 You're welcome back. It is said that every people, yes, every community, every country gets the leader they deserve. That means the bulk stops at the table of the electorates. If you choose a bad leader, you get bad leadership. You choose a good leader, you get good leadership. If you hold them accountable for whatever they do, they stand on their toes and then they perform the way they should perform. So the responsibility of the electorate is really, really, really big. And to talk more about these, we have, just joining us, Mr. Faisal Umar Lawal, who is the director of strategy and planning. Welcome to the run-up, Mr. Lawal. Thank you. Okay, director of strategy and planning. Just give us a little insight into your responsibilities before we talk of the responsibilities of the electorates. The director of strategy and planning uses inclusive and governance organization and our priority is how to get youths involved in governance and of course we would say good governance. We believe I myself and a couple of youths like me always, we feel like... Can you still hear me, Mr. Lawal? Well, we have lost the audio of Mr. Lawal and we're hoping he will rejoin us as soon as possible. But like we said, we're talking with Bayo the other time that we need to do something. We need to be more proactive. We need to be able to hold our leaders accountable and he was going to give us an insight into what he does. Like he started in his opening statement that he works with other youths to make sure that they get into governance. It is not enough to just say that I want to be a politician or I want things to change or I want to go into governance. If you're going, how are you going? Why are you going? Because you need to have a reason, a motive of going into whatever you're going to do. So if you're going into politics, what is your motive like? Is it for the people or for yourself is interest or because you want to... You have a vendetta with someone so you want the power to be able to find that person. What is your motive if you're going into politics and what is your motive if you're even electing someone into a political position? Because if it is only for yourself or for your community, you need to know why you're doing what you're doing. But the bottom line is that there is so much that the electorates can do. Are you okay? We still have not been able to reconnect with Mr. Lawal. But Bayo, you're standing by. You heard from... Yes, I am. He's a little introduction. They work with the youths and he strategizes. He told me just before he came on a line that he does things, non-partisan things and some partisan things. And then he now said that for the partisan things for now, he does more of his work for the APC. That might be an issue for another day, but for Bayo. Now the electorates are what we are concentrating on, mostly what we are talking about today. We seem not to have that knowledge, that understanding of what our role as the electorates are. True. And I think we substantially dealt with that. We dealt a bit to getting young people to get into governance. Okay Bayo, Mr. Lawal is back. Lawal, you're back. So the thoughts you were holding, just continue with them. So normally you have to come into a particular system so you can be groomed. You can learn and go through the proper process of tutelage before eventually whether you're prepared or unprepared, power can be handed to you. So but when without a proper tutelage, without proper guidance, without even being in a system and you just want things to be served to you on a platter, you can observe that in business and other spheres of life that thing hardly works out for the best. Because you're entirely being transferred into something you have no prior education about. So there's hardly a chance that you will perform well. Without having to call some politicians in Nigeria, those who have enjoyed the privilege of either gender bias or age bias, because you want to favor this gender or want to favor this age, you're not too young to run, then you give them. But before you know it, the world is hearing something that is unbecoming of them and then it becomes scandalous. And if you go through antecedents, this particular people, God's deliver them, have not done justice for the group they represent, whether it is the gender, the female gender or the younger generation, because that behavior does not mean that entirely all of us young people are like that. Or entirely all of the females are like that. And that is why some of us even feel like people should be given things based... What a time to choose to freeze. Well, we'll rejoin Mr. Lawal as soon as it's possible for him to finish what he started. But we'd like to really know from his perspective what these responsibilities of the electorate are and how much of these responsibilities are upheld. And especially what he's... Okay, Mr. Lawal, you're back. Let's just cut to the chase. You have given a background of what you expect of the youths and all that. Or what it is that not all the old ones are bad or good, not all the young ones are bad or good, same for the gender and all that. So the question is, these responsibilities that should be in the hands of the electorate, should be entrusted in the hands of the electorate, or that they already have, how many of these are being upheld? And how can we correct that? It is, we're growing as a country. I want to look at the positive side of things. Are we? Mr. Lawal? Okay. Well, Bayo, there seem to be... There seem to be... The electors that are core for every electorate are those who we want to vote into power, into political offices, because of a fundamental core, which is to hold them accountable. I don't want to ever miss that. And I let people always remember that. Accountability. I hold this ground, of course, I believe in local government autonomy. A few other things, like even the executive order 10. I just believe that leadership almost everywhere, actually everybody is a leader only if you leave alone. And older brother is a leader, whether he has accepted it like it or not. You would either be called a bad older brother or a good older brother, depending on how you carry out leadership roles. A father, a community leader, even the area where you live in an estate manager. So we need to hold people accountable. Now, the roles of the electorate is that you must be informed. You must be just. Without justice, you will not be able to have a good electorate. I must go into the voting ground with the idea that I am voting for competence. Or there is actually an end goal, which principally is good. But certain things such as whatever sentiments or bias would be a reason to vote. Trust me, it's more like you're just infinitely willing to wait for the day that you shall cry. One way or the other, you will cry because you did not uphold the virtues and responsibilities of being an electorate, which the community has given to you, which the government has given to you, or if you're religious, which God himself has given to you because of one thing you held, which you should be accountable for, you should be responsible for your own mistakes. So majorly, you must be informed and you must vote wisely and educated. So that why I don't miss this. If it is not your responsibility, this question I'm going to ask you, just say it's not your responsibility. But when we hear strategies, we think of the person who plans what happens so that you can get some things done. Maybe you want to get votes so you strategize what is the best way forward so that we can get this. So strategies fits the bill for the question I'm going to ask, but maybe I will be wrong. Now, the principle, the presidential candidate for the APC, because I heard you mention that for the partisan side of your duty, you are mostly affiliated with the APC, am I right? Mr. Lawal? Yes, okay. Now, there is a worrisome trend that people have been talking about. I don't want to use the word complaining about, but that's basically the thing. That your principle has refused to talk to the people in a forum that the people can get to ask him questions. Was that part of your strategy or that thing, that negligence or neglects to come and face the people is all him? Is that his decision or you strategize that with your team? It's not in my office and it's in the offices of the higher strategists. So your hand, no D as Nigerians will say. Now what's in my hand, no D? There's a way you will ask me, even as a young person, as an advocate for good governance. There's a way I would respond to that. So yes, so what is your reaction directly now? What do you think about the action of the presidential candidate of APC refusing to honor invitations to debate so that Nigerians can get to ask him questions? There should be a proper education. It is good he talks with Nigerians, but as Nigerians, many of us tend to also abuse privileges. I've seen that myself. If I rest within seconds, I will show you a reminder of instances where people are driving on the road just because they are educated to believe that it's democracy. A military convoy comes passing to the lane and they are busy trying to cajole you to shift to the other lane. I've seen with my eyes, happens only in Abuja and people are being strong-headed that I'm not going to shift. And I'm like, this is an abuse of privilege. They are working for the government. They are enforcers of the law. You don't know what everything is chasing them or what they are going through. It is part of their privilege that is why they have the side beam. It is not for luxury. They are saying shift from the road and you're busy abusing something that is not even to your right that you don't want to shift from the road, which moves ahead to show your bad responsibility as a citizen while you get a side beam. Because of your neglect, you continue to drive recklessly so much that an ambulance was the one with the side beam and you're refusing to do the right thing. Custom somebody is life. Now, when you see people, in my own opinion, there were certain abuse of privilege even by some media organizations like your own organization, but not your organization, understanding media organizations. So sometimes to remind somebody that look, it's just a privilege. I am that person sometimes. I'm like, okay, you know what, I'm not going to do a thing. Let's see what happens. By the time you realize that I have the right to say yes and I have the right to say no. And you are only an option, right? You are only an option, not the only option. An option, not the only option. So you are not the option, but an option. And I'll show you that there are many 1000 ways I can talk with the electorate. And I don't have to follow the normal process. Is it a debate? I can organize anything or I can get people to organize debate for us. Just simply because I don't want to feature on XYZ TV station. It's my right. The concern is that whoever is trying to get elected, it's like someone looking for a job. I don't see how it can relate that someone who is looking for a job will organize his own interview because he will have the questions that he wants to be asked. He will, he will dress the way he wants to dress. He will talk the way he wants to dress in his own interview. And I think also that the privileges abuse goes both ways because we've seen instances where we see sirens blowing. We hear sirens blowing and there is no emergency whatsoever. Maybe a gas driver is just going home with a car. That is all. And the siren is blowing and everybody who is struggling to go to work has to give way. And so people have seen this over the years and seen that these people, they just also abuse privileges because when you get there, you are a DSP, you are IGP or anything. It is also a privilege. Anybody could have been that. So now the concern is this man, the principal of the presidential candidate of APC is not going to debate because he feels the interviewer maybe is beneath him but everybody else is going. He is also giving conditions for the people that he has to debate with. Does that seem right as an advocate for good governance to you? First and fundamentally, I believe that he's going to speak to the Nigerian public and he is doing that. And I also want to believe that he is still going to be featured in debates speaking with Nigerians. I only told you that it may be a response. I have also given you a valid disclaimer that I wasn't in the decision making for that process. I am of the lower KEDA, the higher KEDA might have caught it twice. If you ask me certain reasons, even as a young man, why my principal is my best choice among all the candidates, I would outright hit the interstellar by the grace of Almighty God until you tell me to take it a chill or stop it back there. So if you keep asking me why he's not spoken to the media, I think the honorable and fastest one can respond to that better and probably preferable. But for me, if you ask me, should he speak to Nigerians? Yes, he should speak to Nigerians and I know he is speaking to Nigerians but he doesn't have to follow the regular. I'm not the regular. But he doesn't have to follow some debates organized by some privileged private entities because if I am him being featured with this attitude, also be an honor for them. Actually, I can decide by them going for the big TV stations, I will go to the other TV stations so that they can come up. We've seen how some mega stations in the previous government, their rise came to a decline and another station which wasn't really at the top, came to the rise. Now that is power and that is what the world is. To give you the one, to motivate somebody else. Okay, well, that also, I give you another assignment as well. We have been talking about it but people like you who are there advocating for a lot of things to change, maybe we should also start talking to, for instance, National Orientation Agency. Maybe they should have been the ones to organize these debates so that it will be more neutral and every other thing. But for now that we don't have that, well, let's leave it to the electorates to decide what they can decide. But for 2023, very briefly now our time is up, for 2023, what do you think, what kind of a leader are you looking out for? And what do you think specifically the youth should do to make that election a success? I will tell you the leader I am praying for and quickly it can be NOAA, that's the National Orientation Agency and the I-Net itself, National Electoral Committee, independents. I think these two bodies can come up with valid electoral debates whether it's governmental, senatorial and presidential. It can be as neutral as possible and they can even make it a duty of the elector to participate or attend these debates. And that would, like you said, that is going to be fair so that anybody who doesn't attend would know that he has also failed in a particular electoral responsibility. I think that's a response to your own idea. I would keep saying it, I say it everywhere. I love Nigeria more than I love my own principle, more than I love any presidential candidate. So I want whoever is there to do the right thing and that is the reason why I've accepted my leader because I have looked at certain things he has done even when I was younger I witnessed some and some things. I'm grateful to God that of course I was in secondary school and mature enough to understand from the day one of his gubernatorial office and I'm a president and a student of history I like to go through previous documents. I like to see leadership in a person who is a strategist, a positive or good schemer, schematics in a good way. Somebody who can plan something to achieve in the near future or in the long run. Wise people, wise philosophers will tell you if you think ahead of what you're seeing you are planning for something that lasts but if you think at the short side of what you are seeing then you are planning for something that is passive. That is what wise philosophers say. So people just jump onto a responsibility and say okay I want to do this, like give us some idea that you've actually been planning leadership so that we would know that when you come into power like even when it comes to releasing manifestos and whatnot that will show us somebody who is already within, somebody who is prepared, somebody who wants a better Nigeria. So your other question again about what we should expect in leadership, we are praying for the leader that would come and set up a cabinet of doers, a cabinet of makers, because it's not about me being the overall leader, it's about me identifying good leadership skills in my cabinet. Without a good cabinet, no leader, no team, whatever you call him is going to perform or call him is going to perform. When you have an excellent team then there is a high chance that the figurehead of that team will perform better. Compare whatever government it is from this government to the government previous and the government previous, I will promise you I stand not to be corrected by anybody but the best government will be the government that has an excellent team. If this government has not performed the way you want it to be, remember it's not just the president himself but the people. So we want a good cabinet. Okay, Mr. Umar Al Awal. Thank you so much for your time. My colleague was standing by to ask you a lot of questions but because we have run out of time and I talked too much, so we cannot ask you the relevant questions but we will still have time to discuss these as time goes on. Thank you for today coming on the program. Well, we were talking with Mr. Umar Al Awal and we're going to take a short break for the news when we return. I'm sure Bio will have some talking points from these and you too might have some things that you'll be thinking about. Do well to be engaging with Plus TV as much as you can through our platforms. Anytime you have the opportunity and any question that you have we will either answer it or answer them or send them to the relevant people that need to answer. Let's take that break now. We'll be back in a moment.