 Welcome to The Advocate, the programme that keeps you educated and informed on current events around you. I will be talking about constructive politics, competence and brotherhood above tribalism. Olu Dholakbo o Jilabi will be talking about how the new Nigeria starts with you. Steven Agiode will be talking about Bivas, election management and black holes. Today, expect interesting conversations that concerns all Nigerians will be back after this break. Constructive politics, competence and brotherhood above tribalism. The ongoing general elections in Nigeria demonstrate the need to rise above tribal sentiment and prioritize reliability in decision making. Using legal state as a key study, the overshouldering conversations arising the forthcoming gubernatorial elections are much centered around the tribal affiliation of majorly the candidate of Labour Party, Badebo Rodis Vivo, in comparison with other candidates including the incumbent governor, Babaji De San Wulu of APC. In the same vein, the threats and targeted attacks on businesses owned by persons of different tribal affiliation in a bid to suppress their right to assist their franchise. This is rather an unfortunate scenario as the tribal sentiment obituates the importance of brotherhood in our society and proper competence driven decision making process that would first track our common growth and development as a cosmopolitan city. However, Nigerians have spoken and we must accept that and work with our choices while reflecting on the relevant social divides that we allow to hinder progress. In Nigeria, competence should be prioritized over tribalism in all aspects of life, especially in politics. It is happening to see the emergence of the retic ngubi as the first elected female senator of the federal capital territory in Abuja under the auspices of the Labour Party. This achievement is a testament to the importance of competence as well as the need to break the gasoline across various fields and celebrate the achievement of women. Dr. Angoti Okunjuwiala, the director general of the World Trade Organization, at the 2023 International Women's Day Summit held in Geneva, has called for more inclusive policies regarding women in the economy and other sectors of the human endeavor. We must strive to create a society that values competence and inclusivity over tribalism and division. As we celebrate women's moons, let us continue to break barriers and create opportunities for women and men to excel in all areas of life and continually break the bias of tribalism, patriarchy and ethno-religious sentiment. Let us conclude by pondering on these words of Idu Koyenikon, an international acclaimed organizational consultant and author in the US. You can no longer see or identify yourself solely as a member of a tribe but as a citizen of a nation of one people working towards a common purpose. I said two things. One is about the importance for raising our consciousness of brotherliness, good-niboliness, national cohesion and nationalism, a both tribal sentiment. It's all happened this period. The election is coming up, the Kumbakhtura election, and there is much talk about the tribal affiliation of the liberal party candidates, JRV, Badebo Revival. He has, according to findings, his father or his parents have been in his ancestry. They've been in Legals for over 400 years. But no, in this time, his father got married to or his mother is an Igbo woman. His father is a rebel man, a Legalsian, married to an Igbo woman. He means safe, married to an Igbo woman. I think his wife is the daughter of the former military governor of Browns State, Major General Igbo. Now, this issue, rather than seeing our politicians, rather than seeing how to come together and tell us what you want to do and why we should vote for you. You see them downplaying the politics by bringing tribal sentiments. Like, why would you vote? Why should Legalsians vote for Badebo? That's what they see. So, there's much talk about tribalism, tribal tension. And then you see the attack on some persons from mostly maybe Southeast extraction during their businesses here and being threatened by persons that claim that the Legalsians, for them to vote the candidate of their choice. And I'm saying that this is not a very good thing. And then the issue of ʻOgunju Iwala delivered the speech during the International Women's Day and she was emphasizing the need for competence. Women should be given a chance not just because they are women. Competence, anybody, man or woman should be given a chance. That's how we can deliver Nigeria. So I want to hear your take on this. It's unfortunate that we have come to this. I think the issue that Rose was not even the fact whether Rose Vibe is a legusian or not. It was more that he was not a Yoruba man. And it's unfortunate that after we have gone through civil war we should be still talking like this. Some of these elements that are making this call are forgotten that only recently and I know many of them celebrated it in Nigeria. A person of Nigerian origin who had lived here with us for long. Kebi Badinoch who not long ago left for the UK was contesting and almost in fact won the UK Prime Minister'ship. Nobody in England was talking about Nigerians coming to take over London. Nobody was talking of us taking over Britain. It's unfortunate that and in fact the British Prime Minister is of Indian origin and nobody talks about it. The important thing is his competence and his ability to govern in the country. It's unfortunate that at this stage of our national life we should be talking like this. I think we should have gotten the stage where we recognized that the most important thing is the competence of the person. And in any case what are we really talking about. Who can be more negotiation than erode survivors. If you go back in our history, they also say colony. And some of the people that are saying this were in what would have qualified to be called the hinterland. But no one wants to go there. Today we should recognize that we are all Nigerians. We are all brothers. We stand in brotherhood even though our origins may be different. So I'm surprised that such an issue should be coming up at this time. Sure. So I want to say something before you come up. During the last you cited Kemibadinoch and the Richisunak emergence as the Prime Minister of UK. Richisunak is from an Indian descent. His parents migrated to Britain and his school there. But you see he has much ties towards his cultural heritage from India. But he is the Prime Minister of Britain. And then in America during the last election, the midterm election they had last year. There were instances where I saw Nigerians. So Nigerians contesting other the Republican Party. We were celebrating it. We were celebrating it. Even though maybe some did know me. But for the fact that they even clinched the ticket in the first place. And then if you go to... You see the hypocrisy here. This person, Simon Iqba right. He is one of the iPop shifting. He is handling a very important office appointment in Finland. If you go to Canada there are a lot of Nigerians handling political appointments. Or being elected into office. Nobody is talking about African invasion or Nigerian invasion. And we go there. We Nigerians, we travel to this country hoping that one day become president of this country. Or contribute. And also contribute their quota to the world of this country. But in our country we don't want to allow our fellow brothers. Simply because you say you are from Zosoto tribe. Don't come and do anything. One famous writer said, one of our writer said. If ethnicity were racism. The way we are carrying on. We will probably carry the banner of the most racist people in the world. It's unfortunate. These are the things Obama was talking of when he visited Kenya the other time. You are not going to get anywhere if you emphasize tribe. You are going to get somewhere if you emphasize competence. We are all from somewhere. Historically we have not gained anything from emphasizing tribal conflict. All we get from it is tribal conflict. Tribal division and all that. There is no good reason. There is nothing good. A certain president expects, for instance the president of the candidate of the APC. Ashwa Dubola Mehtunbu. He expects to get food from the southeast and other parts of Nigeria. Of course. If you are playing tribe. There is no need for having a president seeking for food from anywhere. I want to hear your thoughts. Olujulako. Okay. I think the first thing I will say is that racism is everywhere. Racism is the senior brother of tribalism. They are the same thing. They are the same thing. They are siblings. The important thing is that it is human nature to default to your lowest level of identity. So for instance when Nigerians go out, when they meet outside the country, tribalism is not as emphasized. Because we are Nigerians. When you are in Nigeria then you fall into tribalism. Even within the tribe, there are divisions. You find the Yorubas, the Oyos and the Abaddon people. They all have differences. If you go within the city, there are differences in families. Your family is this, your family is that. So it is human nature. What is unnatural is actually taking the time to build bridges. So that what we are focusing on is what we have in common. I mean for me to know your competence then I must be able to assess what you've done. Score it, make sure it's measured. What is critical is building bridges. If we say we don't expect that we are going to do to respond this way. My question is what have we done to make sure that people don't default to this behavior. You understand? What do we have in common? We are all humans. We feel emotions. We have the same desires, fears at the end of the day. So in summary, I'm not surprised what is going on. And I think it's a wake-up call because it's showing us fault lines when we are pressurized. This is how we react. We fall back to those identity levels. And we need to consciously take the step to build bridges to make sure that like you said last week. I think travel, get to know people beyond what you've heard. Form personal connections and get deeper insight into the humanity of people. Okay. I'm going to ask you something, your thought on this. According to the Nigerian constitution, a Nigerian can live anywhere. Nigerian is an indivisible territory, right? You lawyers are good with these things. It's an indivisible territory, right? Every part of Nigeria is Nigeria. If you're in Lagos, you're in Nigeria. As a Nigerian, you can live, thrive and work in any part of Nigeria, right? Now, I also want to understand, a Nigerian can also be voted and be voted for in any part of Nigeria, irrespective of tribal background. Why is it that we have not realized the full potential of this? You still see people giving back to their children in one part of... Let me use Lagos as a case study. Let's see for instance now. Many of us, we are giving back to in Lagos. A lot of us. But your parents will tell you, state of origin, when you are failing from state of origin, you call your father state. But they get back to you in Lagos, right? So the question is, why can't we just realize the full potential of that clause in the constitution? Anybody, maybe it means if you are a descent of Ausa, Fulani, Ibu, Yoruba, what have you? But if you are living in a particular side, especially when you are giving back to in that side, you are supposed to be able to play your role in that part. Or you have contributed to the development of that part of the country. You should be voted and be voted for. In the early days in Nigeria, I think if Mala or Fulani man was one time mayor in Enugu, right? Yes, it was. That was Nigeria. Why can't we have this? Why is much emphasis on you are from Sosu state? And my third neighbour was once head of the legal city council. But the point I want to make, we have been independent for say over 60 years now. The point of loom mix is important. But the truth is, I also see that at the level of ordinary Nigerians, a lot of us have come together and we have intermixed. In front of many of your houses or your neighbours and all that, you find you live with evils, you live with houses and you really have no significant problem with them. What is dangerous and what we must not allow to continue is to use our divisions as a political strategy to win votes. That's what is dangerous now. Toxic politicking. That is what divides people, creates the situation. Like what happened in Rwanda, like what happened in Bosnia. Yes. When you manipulate people politically to win votes, that's the dangerous thing. It's happened before and we are seeing it happening again. At the lower levels between people, people don't have problems within themselves. No, the Igbo man and the Yoruba man and the Hausa man really they have no problem within them. They deal with themselves. They relate, they trade together. It's not as if there is a major problem between us but it is dangerous for politicians to keep dividing us, manipulating us because if you look at it at the top, they are actually united. So it's unfortunate that any politician would think that he wants to use to divide us and it's dangerous we shouldn't go this way. It's a strategy. But people just manipulated them and look at what happened. In Bosnia you can't tell a Muslim from a non-Muslim but political manipulation can do anything. I personally can't tell a Jew from a German but look at what political manipulation did. So it's very dangerous and it's something that we should guard against. It's a road that we should not pass. It's very unfortunate. So that means there's no need of we crying for our racism when we are committing the same thing, tribalism. It's like Keto calling Port Black. You accuse the British or the Americans for allowing racism to thrive in their country and yet in your own country, African countries, you tribalism. How do we guard against it? Yes, I think our political actors recently signed a peace accord. The president was there and everybody was there. I was saying at the time if you don't have mechanism for enforcement why are you signing any form of accord? So the issue is now on the ground now. There is a peace accord but people are using tribalism to cause confusion to breach the peace. I don't know what that peace committee can do to step in now because now we are seeing it like I said before there was no mechanism for enforcement. But the peace committee ought to speak up There's supposed to be a special tribe to look at it. The peace committee is supposed to be the one that comes out and talks and enforces these things. I think some of them, father Kuka has been talking he has been criticizing the Bishop Kuka he has been criticizing all the spokesmen for the political parties for their principles the petroleumic language they have been using has been condemning it. Beyond that, the peace committee needs to come out and say this kind of politics is not right and perhaps they need to name names need to point to people and shame maybe we need to shame people so that they exactly so that the principles call their people to order that some of these things are not imagine that someone had put something on social media and was making reference to the liberal candidate and said he's not going to be a major as governor and in fact threatening him and you know the police is not supposed to wait they are supposed to apprehend such individual because it's a crime the police who have a role to play because you see we are seeing the beginnings of people burning places and other people's houses threatening voters telling them you must vote for social services more than that the political leaders need to step in the peace committee needs to step in and I think what we are seeing more is a toxic manipulation of tribal sentiments to end votes and that should stop before we round up this is women's mood we will not stop without seeing something to encourage all the women in Nigeria and in Africa and the world I said Dr. Ukunju Uiala I said some things about the need for giving women a chance and encouraging them women are competent competence has no gender I am trying to paraphrase what she said in Geneva during the international women's day celebration held march 8 and then I listened to Christian Amapon on CNN 2 she was recounting her experiences as a CNN war correspondent going to wear especially where there are crisis like if you go to Afghanistan Iraq the issue of hijab suppressing women's rights education and other things so let's just see something to encourage women especially we have some women they are just a mage for the first time as the first senator of Abuja and some other women too trying one way in order to do something positive in the country and the world so I just want to hear one thought from you to round up let me start with you Mr. Oludulako just see something positive I will move to Mr. Agiode something positive I think if we focus on competence above all the opportunities are going to show themselves and as society becomes better it will become more accessible to you know the female gender more than it is now Mrs. Gwadebe was once in that position I think a long time ago Kerat Gwadebe was the first senator from Abuja FCT FCT yes yes so it is a good thing that King Igbeireti is continuing in that track although it was broken right in between yes thank you very much gentlemen thank you very much for your input so let's try our base to see how to encourage politics that had void of tribalism hatred any form of bigotry against one another Nigeria belongs to everyone and no Nigeria is more Nigerian than any other Nigeria both within and outside Nigeria Oludulako is next after the break