Weakest opposition party can defeat Tinubu –Ogun, ex-Reps member

From Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja

Ahead of the 2027 general elections, opposition politicians are exploring the possibility of getting the major opposition parties to field a single presidential candidate to challenge President Bola Tinubu, who is the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC). This is informed by the sentiment that the opposition needs to be united to unseat President Tinubu.

However, former member of the House of Representatives, Honourable Sergius Ogun, says that in as much as it is good for the opposition parties to forge a common front for the next general election, any of the opposition parties can defeat the incumbent administration in a free and fair contest. Ogun, who is currently a member of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), said this is because President Tinubu has allegedly performed woefully and does not deserve a second term.  The former lawmaker also spoke on the moves by the G-100 to unite opposition parties for the 2027 contest, among other issues.

What is your assessment of the INEC in the run-up to next year’s election? Do you think that INEC can deliver a credible election in 2027.

No.  I don’t think they will be able to do that.  Look at the Osun governorship election. This is an off-cycle election. Usually when you have an off-cycle election, you have the BVAS functioning well and then they get to the polling unit in good time. And we had little issues here and there in Osun. For an off-circle election, it is just one state, you are not supposed to have those issues.  because  you have most of your staff, not just ad-hoc staff, most of your staff available to man the BVAS.

In Osun we were having BVAS that were very slow.  What that does is that the election will not finish in good time. When materials don’t get to the polling units in good time, it means that you will finish voting late. And that’s where most times the problems come from. Before you now get to Ward Collation Centre, after voting, LGA Collation Centre, it is now night. That allows for manipulation.

So, I expected a better performance from INEC, considering that it was an off-cycle election, it is just one state. So, when you have experienced staff to man the BVAS, to program them well and everything will work well. Imagine that you are going into an election in 36 states plus the FCT and then you have BVAS that are slow. You are going to be using ad hoc staff that might not even know how to operate the BVAS and then you are finishing late and then you have logistical problems and all. Yeah, you might have changed the chairman and all that, but you still have people, you know, who will call the institutional memory, people that have worked there almost in the last 30 years or 29 years, probably 28 years. They have been there. So, why are we still having the same problems?

What, in your view, can be done to remedy some of these things you mentioned on the part of the electoral body?

I think first and foremost, we must do an audit, an external audit of INEC. The glitch of 2023, we don’t know the outcome till today. It is not for INEC to tell us; this is what happened. INEC must be audited. External audit of INEC. Not just their finances alone, of their equipment, of the human beings. That must happen and must be released so that we know where we missed it in 2023, where we failed. Even in 2019, but we don’t want to go that far because the server was used in 2019, INEC denied that it was not used.  2023 again, after so much money, budgeted for INEC, the then chairman, Yakubu, said so much about how the election was going to be transmitted real time and all that. Then we didn’t deliver on that just because of the glitch.

So, today, we cannot just go into another election expecting that everything will work well. There must be an audit to let us know where we failed. And then, we must have plans to mitigate against such failures. Very important. If we go to the 2027 election, believing that INEC will self-correct, it will be a huge mistake. So, the first thing will be, we must audit INEC, no matter how short the time is.  Let’s know what the issues are and then let’s believe they will learn from where they stumbled previously. That is very critical.

How realistic is this audit?

We must insist on it, because that’s where we keep stumbling. INEC will come and give us stories and say “okay, we will look at it internally.” No. Internally, who are the people? The same staff that are expected to be promoted or even the ones that have just left. I don’t know why we keep expecting the same people that are drawing pension from INEC to tell us what is wrong in INEC. No, it’s not right. There must be an external investigation of what’s happening in INEC.

When was the last time you saw INEC advertise for staff? The chairman comes in with his tribe and everybody that will work with him.  The Resident Electoral Commissioners employ their relatives and all. You don’t run an establishment like that.  We also need to look at the remuneration of the INEC staff. They are core civil servants.  So, elections are a bonanza for them. Or they are bazaars for them. It’s an opportunity for them to make money. And then we are expecting so much from such an establishment? No.

We must treat them the way we treat the CBNs and the NCCs of this world. And make sure that they are well trained. We should hire the best of people. Not people coming, they bring in their relatives, not going through any sort of screening. No. We should give more attention to INEC. Do you know the money we budget for INEC every election cycle? Even this Osun, that is an off-cycle election? Enough is enough.

How would you assess the recent amendment of the Electoral Act which was expected to enhance the integrity of elections in the country?

The APC majority in the National Assembly followed the dictates of the President. That’s all. They wrote it the way they think it will work for them, although part of it has backfired on them now. But I do think that it was a disgrace. They had an opportunity to do a good thing, and then they messed it up. The 2022 Electoral Act had issues here and there that they could have amended, but they just messed everything up. We have always warned that you are in government today and that you are writing a law, a law that’s supposed to serve even your great-grandchildren, you are writing it to suit yourself today, that’s not patriotism. That is not how to be a statesman.

You should write a law that will work for all, not the one that will work for you. In any case when people do this, it shows that they are short-sighted, because that same law can work against you tomorrow. So, the 2026 Electoral Act was a missed opportunity.

President Bola Tinubu is preparing for a second term. How would you assess him? In your view, does he merit asking for a second term?

Not at all. Nobody has seen the president outside the villa in the last two months. I don’t think he’s well. I don’t think he’s capable of governing this country. He hasn’t done well in the last three years and three months. He hasn’t done well at all. Look at the economy in shambles. What’s the exchange rate today? They say it is because they were trying to unify the exchange rates. You removed subsidy, you unified the exchange rate. Whatever you could buy for N20,000 some three and a half years ago, today you’d be talking about N 100,000 plus. I’m not exaggerating. That’s how worthless the Naira has become. Now you say the minimum wage is 70,000 Naira. But most people have said it cannot buy anything reasonable in this country today.

Look at the price of fuel. Most of us supported the removal of the subsidy. You said okay, fine; that is going to cut down on borrowing and the rest of it. But we are borrowing more now that we have removed subsidies. So where is the money going? And we have asked you to account for the money. And they are saying, okay, we will. We will.  I don’t even want to go into the fact that we have three budgets running concurrently.

But the fact is that we are supposed to have made savings from the removal of subsidy from petrol and even from power because of the Band A. Where are the savings? You are borrowing more. And when you are telling us, you will tell us where you are spending the money. You will?

Is the system not audited? There should be an annual audit of all the agencies. That’s the law. Every year. Did you notice that since this government came in, none of the parastatals, ministries, departments and agencies have submitted their audited accounts, audited reports?  Not one.  So, we are only on autopilot.

We are not auditing the system. We are spending money. The people’s money. It has not been audited. You don’t run a country like this. I am even surprised that the man is asking for another tenure.

The man should not even go near Aso Rock again. That’s the truth. He shouldn’t go near Aso Rock. Besides is the fact that he is not well.  How is he going to campaign? In the last two months, tell me where you saw him outside the Aso Rock villa. They package him to come out and receive people.  A country that is bedevilled by so many terrible things, insecurity and all. They just package him for the cameras and then he goes back. He’s not well. He cannot run 2027 elections. That is why he wants to have all the governors.  Are the governors the ones that will campaign for him? Are you going to be voting for the governors?

We are talking about the President of Nigeria. He should be seen up and about. But he is sending the vice president everywhere. Sending his chief of staff everywhere. Sending Akpabio everywhere to go and represent in project commissioning and events. He is in the bunker in the villa. He’s not qualified to contest in 2027. if you ask me. That’s my personal opinion.

There is the impression that the opposition is in disarray and not in position to rescue power from the APC. How would you react to that?

That’s not true. For the first time in the history of this country, we have somebody that called himself a democrat as the president. And yet, all the viable, all the  supposed strong opposition parties are in court today. It took court orders to get INEC to upload some of their candidates. Most of them don’t even know if they are going to be on the ballot in 2027.  And people are saying they are in disarray.  What do you want them to do? They are doing their best.

You have heard Peter Obi criticise the government. Peter Obi is up and about visiting schools, donating his personal money, visiting IDPs and he’s up and about and he’s talking. Atiku is doing the same thing. So, what do you want them to do?

We cannot be doing the grab it, snatch it and run away with it, which is the kind of opposition party politics that the APC did in 2014, 2015. No. Opposition means that you point out where the government has failed. You proffer a solution on what you think should be done and I can see most of them, even the SDP candidate, Prince Adebayo, he is doing that too. I have seen Seyi Makinde go around and he’s talking. So, it’s not the one that you’ll be lying against the government.

Lai Mohammed when they were in opposition in the APC said Nigeria was a pariah nation. How? It is even now that we are getting that status. Under the PDP in 2014, Nigeria was not a pariah nation.

What people expect is you have to be churning out tons of lies to be opposition. No.  That is not correct. Stick to the issues. Tell us what you will do better and I think the leading opposition members are doing that, despite the tons of court cases that they have.

In the 2014-2015 you referenced; the opposition parties came under one umbrella to present a candidate who was deemed formidable to challenge the sitting government. But now there are  two or more formidable opposition candidates. Will it not be counterproductive for the opposition?

Well, just to let you know, I am a member of the G100. We came together to say, okay, let’s get the opposition talking and to work together. They attempted it before, but it didn’t work because of this same government.

You saw what happened to the Labour Party. Ordinarily, the political party can stand alone and win. Someday in this country, they will release the actual result of the 2019 election and the 2023 election. Peter Obi clearly won the 2023 election. But someday, the actual result will be released.

The opposition doesn’t have to come together to be able to win the election.  That APC did it, it has not become the standard that they must come together to win. They can stand alone and still win. Even in 2023, if they release the actual results despite the three major other candidates in the other parties that were formerly PDP members that now went on their own, they still defeated the present occupier of Aso Villa, if not for the glitches and all INEC did.

However, we are talking to them to come together. They could have easily achieved that under ADC because most of them came together. But as you remember, the minute ADC came together and said we’re going to work the coalition, and then the crisis started. The government started sponsoring people to take them to court. That’s where the problem started from.

But in any case, they don’t have to form a coalition to defeat this government. This government is so unpopular, has been so bad to Nigerians. The weakest of the opposition parties can take them out.  If only they allow free and credible elections in this country, the weakest of opposition party will defeat this government.

You talked about the G100, which is moving to have the opposition present a common front. How feasible is it to achieve this objective, especially as the campaign has already started?

 The first is to get them to talk. Let them see what is ahead of them, because the party in government today, has introduced money politics. The opposition will not have that big pocket to challenge them. So, the earlier you put your resources together, I’m not necessarily talking about money, human, material, and then harness the goodwill that the individual political parties and  leaders have. The earlier you do that to present a formidable front, the better.

So, that’s why we are advising them to come together and then use that might against this government. It is possible. It is doable. It is not late. They can start campaigning individually. You don’t have to present one candidate for the election for now. Now, you can start by saying you should not be attacking each other. Your spokespeople should not be attacking each other. Your members should not be attacking each other. We have a common enemy.  Let’s attack those in government that have plundered our economy.

We can start with that. Then, if eventually at the end of the day , they believe strongly that one can step down for the other and that they can present a common front by presenting a candidate. It will be the case of all the parties to tell their members for the presidential election, vote for this one person.

For the National Assembly, vote for our individual members going to the House of Representatives or Senate, but for the presidential, this is the person we are backing. It is very doable, and it is not late at all. Campaigns can continue. As long as they keep talking, we can achieve it.