Peter Anosike
The Deputy National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chief Uchenna Okogbuo has described as provocative the utterances of the National Chairman of All Progressives Congress(APC), Adams Oshiomhole, over the disqualification of the APC David Lyon as the Bayelsa State governor by the Supreme Court.
Speaking in an interview with Sunday Sun, Okogbuo said that as the national chairman of the ruling party in the country, the leaders of the other registered political parties are looking up to Comrade Oshiomhole for direction.
However, he said that the conduct of the former governor of Edo State is not worthy of emulation.
In this interview, he said that those calling for the sack of the Service Chiefs should extend the call to their employer.
According to him, like in the game of football, if a team is not doing well, it is the coach that gets sacked and not the players.
He also spoke on regional security and the 2021 Anambra State governorship election. Excerpts:
How do you see Adams Oshiomhole`s outburst after the Supreme Court decision in Bayelsa State gvernorship election?
Well, to be honest with you, the claim that nobody would be sworn in as Bayelsa State governor despite a Supreme Court decision is a total declaration of anarchy and I want to say that the statement may be what incited the youths in Bayelsa to engage in that senseless destruction of property. It has become his trademark to be making careless, inflammatory and unguarded statements. He should know that he is no more in the labour movement, but rather the national chairman of the ruling party in Nigeria. So, the whole world is watching his utterances. Even the leaders of the other registered political parties are supposed to be looking up to him for direction. But his conduct is not worthy of emulation. His kind of leadership is not only hurting his party, the APC, it is also hurting the country because these are some of the ingredients that contributed to the United States imposing travel ban on Nigeria.
But as a deputy national chairman of a political party, what is your advice to him?
To be honest, I don’t think that he listens to advice. But if he does, I want him to emulate the National Chairman of All Progressives Grand Alliance, Ozomkpo Victor Ike Oye who first of all weighs his statements before letting them out. Ozomkpo Victor Oye always chooses his words whenever he is addressing the press or the public. That is leadership. You must not be talking from the point of emotion. So, Comrade Oshiomhole should purge himself of the mentality of a labour leader, where he ran the Nigeria Labour Congress like a sole administrator. He should know that he is now the national chairman of the ruling party in Nigeria. His combativeness and always trouble shooting which most of the time is to save face after he had committed blunder should stop. He should make sure that he should not be talking like a labour leader. Lastly, he should try to be talking like a statesman.
Anambra governorship election is around the corner and Dr Chris Ngige has said that APC will win the state, what is your view?
APGA is not new to the empty boast of some individuals and political parties in Anambra State. I read the comment of the Minister of Labour and Productivity with regard to the forthcoming election and my thinking is that he is supposed to be tired of Anambra State governorship election by now. APGA has walloped him roundedly from Peter Obi to Willie Obiano. Let me reiterate that Anambra State politics has gone beyond trial and error. Anambra State has tested quality leadership from Peter Obi to Willie Obiano (Akpokue Dike Global).bOur promise to Ndi-Anambra is that we will continue to bring dividends of democracy closer to them. The pet project of Governor Obiano titled “Do It Yourself”,a community development initiative, is still fresh in all the communities and more is still to come. In Anambra State, APGA will always partner with critical stakeholders to elect good candidate for a responsible government.
As an American-trained security expert, what do you have to say about the issue of insecurity in Nigeria?
The issue of insecurity is now on the front burner and there is a lot of concern both locally and internationally. This is because the killings are getting out of hand. It now seems as if life does not worth anything again in Nigeria. We are now more comfortable in attending condolences than developing strategies to stop the killings. Even the Nigerian Senate, though the ruling party are in the majority, is now speaking out against the insecurity, which is no doubt an indictment on their government. As a security expert trained and worked in the United States, I have always maintained that terrorism is not a conventional war, but a gorilla war and the approach in contending terrorism is different from that of a conventional war. In this kind of war, strategies and intelligence play vital role.
What is the way out of the insecurity?
One thing that is meditating against winning the war against terrorism and insurgency is because there is no strategic base of operation. The civilian, that is the masses, the private security operators, professionals in various fields of endavour who are supposed to be part of this fight are not involved, especially in the area of information, surveillance and intelligent gathering and this are important ingredients in combating insurgency and terrorism. Our military are doing their best in the midst of all the complaints, but more efforts and strategy are the way to go. The Nigeria Police should also intensify their internal operation to fish out criminal elements that exhibit terrorist behaviours within the society. They should get more international training on how to detect and prevent terrorist since they don’t have signs on their fore-heads to indicate their plans of action .
What do you have to say about the clamour for sack of Service Chiefs?
Personally, I don’t like the word sack because these are people who have laid down their lives at one time or another to defend the territorial integrity of Nigeria. If their tenure has expired they should be replaced because nobody has monopoly of knowledge. Again, if the senators are calling for the sack of the Service Chiefs, they should also call for the sack of the president who promised Nigerians during his campaign tours and at inauguration in 2015 that he would defeat Boko Haram within few months of coming into office. But this is never to be.
What is your view on regional security?
The issue of regional security narrows down to what I said before. We need strategic base of operation. There is nothing wrong with regional security. But the issue is how are they prepared for the job at hand ? What is the level of their training? What is the duration of their training? Governors who are not security experts cannot strategically form security organization without involving pure security operators to formulate the operational guidelines before even coming on air to announce the investigation of such group. There is need to internally tie all the loose ends. Such organization should basically be visible patrol, surveillance and intelligence gathering. They must work together with security agencies and not as alternative.
How do you see community policing?
Well, I am more comfortable with community policing because creating various security organizations in all the geo-political zones may be misconstrued. Community policing is a policy project well thought to assist the police and the other security agencies. But the problem is that it has been poorly managed .A lot of the civilians are members of the Police Community Relations Committee(PCRC).nI want to use this opportunity to call on the Inspector General of Police to strengthen the PCRC and get more people involved. In America, such committees form part of the police architecture of every state and they involved most of the citizens, professionals, artisans and so on. If this is done, genuine information would be going to the police to work with and this would help to reduce the security challenge.