman, boy and girl. In most cases, you say politicians are bad but if you go to the ministries, those civil servants,a politician comes and stays two,three, four years and go, all eyes would be on him or her, but if you see what those people that carry files do, you would marvel. Nobody is talking about them. Outside here, we criticize, which is normal; a leader must be criticized constructively, but when some of us get in there, you would now see the rot.
I listened to a senator say on television that it is not easy, that she has gone there and noticed that it is not easy. What we see outside is not what is inside there.
So let us criticise constructively and leave the rest to God. I said it somewhere and people started attacking me. I said why are you attacking me? Go and say your own. We never knew somebody would go to court to contest election but it is happening these days; people can get up and say,INEC, you have done this, you have done that, it wasn’t like that before. We never knew we would be out of the military to express our view, so these things are advancement in one way or the other. Let that rebirth start with each and every one of us.