 Very good morning to you and thanks for joining us on the run-up. My name is Nyam Goul Agadje. And my name is Uche Chuku Onodo. We're welcoming you to the show with a quick reminder that today is the 25th of January and this means that the general election is exactly one month away. Whatever we do from here on out, we should think, dream, talk, election. We also have an American president once said that one must think carefully and act wisely for a lot depends on it. So we think carefully, we act wisely, so you think about what the presidential candidates have to offer, what the candidates generally, whether state or national have to offer and then choose wisely, not based on ethnicity, religion, even party and all that. By the way, we also have Mr Bayo Luwake here with us. Good morning and welcome to the show, sir. Good morning Uche and Nyam Goul Agadje. Yesterday the president was in town and we hear that he rode on the Lagos Blue Rail train. It means it's no longer a meet. And like you said yesterday, we hope that this will also help in the transportation in Lagos and also the traffic that we experience every day. But do you really think this will help us in any way, granted that the whole mileage that was supposed to be done is not being done and it's not taking everybody from everywhere of Lagos to another destination? Do you think it will help at all? I think that the commissioning yesterday by the president is very much welcome in the sense that at least finally we can actually see the rail project. Alaji Yaqlati-Jakonde's dream finally been manifested. Alaji Yaqlati-Jakonde was the civilian governor of Lagos between 1979 and 1983 and he initiated what was called the Lagos Metro Line which was going to be constructed by a consortium of French companies called Internifera and the project was going to cost approximately 77 million Naira and the 77 million Naira was going to be sourced entirely within Nigerian banks. That was in 1979. Now that rail project was cancelled by the Buhari Idia-Gong administration without any reason. So it is half-warming that finally that dream has been realized to some extent and it is also pleasing that it is President Buhari who commissioned it. Now, as you rightly mentioned, the duration or the Spanish of the network that was commissioned yesterday even as admitted by Governor Sun Wulu himself is not that much. I think it's Marina to mile two, but it's a very symbolic and positive beginning. Secondly, the contract for the expansion of that system, I think from mile two if I'm correct from mile two to Semiboda was also signed during the commissioning ceremony yesterday between the Lagos State Government and the China Construction and Engineering Company but I also got that correctly. So there's progress being made. The red line is almost ready from what the Lagos State Government says and should be commissioned according to Governor Sun Wulu before the end of the expiration of President Buhari's administration. So it means that before the end, in another four months, the red line will be commissioned. Now, when the red line is commissioned, I believe that your question will now be answered that is as to whether this commissioning will solve the problem or contribute to solving the perennial traffic or gridlock problem in Lagos. So I think the red line and I think this was also alluded to by Governor Sun Wulu. He said, look, this is a longer distance. It covers a longer distance. We should definitely have a bigger impact on the transportation system. But the blue line was designed to cover the area where Lagos has the largest concentration of its population. That is the mile two, first stop, Okukomayiko, Agero-Milferru, Axis. This is where it is reported that Lagos has the highest population density. So we are only hoping that they can accelerate the construction of the expansion of the blue line and it should not take almost the 15 or 18 years it has taken us to get to where we are now. I do hope it's affordable as well anyway because sometimes we heard that a train ride from Lagos to Ibadan if you want to be very comfortable will cost you like 6000 Naira to get to Ibadan. I was asking myself, if I'm going from Ojodubega to Ibadan and it is just 800 Naira on a bus, how many of the 800 will enter 6000? So I'll take like three seats or four seats and just make it a private thing and get to Ibadan. But they should consider it. But then if you consider the hike in prices for public transport, I mean buses now due to the fuel scarcity and talking about fuel scarcity, President Buhari also set up a 14-man steering committee on fuel scarcity. I think he's chairing the committee. He's chairing it with the TV Press Silver as the alternative chairman. I could never understand why a country like Nigeria would be battling fuel scarcity. I know there has been a lot of conversations around the people holding fuel downstream pointing at the upstream, upstream pointing at downstream and all that conversation. But it's still beyond me. I mean we live with this product. It is our own, even though we are in the position where we export to refine and then import and all that. But shouldn't it be easier? Why do we need to keep steering committee after committee, fuel scarcity, long queues after long queues, year after year, it's almost as if November is ending, we are entering December, everybody is agitated because you know what usually comes with it, fuel scarcity. How do you react to that bio? To put it mildly, it is embarrassing. We are probably the only oil producing country that experiences this mess. Having said that, we could also interpret the decision of the president to chair this committee as his own expression of frustration with those he had asked to resolve the problem. That's the way I interpret it. So the president has decided now that he would chair it. It's a simple vote of no confidence in those people that he probably had asked to solve the problem. And that's why he decided to step in himself personally. Now, the expectation I hope now would be that since the president is now chairing the committee, we should see a disappearance or the disappearance rather of the fuel queues in a very short time, hopefully. My problem is that the president is not new to the ministry, that ministry. And in fact, in this administration, he is both president and minister for petroleum and it's still happening. He has been a minister for petroleum a long time ago. He had the experience. He carried it forth to this administration and still became minister of petroleum here with Timipere Silva, just a minister of state. And these things are still happening under his watch. And I'm wondering what magic he will do because as minister, if he cannot do it, is it as chairman of a steering committee that he will make things happen? I don't know how much of a difference he will make or this committee will make to ensure that we have fuel in our country. Because, first of all, he promised that the refineries will be refobaged and we will start producing our own fuel here in Nigeria. Nothing was done about it. Now, Dangote is coming. That's a private entity for Craig Outlaw. And he will be selling to make profits. So he cannot go to the kind of price that the government would have been paying. Do you think a steering committee will make any difference if the ministry of petroleum, whatever, is not doing the kind of things that we expect to get from them? For what chance of the Nigerian oil industry, there are a lot of questions. Yeah, a lot of questions begging for answers. And I don't think it's something we are going to be able to discuss. If we were to spend the whole duration of this program, I'm very sure we will not be able to exhaust it. But let me just try to respond as much as I can. When Buhari was minister of petroleum, our refineries were working. That was in the military era. That was between 1976 and 1979. In fact, we were building, that administration built the Kaduna refinery during that period, which was constructed by Chiyoda, a Japanese company. They started building the Wari Refinery. And the Wari Refinery was completed during the tenure of Al-Hajshil Shagari, who was the first civilian president of Nigeria. They expanded, I think, Podhakot, Lesya, and Lemetri. So at that time, the refineries were working. We used to have some shortages, but that was during Hajj. And that was because, and the shortages we used to have were largely kerosene, because we had almost two million Nigerians performing the holy pilgrimage to Mecca. So a lot of aircraft were chartered, and the aircraft, they run on kerosene. And so during Hajj period, we would have shortages. And I remember as a reporter, I covered the shortages that we used to have at that time. And I actually broke the story that we're having shortages because kerosene was being used to fuel the aircraft flying up those grins to Saudi Arabia. So the scenario at the time you was a minister of petroleum is completely different. And let me point out something. That administration left office, not the three of us in the administration, military now, left office in 1979. Between 1979 and 1999, Nigeria did not build a single refinery. And our population went from 60 million to 120 million. So if in 20 years, you had only three refineries that you had to sell to 60 million people, you had only, I don't know how many power stations, then we had the Borodetaman station, Sathile, Egwin-Taman station, Shiroro, and Kanji Dam to sell to 60 million people, now double to 120 million. Of course, the problems we started to deal with, the problems we had to deal with, the problems we had to deal with, now double to 120 million. Of course, the problems we started experiencing in an acute form from 1999 was simply because for 20 years, not one single refinery, not one single power station was built. So I'm not defending anything. I'm just stating the facts. We are dealing with a long period of systemic challenges. Having said that, 1999 and 2023 is enough time for us to have solved these problems. And so this now will cause to question the commitment of the political elites that we have in the country to resolve these lingering problems that have become a monumental embarrassment. Okay, well, let's hope that there will be fuel, and not just that there will be fuel, that the cost of transportation will come down drastically, because if it doesn't, well, there are a lot of things surrounding that. But let's move down to politics, because this is more like matters arising we're talking about. SDP, Lagos State Chairman, we've just heard that he has defected to the PDP. It's like a primary transfer window from the chieftain of the APC campaign committee leaving the fold, because according to her, the presidential candidate of APC is not physically and mentally fit to rule Nigeria, even though the party came out and said she was sucked. But after that, we saw her hobnobbing with the main opposition. Now the SDP State Chairman leaving for the PDP, it seems to be getting more and more interesting. How do I say this? Political parties are built on ideologies. So if you're joining a political party, you're probably joining because it defeats your ideology. But that has not been the case. I mean, if I'm to move away a bit, 1999, let's leave it aside. But after 1999, there has been a lot of moving from one political party to the other. And that begs for an answer to the question. What really is the basis for the formation of these political parties? If it is ideology, if we have two political parties who have the same ideologies, the same plans, the same outlook to things, then why do we have two of them? So now we know what we're doing. I mean, it's beyond embarrassing and appalling that we have a country as big and thriving as Nigeria is. And we keep having this... You just know that it is a clear case of anywhere, wherever it's working for you at the time, you just carry your bag and you move. And nobody is asking questions that nobody is being held responsible for these actions. I don't... I can't understand it anyway. But even then, if what the chieftain of the PCC of APC said is true, because I haven't had that personal encounter with the APC presidential candidate and whoever else, if what she said is true and inside her, she feels that that person cannot rule the country. And maybe she has made one or two moves and the people still went ahead and did what they did and she leaves. I would say she left because of her conscience, because it doesn't matter the kind of ideology. If this thing wouldn't work for the greater good of the country, then you will either stay there or you leave. You know my idea. The only problem is that she went to another political party that is opposition. Exactly. It still doesn't answer the question. I mean it's okay for her to leave for good conscience. That is understandable. But if you joined a political party because of the ideology, it means the other political party doesn't have it. So no matter what, except your ideologies have changed now. Is that what you're trying to tell us? Maybe this is the next best thing. Bio, help us out. How can we make people start to see the place of ideology rather than financial benefits or any other mundane benefits that these politicians seem to be craving instead of patriotism and every other thing that they should be craving for? You know, which I said it all when she said political parties are supposed to be founded on ideology and they are supposed to be identifiable by their ideology. If we just want to break it down into very simple terms, and from what you see in other countries as well, you are either a party which is heavily in favour of the industrial, commercially savvy and privileged population that is those in charge of production, right? Or you are a political party sympathetic to the problems or challenges or aspirations of those who are the consumers. In every country you have the elite that controls production and then you have those who consume what is produced, right? Unless it's a socialist system where the state determines what to produce, for whom to produce and how much to produce. So but now there are very few socialist countries anywhere. So we assume that you are either for the capitalist, if you like, production class or you are for the consuming class. So even this basic definition, in order to make it more clear, even that basic definition that I've just used, you cannot say which parties in Nigeria are for the production class or the consumption class. You might say this presidential candidate or this government candidate seems to be in the class of this kind of people. So this is a big challenge and the parties are not making it any easier for us. You know, when people say that, I'll come to the question of the defection later, when people say that we have a leadership problem in Nigeria, a lot of people say that. I don't entirely agree with that. I think we have a problem of collapse of our value system. The leadership problem in Nigeria is merely 40%. Collapse of the value system is about 60% of our problems, in my view. But when we say we have a leadership problem in Nigeria, people forget that the political parties themselves are supposed to be agents that groom and provide and train leadership, right? And the political parties themselves must be democratic. So if you say our democracy is neither here nor there, you tell me which political party in Nigeria, all the presidential candidates that have emerged, how many of them actually emerged from the true, transparent and, you know, clear electionary to pick up their tickets, you know. So we have a lot of issues around this. Now, the person who has defected, the question is what is her reason for defecting? The one who left Ashwaju's campaign team, she said she suddenly realized that Ashwaju is not the right person. I mean, you are realizing about one month to the election. For me, that's a feeble excuse, okay? And the lady who just, and we do respect to these people, who just defected yesterday, one month to the presidential election, you are defecting. You know, I mean, they should give us more cogent reasons. You know, I think all these things are more personal than ideological or, you know, fundamental. You know, I mean, this would be my reaction to that. But there are a lot of things we need to do, you know, in terms of the structure and orientation of our political parties. Virtually all the presidential candidates have moved from one party of the other to another one since 1999. So it tells us something about the process. Okay, well, ideology or no ideology. I hope that one of the reasons she gave will be what Nigerians will adopt if they cannot adopt ideology. Because she said she's leaving the SDP so that she can support the governorship candidate of PDP in this election. But she still supports the SDP presidential candidate. So, okay, so let's just say, let's just take a good thing out of that. Okay, let people begin to look at individuals because party politics is not working. Ideologies are not working. So let's see the people because within APC, there are still good people. Within PDP, there are good people. Within other parties, there are very good people. So let's look at individuals. I still find her reason very fishy. And you know, why I say that is at the time that she chose to put out this realization and act on it. And she just woke up. She actually said that the SDP was a training ground for her. I mean, what is that even supposed to mean? Go and join politics. What is that even supposed to mean? And where a few days, I choose to call it days, a few days away from electioneering proper. And you just realized that you want to work against the APC and you're supporting PDP called governorship candidate. I can never understand the technologies they use in politics. For instance, the one that I want to understand is why they keep saying and happily to that politics is about interests. No permanent friend, no permanent foe. It's about interests. Where do your interests lie? So this is a grammar, as Nigerians will call it, grammar for anywhere belief is that you were talking about. Like, so long as your interest, your personal interest is there, you just go there and give your energy. Which shouldn't be? We shouldn't be. What about the general interest of the country? Exactly. What about the community? You just think about, you know, there are the set of people that think the end justifies the means. I don't believe in that. It beats the entire purpose of being in political office in the first place or in a political party. I mean, it should be about service. The moment it becomes about personal interest, then you've lost it. You've lost it. Because if you're coming into politics and you are thinking about your selfish interests, then you shouldn't be there in the first place because you're supposed to be out there looking out for ways to better serve your people. And, oh my goodness. Yeah. I won't be there. Yeah, go on. If I just quickly, I agree with both of you. And if I just quickly come in, you know, what Yambu was saying about interest, you know, actually that statement is absolutely correct. We wanted it. But the problem is that individuals are getting into themselves. Whereas that statement is actually for the political parties. Because the political parties are supposed to aggregate the interest of sections of the population and to go into elections in order to be able to receive political power to advance the interest of that particular set of population. You know, so that's what they mean when they say is about. So if you find, for example, in parliamentary systems where the government is usually formed by the party that won majority of the seats in parliament, that's why you see coalitions being formed. And then you will, you may find sometimes that a left of center party and an extreme right party like in Israel, go ahead and form a coalition, strange bet fellows. But what we have them telling you is, okay, we have negotiated and maybe, maybe you have a party that doesn't want Israel to expand territories to the West Bank, which is Palestinian. Okay. So and then you certainly find that a party that wants to expand into the West Bank has more seats. And once a coalition arrangement with a party that doesn't want that expansion, and then they reach a deal. And then the party that doesn't want the expansion, says we have an agreement that for the period that we are in government together, there will be no expansion to the West Bank. I'm just using this as an example. So the interest of the people that those two parties respectively are representing becomes the basis of negotiation to form a coalition. So when somebody now, I would guess it to bring it down to an individual level and says, okay, I realize this is a training ground. First of all, you don't even say such a thing. People forget that in politics, the statements you make today, somebody is waiting to remind you of that statement 10 years from now. So politicians really need to be careful the kind of statements they make. You might say, look, for personal reasons, I have decided to pick up. And you are at liberty not to tell us what those personal reasons are. But whenever you are going to stipulate reasons, you really have to reflect properly before you make them. Interest should be what's supposed to be, and it used to be what the party's focus is. So if a wall or wall and his party is saying, we are interested in free education for everybody, wherever you find that party, you find free education. But nowadays it's not like that. It's just me. I'm moving to the next party because it's permanent, it's interest. No permanent friend, you can move to anywhere. So that's why all of them are hobnobbing around. They're just jumping from party to party wherever the roses are. And that's why there's a lot of distrust. Because they keep loading, if I'm to use that word, a lot of things under that umbrella of interest. And you just mentioned that if somebody says their interest is education, then you should find it wherever you find the party, right? Do we even know what their interests are these days? They just keep saying that because it's in tandem, or it's romantic, whatever it is that they are very interested in, that we don't know about. But we are the people they are leading. Oh my goodness. Sorry, just quickly, something I wanted to add. We also have politicians who are loyal to the party in Nigeria. But we have a lot of... If you allow me, I would mention something. If you look at the GDP in the East, and when ABGA emerged, ABGA became very strong in the East. And then you had... And then when Namdee Khan came with his own ambitions, articulated for the people of the East from his own perspective, right? And he started gaining ground and so on. Some people remained loyal still to the PDP. Even when PDP was not appearing to be popular anymore there. I don't want to start mentioning names. I think Ihe Jorah and a few of them, they refused to leave the PDP. And when, for example, in the last presidential election, Aladjiatiku Abubakar got the ticket and was going to pick his running mate, those who had been loyal to PDP were not so happy that they were not consulted. But the reason I'm mentioning this thing is because these people have remained in the PDP. I remember them easily and without prejudice to other politicians who have also remained in the APC, because I know some people who remained in the APC and have refused to leave. You also have a situation where some people don't get a ticket. Everybody believes, okay, this person will get the governorship ticket or will get the senatorial ticket and the person for some strange reason doesn't get that ticket and they do not come from that party. They remain in that party. We have several people like that, although we don't talk about that. And that's why I just thought of mentioning this scenario in the East just to underscore the point. But we do have a lot of people who have remained in the political parties, even though they remain loyal but they are not getting compensated or they are not getting that knowledge, they are not even getting that point. I think we should commend such people because they are sending messages to the rest of us because it shouldn't always be about post and position and all that. If you really believe in what this party stands for, as unclear as what most of the parties stand for, as we have said, yet some people have still been loyal to it. Anyway, moving forward, the general elections is a few weeks away and the opposition parties have come out to say that they are worried over persistent mausoleum of their political campaigns through schemes allegedly induced by the APC. However, the APC has dismissed the allegations saying that it does not need underhand schemes to retain the state and it has been ruling since 1999 through various platforms. And according to them, the APC was undermining the campaigns through destruction of their banners and posters, attacks by hoodlums, intimidation of supporters and, of course, stopping them from using billboards. And on the other hand, a Labour Party says APC is always in INEC offices sorting, separating PVCs. At this point, they will just pray for dissentment. Well, some of these things are allegations that we may not know. We can see some posters are mutilated, some posters are removed, some are very prominent and they are not touched. People were seen this morning wiping their own posters, keeping it clean. So some allegations are like that. In Cross River State, for instance, not only in Lagos, in Cross River State there's been a cry within the last two days that the BVAS machines, I don't know where they're supposed to be, but the BVAS machines were seen being housed in government house. Okay, so if government house is APC, the governor's office and all that is APC, and you're putting sensitive election materials in that office, so even though the security for those things is high, what will the opposition party think about? So I think INEC should do something about it because no matter what the outcome is, even if it is fair, it is free and all that, there are some things leading to the election that might give some other people the reason to raise eyebrows. So if sensitive materials... That's an allegation. Yes, I'm not talking about the one in... Okay, the BVAS being kept in government office is an allegation. Not in Cross River. In Lagos, I don't know, it's an allegation, but in Cross River that cry has been there and something is being done as we speak right now about it. But if sensitive materials are supposed to be maybe in the central bank, which is in every state or somewhere very safe, it shouldn't be where it will be perceived that there might be some foul play. Is it still safe to keep it in the central bank? I don't know, I might be looking for trouble with what I'm about to say, but I'm sure I'll still be able to say it. So do you not think that there's been a lot of... that the central bank has been compromised, seeing that the governor of central bank wanted to... So where do we run to? Yeah, because I mean, I grew up knowing that during elections, election materials, especially presidential election materials are left in the CBN. And then not even the governor has access to it. It is only INEC that knows where they kept their stuff and when the day comes, they go to pick it up. So is it still safe? I mean, seeing that there's been a lot of show of partisanship from the governor of the central bank, is it still okay and safe to keep election materials in the CBN? We'll just believe in God and laugh at it, but at least if that is where it should be, it should be there. Whether the central bank governor... who is under fire right now anyway, because even the people that we are seeing, his partisans, his bedfellows with, the ones that are saying that he's being... he's witch-hunting a lot of them and doing a lot of things to scuttle their progress in the campaigns and all that. So I don't know, but it cannot be... Central bank should be safe, yes. Yeah, I mean, central bank is safe. The question is, the people, any institution that has to do with security, that is security, printing and printing companies, and even the banks are fairly safe, okay? But the question, and I agree with you guys, the question is, the integrity perceived, you know, in public relations, we say perception is everything. The perception of people, the moment that perception appears to have been compromised, a good perception appears to have been compromised, there's always a need, especially for public officials, to make immediate interest. The moment the governor of the central bank was alleged to be a contestant. That was built up to the primaries before we had the candidates. And then even if he didn't say anything, we had people issuing press statements on his behalf and criticizing the others and almost justifying his right to contest him. This has never happened in the history of Nigeria. So if people are now doubting the integrity of the institution which he presides over, as Uche just suggested, if there's that doubt, I think that doubt is justified because the perception, we have never had a central bank governor who, while in office, is even being rumored to be a candidate. It never happened in this country. Not to talk of us actually seeing vehicles with posters of the central bank governor's image on them as a possible candidate in a primary election of a political party while he's still the sitting governor of the central bank. So I think this could be the reason now why we put doubt, the integrity of that institution. All right. It keeps getting heated. The tension is rising. Election is almost here with us. But we will go on a quick break when we return a bill that is supposed to be nice if you ask me, was rejected by the state houses of assembly. You find out what bill that is when we return from this quick break. And then we'll take a little bit about our foreign policy. We've talked a lot about it, but let's just, by way of summary, see how the relationship between Nigeria and the world should be. All right. Stay with us.