From Kemi Yesufu,

Abuja

Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara sponsored the bill to establish the North East Development Commission (NEDC). In this interview he speaks on the bill signed into law by President Muhammadu Buhari in October, explaining how unity among leaders from the region led to the passage of the bill and why he believes there still a need for an international donor conference for the region.

You sponsored the North East Development Commission Bill which has been signed into law by the President, how did the idea for the commission come up?

For us who are sons of the North-East, we know our history very well, we appreciate this gesture (of the president signing the NEDC Bill into law) and we will not take it lightly. I commend Mr. President for signing the Bill into law. As I said before, this shows the level of the President’s sensitivity to the plight of the highly traumatised people of the North East. From day one when we (North-East lawmakers) started meeting, our thinking was how do we ensure that whatever policies that is developed by government, aimed at tackling the millions of challenges facing us as a zone are policies that will survive whoever is formulating them? So, it became clear to us that if we leave everything at the level of policies, granted that today we have a president that supports and loves our people, chances are that he will not continue to be there forever. Not even chances that is the reality. So we had to come up an idea that will outlive all of us.

Probably because there was a delay in the president signing the bill into law, there was the speculation he may veto it. Was this talk unfounded?

We lobbied members from other zones and fought to get the bill through this process of lawmaking. At the end of the day, the law was prepared and sent to the executive; obviously they had issues with it. And realising that time was going and if the president doesn’t sign within 30 days, it means that he has vetoed the legislation. The only other option was to bring it back to the National Assembly and override the veto. But the question was whether we could muster the two-third votes that we need in order to override the veto should that be the case?

And we thought it wasn’t wise. So at a point I had to ask that a letter be written to the executive to withdraw the bill so that we can address the concerns that they had. They returned it, some lawyers were brought from the executive side, I gathered a team of lawyers as well. I chaired the meeting. We were on the matter for three weeks with a notable son of Borno, who is no more in the House with us, but I knew him during our work as lawyers here in Abuja. I had to draft him in too, to give a helping hand. At the end of the day, we cleaned up all the misunderstandings, addressing the issues the executive had and we sent the bill back to them. If that Bill had not been signed on October 25, 2017, I think officially the thirty days would have elapsed by now. Ultimately, we should thank God for His intervention, even as we thank the president and I want us also not to forget the role of the First Lady, her members were here with us. When we had a public hearing on the bill, she personally led wives of governors to come and witness that public hearing. And happily, many high ranking stakeholders from the north-east came, from all across the states, former governors, former ministers; I’ve never seen that kind of solidarity before.

Going through the new law, the source of funding which is three percent of Value Added Tax (VAT) from the Federal Government will only be available for ten years. Can the region be re-built with the ten-year funding?

The truth is that the level of devastation as a result of the

insurgency is one that is going to take us decades to recover from. If you were to quantify the infrastructure, wealth and everything that we have lost, you’d be talking about trillions of naira. Then, you look at the national budget and imagine where we are going to get allocation of trillions to North-East. So even to recover the things that we have lost, we are saying it will take us decades, not even a few years. This is why as skillful legislators; we decided that we will go for the North East Development Commission.

Many aren’t upbeat about the NEDC and their reason is the situation with the Niger Delta Development Commission which many believe is falling short of expectations…

Yes, a lot of people thought it (NEDC) isn’t necessary. Some even thought, well, we want to create a system that will be like a pool of prosperity in the desert, for a few privileged sons and daughters of the region to just mismanage the resources. I know that even the president was watching us before signing this bill into law. But I guess that he saw the plight of the people having been told of the level of devastation in the region. And since these current efforts are not enough and may never be enough to address the challenges, if these interventions are left at the level of policies, any subsequent government that comes and doesn’t love our people that much, will just with a stroke of a pen, strike the policy out, and that is the end.

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Therefore the thinking was that if we could elevate this to the level of a law, then any future government that seeks to reverse it will have to face the members of the National Assembly in order to repeal the law. But because we have a voice and will continue to have a voice in the National Assembly, it is going to be exceptionally difficult for a repeal to be achieved. So we were making provisions for the long run, not for the short term. As a matter of fact, in some places where I have had to advocate for this commission, I have said the freedom for us to plan for ourselves, to manage the resources accruing to the zone is something, and we should be given that freedom. I should never be understood to be canvassing that we will mismanage resources given to us, but I said even if we do it, and we fail, a free man when hefalls blames no one.

You have also been advocating or an International Donor Conference under the auspices of the United Nations to rebuild the region, now that the NEDC is here, don’t you think it is no longer necessary?

As far as I am concerned, if it was the responsibility of the House of Representatives, we can do it tomorrow. But unfortunately, we need the three arms of government to make it happen. This I believe will provide a platform to further that discussion. The important thing is that it has been done for Syria. So, I do not see why the international community will not respond to this crisis that we are faced with in Nigeria. The world is a global village. The problems in Nigeria, if they are not well taken care of will have an international dimension sooner than later. Those countries in Europe, who felt that they were detached from the crisis in Syria, were overrun by the massive influx of emigrants. For us to deal with this there must be an international response.

Some have argued that the Boko Haram insurgency was caused by prolonged years of neglect and marginalisation of the North East. Do

You agree?

It is true that for years in this country, North-East always came last in terms of budgetary allocation. This is in spite of the fact that we face more challenges than others. And when it comes to development indices, we are the last in the country, but we didn’t pay attention. When the population curve was going up sharply and opportunity costs were nose-diving, we didn’t pay attention.

How would you assess the situation in the North-East, especially withrecent lone wolf attacks?

As a matter of fact, the heat was becoming very close to our section of the North-East, if not for the timely intervention brought by the change of government in this country. The current administration was able to put these insurgents on their back track. With the progress made, some have said Boko Haram has been degraded, decapitated, some have said that they have even been defeated. But whatever the situation is, the most important thing is for our people to go back to where they belong, and then, for them to be hopeful in the environment where God has given us. That is what is important.  At this stage, the debate shouldn’t be about the degrading and decapitating of the Boko Haram, but about the survivors, the IDPs, rebuilding these communities and hopes that were shattered on account of terrorism. Unlike your brothers from the North West, it is believed that the various people and tribes of the north east never unite for a common cause, is the cooperation for the NEDC a new beginning of togetherness in the region?

In fact, it was on account of that (NEDC) I now know more about this issue of unity in the North-East. It’s just that we have been playing with it, but it is something that is achievable because I’ve seen the possibility. A delegation was sent under the leadership of the

Governor of Borno, Kashim Shettima to the National Assembly to thank both the Senate President, the leadership of the National Assembly, not me because I was the promoter, I should be the one thanking them.

And through all that period, I saw emirs from the zone, two governors from the zone.  I saw former ministers, across board, they all supported the bill. So you know that if we can continue to pursue things in the zeal of this unity that I saw, there’s nothing that we cannot achieve.

Sincerely, there’s nothing that we cannot achieve, if this unity is possible, then the only reason why we are not seen to be united is because nobody is working on that. With the right leadership, we can be able to unite and with that unity we can push through so many regional objectives and they will come to fruition.