Denying S’East Senate presidency not good for Nigeria’s unity –Ucheaga

By Dickson Okafor

Johnny Ucheaga, a former National Administrative Secretary of the defunct National Centre Party of Nigeria (NCPN) and Secretary, Police Equipment Foundation (PEF), has frowned at the decision of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to deny the Chief Whip of the Ninth Senate and former Governor of Abia State, Orji Uzor Kalu, the position of the senate president in the just inaugurated 10th Senate.

He said President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s failure to make Kalu the Senate President has further cast doubt about the fate of the Igbo in the APC, saying Kalu would have further united the country and stabilized the polity.

Ucheaga said with the election of Tinubu, Nigerians have, for the first time in the country’s history, elected a businessman as President, even as he noted that the fuel subsidy removal by the President would improve the nation’s economy if well managed.

In this interview, he spoke on other national issues

President Ahmed Bola Tinubu, during his inauguration, announced that fuel subsidy on fuel was gone, and since that announcement, prices of goods and services have sharply risen beyond the reach of the common people. What are your thoughts on the matter?

Now, we have a businessman for the first time in the history of our country as a president; a businessman who comes from the private sector of the economy. In the past, we have had people from the colonial administration; people from the military and people from academia, but now, we have people from the private sector. So, I’m not entirely surprised that President Tinubu has taken a pragmatic view of the subsidy regime and made the pronouncement he has made. That is what is expected from somebody coming from the private sector. He has put the private sector instinct in the government’s economy.

How can the fuel subsidy removal improve the economy of Nigerians who are just coming out of the cashless policy of the immediate past government?

Subsidy is an ugly duckling, no matter how you try to resolve it. The only way to deal with an ailment is to deal with the ailment directly. Either you remove it from your body or you allow it to continue to eat deeper and deeper into your body. Now that President Tinubu has removed the subsidy, the next thing is to provide palliative measures to cushion the effect because when you prescribe a drug to cure an ailment, you must provide things that will make the person survive the reaction of the drug. I think that is what the government is doing right now. The Trade Union Congress (TUC) and the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) planned to go on strike, but hopefully, they will resolve it. Are we going to see how it can move our economy forward? Look at how much we were told the immediate administration was using to service debt. So, it is no longer sustainable. It is either we take the bitter pill or we die.

So far, only a few appointments have been made by the President, do you foresee a balance of power with competent men and women, or is he going to appoint members of his party to run the administration?

There are also party men and women that are from the private sector. The fact that there are party members does not rob them of their knowledge of the economy. Appointments are the prerogative of the President because the constitution has made it very clear that the appointment should spread across different states and zones of the country, and we expect the President to do the needful. The few persons he has given appointments are from different parts of the country and from different religious backgrounds. So, we will see how the rest of the appointments will go. The President will appoint those who will tell him the truth and it is very important. Those he will see at any time and those he can call up and ask what is going on and they should tell him the truth. I think those he has appointed so far are seasoned technocrats. If you look at Sen. George Akume, he has become whatever a man can be in his country except being the President. Again, the immediate past Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, has also done well. When you are the Speaker of a country like Nigeria, you are the number four citizen of the country, so, they are very high up. They are people who I will say, without being derogatory to the President, have been in the earlier administrations before him. Sen Akume has been governor, Senator, minister and has headed commissions. So, they come with very big connections.

With the ongoing cases at the election petition tribunal brought against the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and Tinubu by the candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Atiku Abubakar, and the Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi, on the irregularities that took place during the February 25 Presidential election, do you see the result being upturned by the court?

It is not only President Tinubu’s that is taken to the tribunal. Even some governors’ elections are also being challenged in the tribunals. There is no doubt that the judgment can spring surprises. That is the only thing I can say about that.

As it stands, the South-East has finally lost the opportunity to occupy the President of the 10th Senate, following the withdrawal of Uzor Kalu from the race few hours to voting, and by that action, Tinubu like Buhari, could not balance power. What is the implication of that?

How you put the question is not how I understand the point you are making. Sen. Orji Uzor Kalu was eminently qualified to lead the Senate, being a ranking Senator, a two term governor of Abia State and a former member of the House of Representatives. He is a businessman with a lot of connections both local and international. I can tell you that for free. So, Nigeria needed all those linkages to run the legislative arm of government, but there was a challenger, hence, the issue was not whether he is qualified or not. However, that was why he ran the race to become President of the 10th Senate, but eventually the former governor of Akwa Ibom State, Sen. Godswill Akpabio won. I expected that the party would have gone and negotiated with him, but as it turned out, it’s like APC had gone on without putting balance of power into consideration. Nigerians expected that the choice of Kalu as the Senate President would unite the country and stablise the polity, but that did not happen. So, as it stands right now, the failure of President Tinubu to make Kalu the President of the 10th Senate has further cast doubt on the fate of the Igbo in the APC.

But many expected what happened because earlier the National Working Committee of the APC had endorsed Sen Akpabio as its consensus candidate and the former Ebonyi State Governor, Dave Umahi, backed him. Wasn’t that why Akpabio defeated Kalu?

Did Umahi say he was running for Senate President on behalf of the Igbo? So, you have to differentiate somebody’s action as a Nigerian and somebody’s action as an Igbo man. There are many ways to balance power. I’m not inclined to tribalism or ethnic politics. Now, at the age of a grandfather, I can’t go into ethnic politics. If Umahi was going to contest for the Senate Presidency, he would have had other people he would contest against. The Senate is not only for the Senate President rather he is one of the members of the Senate and the first among equals. He doesn’t take the salary of any other Senator.

Many were not happy with Umahi for openly declaring support for Akpabio when he knew that Kalu was in the race, because they believe his action led to Akpabio’s victory; what is your take on that?     

He is a party man. It is the duty of whoever is contesting election or President of the Senate to reach out to all the senators that he will need to win, whether they are contesting or not. If Umahi is not in support of Kalu, it is his right to support and vote for whoever he wants. There are people who will also say they won’t vote for you, but will end up casting their votes for you.

Now that the Igbo are not heading any of the three arms government, how can Tinubu unite the country and stabilize the polity, considering the fact that the just concluded general election has further divided Nigerians?

Nigerians are united as one. In the public, we might castigate one another, but in private, we work with one another. So, that is how it is. I don’t know of the Hausa man, who doesn’t relate with an Igbo man or the Yoruba man who doesn’t relate with the Hausa or the Igbo. Show me any Hausa man or people from the other zones who do not relate with one another, there is none.  So, during the elections, we may sound as if we are not united, but after the elections, we become united again. So, there are other key federal appointments that President Tinubu can cede to the Igbo in order to balance power.