By Remi Adefulu
Mr. Segun Adewale is the leader of the Senator Ali Modu Sheriff- led faction of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Lagos State. He speaks on a wide range of issues affecting the party.
Can we know from you the state of PDP in Lagos State right now?
Right now, the PDP in Lagos State is scattered and we don’t know what is really going on in the party at the national level. What is happening at the national level is having some ripple effects on the Lagos State PDP. I will not call myself the chairman of the party in Lagos because the party is factionalized into groups. By extension, I am a factional chairman of the party in the state.
There are so many factions; we have the Jimi Agbaje faction which does not have followership. We have the Bode George group and others. The various court cases at the national level, is having ripple effects on the Lagos PDP. The Lagos PDP under Moshood Salvador is not really ready to move forward. They are aware that some of us in Lagos have track record of political success.
For instance, I have four House of Representatives members, six House of Assembly members; we have Baba Kola Balogun with us, Modupe Sasore and others. If you look at the record of these leaders in election matters, Baba Balogun won election in his polling booth, won in his ward and his local government. He delivered the local government. He delivered all the Badagry Division, but the other faction, Senator Ahmed Makarfi’s camp, led by Bode George lost his polling booth, his ward and his local government.
He lost everything that had to do with senatorial district whereas, in my own senatorial district which the result is there for any person to see, I won seven local governments. The three that I lost, was because the people left the collation centres. The agent in Mushin disappeared during the counting; he is Bode George’s person. I was called by 11 PM that there was nobody at the polling centre; I had to call Asst. Director of SSS to lodge complaint. He went there and met the INEC officials. He said the PDP people violated the rule. The problem facing the party is not likely to be resolved easily because the same people are manipulating the system over and over again. It is only a mad man that would be doing the same thing and expect different results. We have leaders whose pastime is just to get funds and spend it.
A few days ago the Makarfi faction called for reconciliation, were you there?
We are begging them to reconcile, but there has never been any serious efforts at reconciliation. You want to reconcile and you are calling people to Abuja to reconcile, but you are calling your own people. When we went to Abuja even when we were not called, they did not receive us well.
During deliberation, when you raised your hands that you wanted to talk, they hardly consider us. The meeting was at the instance of Makarfi group, that was about two weeks ago. During another meeting in Ondo, they were shouting at the Sheriff group, that they were the one responsible for their failure; this has characterized each gathering where the party ought to seek genuine reconciliation.
So, if we want true reconciliation, we have Sheriff, the authentic National Chairman recognized by the PDP constitution, we have Makarfi as National Chairman, Caretaker Committee, why can’t the two groups put the house together? This has become difficult because some of our leaders got prophecy that they will become President and, therefore, would not want to meet anybody that would not give them the opportunity of realizing their dream of becoming President.
Our leaders like Governor Ayodele Fayose should go back and meet the people who prophesized for them to get the timing when they will become President. That is one of the reasons why we are where we are today. Sheriff told us that Fayose called him and two other governors that he should go and become the PDP chairman. Sheriff said Fayose told him that he wanted to be the Vice President, but said he told him that he could not decide that one now, that it was the party that would decide. That is why we have the challenges in the party. It is because of the ambition of somebody.
There is the fear that if the crisis lingers, the PDP might die, do you share the fear?
Let me say that everything that has a beginning must have an end. We are not going to remain like this forever, there cannot be storm forever. This one will come and go, the matter has been in court for some time, but let the judgment come so that we can move ahead. Those of us that are leaders in the South-west, there is the need to harmonize and for the sake of our people, let’s move on.
Members of Sheriff and Makarfi groups appear to be planning to join a mega party. Is this not a signal that PDP will eventually die?
If they want to go let them go, even if it is 10 percent of PDP members that are left, we will rebrand and the party will bounce back. We have seen our leader Fayose most times meeting with APC, not in the dark but in the day light. We have seen him meeting with former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, also with Osun State Governor Rauf Aregbesola. He will move from Ekiti to the APC enclave in Osun, pass through the PDP secretariat. These are ample evidence that the man is in and out. So, they can have their mega party. Let them make their decision.
We have it on good authority that you are being approached to come and part of mega party, what is your reaction?
I have to remain in the PDP because this is the same way the APC started with its slogan of change. Nigerians rushed and grabbed the change; the change became an evil change. Now people talking about another mega change, this time around the punishment will be mega. I rather remain where I am now. Besides, 2019 is far, it is out of my consideration. The issue at stake is how PDP will get its acts together.
Gov. Fayose has been made the chairman of PDP Governors’ Forum; do you think he has the temperament to hold that office?
No, he is my leader, but I doubt it, I doubt because his style is winner takes all. That’s all. But he is the one that can bring peace to PDP if he wants. One, he is the only governor in South- West. Two, he is chairman of Governors’ Forum. Three, he is the longest serving governor, maybe even in Nigeria. So he is the only one that can bring peace, but he has to jettison his ambition because if you want to be leader, you must be servant of all.
But there has been an attempt to reconcile you with the Senator Makarfi group, but your group seems to be unwilling?
No, no, even in Lagos, we were not called, that’s the point. If they want to do that, what they should have done, was to call everybody. But they did not do that.
What is your take on the state of the nation under Buhari?
My take actually is that government needs to sack about 90 percent of the ministers because 90 per cent of them are not performing. All we hear is just complaints and giving excuses. You can’t be a minister with your allowances, yet, fail to deliver. So that’s it, me I am not going to blame Buhari.
There is this allegation that the immediate past government under Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, squandered all the money. What is your take on that?
No, no. People have asked that question severally. But money is still being squandered even till today. We heard that money was stolen in IDP Camp, we heard a military officer has houses in Dubai and that one confirmed that it was true that he procured the building from his salary, so that is the point. The issue is that the main problem we have is policy somersault, indicating that most of the people that are running our affairs now are not competent. Some of them have been at home for the past 20years, waiting to die before Buhari picked them, how would they be able to perform? That is the point. We have just few ministers who can do the job.Majority of the people in APC are not really particular about the economy, they are only particular about sustaining themselves in power after 2019.
Are you surprised that under two years of this administration, people are complaining badly about hunger and all sort of things?
I am not surprised because people just need to experience another government apart from the one we were under before. So this hunger is just the punishment from God, God is just punishing the people, just like He did to them in Sodom and Gomorrah. It is punishment so that when you hear about change again, you will ask what kind of change are you bringing or giving to us? Everything they promised, they are doing the opposite. They said $1 would become N1, it is now N510, you understand me. So this experience is an eye- opener, people need to get involved in governance; we can’t allow nonentities to continue to rule us. Let’s calculate how many bankers we have in Lagos, and how many of them do vote. They would tell you I am busy, it is not my problem. There is a conspiracy in Nigeria to sustain some people in power. So for Nigeria to move forward, we must do three things. One, we must be able to count ourselves. Two, we must be able to count our money and not just talking about estimates of crude that we produce and sell and finally, we must be able to count our votes. These are the three problems we have, if we can count ourselves, we would be able to plan for ourselves to know how many schools and hospitals that we need to build, among others.