 You're welcome back. We are being joined by Mr. Esse Anya, a public affairs analyst, and we'll be looking at the evasion of the presidential debates by some presidential candidates. And we also will look a little bit about the newly printed money, new narrow notes that have been introduced into the society. Mr. Anya, welcome to the run-up. I don't think Mr. Anya has joined us yet. Mr. Anya is nowhere to be found for now. Okay, until he joins us, this debate will continue and we'll keep talking about it all the time. Bio, you're there and the discussion is on people who want employment evading an interview as it is. I don't know how you personally feel about that, Bio. For me, to be honest, it worries me. It worries me because since the return to the Democratic rule in 1999, I don't think we've had a scenario like this, you know, where, if you like what you described as the front-runners, avoid the scrutiny because that's what it suggests. And even though legally they are not obliged to be part of this, but it's something which has become a tradition and not only in Nigeria, but in non-democratic environments. So, like we said the other day, if you come into a presidential debate, then you get asked questions. If you are in a campaign run, nobody asks you any questions. So campaign run is a choreographed while presidential debates are not. And this is for me where I think those who manage presidential candidates have to impress it on them the importance of appearing before or at presidential debates. Otherwise, there might be few suggestions that there's something to hide. The question is, is it really the presidential candidates that are running away from their mind as the people who are in charge that are making sure that they don't attend because maybe there are some things that they are hiding? These same people that should impress upon them to come might even be the ones that are preventing them from coming. Is it not possible? No, it's possible. And if that is the scenario or the situation then it's unfortunate because part of your job as a manager of public information on behalf of a candidate or your principal is to prepare your principal for such tasks. There is no candidate that gives 100% performance in a presidential debate. There is no candidate. And I think this is why you have a series of presidential debates so that you can always use the very next one to improve on your conduct in the previous one. And we see this in the U.S. because the U.S. exemplifies this whole tradition of presidential debates or governorship debates. If you don't do too well now, the very next one, you are polished up, you're better prepared and you go there to improve. But not appearing at all then suggests that those minders are either not doing their job properly or don't even know how to do their jobs. And therefore would want to prevent their candidates from appearing. And then I think it speaks of the personality of the people that we are dealing with. How do you ignore the call of the people that you hope to lead? The call of the people that you intend to serve because that is how I choose to see it. I mean, you're coming into an office, generally, I think it's disrespectful, honestly, to both the people, the organizers, the people who are at home hoping to watch, people who are sending in questions. It is very disrespectful and it shouldn't be encouraged. In fact, I put up a video on one of my social media handles and people kept answering the question because I asked, do you think that it should be made mandatory for people seeking political offices at whatever level for it to be made mandatory for them to attend these debates? And everybody was getting yeses from different angles and different levels. I mean, how else are you going to, you know, we are not mind readers. We don't know what you have in mind. You might as well, just like Bayo said, come to your rally grounds and say whatever it is you think we want to hear and move on. But when we get to the chance to be able to ask these questions the way it's burning in our minds, it makes a difference. And there is something about close contact when you're standing there and we are closed and we are firing you these questions. Actually, there are so many things we are looking at apart from whatever answers that you give. You go for an interview and they ask you, can you work under pressure? This is our own pressure. We want to give you and ask you the questions. If you cannot stand before us and answer the questions, how then can we hold you accountable if you do wrong in office? That means now that you're begging us, you can't come to us. It means that the time that you get there, you are the Lord and they be all. And we cannot ask you any questions. You can do whatever you like. Because if you can do whatever you like now, then when you get there, you will turn to a tiger or something. Our guest is here finally. You see, it's not only that during this presidential debate, we get to ask questions. It's also a good forum for interaction between the citizens and the candidates. And I give an example of this. I mean, sorry, the candidates can also learn. There are a lot of things that they get to know. For example, I think the last presidential debate, there was the president of the Center for Citizens with Disabilities, if I remember correctly, CCD, David Daniela. David was in that as part of the audience. And he asked President Gohari a question about passing the bill to allow persons with disability to vote in elections. And that the National Assembly had finished the process and they understood that the bill was supposed to have been sent to the president. And I think the president said that he wasn't really aware that the bill had come to him. But guess what? Two weeks later, the president signed that bill into law. That happened during that presidential debate. I remember very, very well because I was monitoring that bill and that issue as well. So this presidential debates are a very good opportunity for the candidates themselves to learn, to hear, and to know maybe there's something they ought to have done or were expecting them to do, that they may not even be aware of. But when you go to a rally, a rally is just a jamboree. I'm sorry to use that word. People that are dancing, it's a carnival and everything. And it's many parties, supporters who are there, and they are not asking of course anybody else. Okay, Mr. Anya, I think Mr. Anya has joined us. Mr. Anya, are you there? Good morning. Yeah. Sorry that we couldn't connect the first time. Yeah. Can you hear us? Yes, I can hear you. But you people have been discussing that there was no question directed to me. Yes, yes. We couldn't hear you at first. So we were waiting for your audio to be better. Now that you're here, you must have heard us talking. But let's get your perspective. Some presidential aspirants are running away from... Okay, well, they are not attending debates. Let me not say they're running away. Give them the benefit of the doubt. So what do you think about that? And what do you think is the place of debates, presidential debates in an election like that of Nigeria? If you want to sell yourself as a candidate in any first set of elective position, either as a governor, presidential, local government, the best place to sell yourself free of charge is through debates. Because you are not going to pay for airtime. You are going to be invited to the station by the station that is organizing the debate. So if I were to be one of the candidates, I would jump at it because it would give me an awful opportunity for me to sell my manifesto to the electorate that would then vote for me. We'll just have to wait until when he comes. But in the meantime, yeah. I hope he reconnects very soon. I have a... That's why it's a very salty debate. But somebody is actually prepared and drawn up a good manifesto that he wants to sell to the electorate. He should jump at it so that we have an opportunity to sell the electorate or whatever he has in stock for them. So I think Nigeria should look critically at this kind of things. Anyone that is a wedding debate should know that that person has nothing to offer. Because if he has nothing to offer, he should be able to come out to tell the electorate what he has in stock for them. So I'm using this medium to tell Nigeria that any country, whether as a government, senator, presidential candidate that has a wedding free debate, they should not vote for such a person. Because that means it's a signal to the public that he does not have something to offer Nigeria. That was what happened in 2015 when President Buahari was a wedding debate. He didn't appear in some of the debates. I don't think he will appear. Today we have seen how the country is. Today the country is at the verge of disintegration, insecurity everywhere, hunger, pains. The dollar is very high now. It's now changing for $850 to a dollar and all that. So this is an opportunity for them to sell themselves. And anyone who refuses to attend such a debate, Nigeria should not vote for such a person. He's not capable. He's inept. He has nothing to offer. That is why he's trying away from debating. Because debating is the apple opportunity for any candidate seeking the vote of the electorate to sell themselves, to sell their manifesto. Okay. No debate, no vote. That's a summary of what Mr. Anya has to say. Yeah, that should be the news as long as no debate, no vote. Yeah, actually there's a hashtag that has been started on Twitter and all that. No debate, no vote and all that. I hope that... He said go do it. Okay, well just quickly because Atam is running out Mr. Anya, if you have a comment on the newly unveiled Naira notes, I'm looking for the word unveiled Naira notes. The central bank just changed the Nigerian currency or just redesigned the Nigerian currency, gave it new color and all that. What's your take on that? Very briefly because Atam is up. Okay. I don't think Mr. Anya can hear us. Yeah, I would really have wanted to get his perspective on the new Naira notes. Well, Bayo, you're there and we've really not had this conversation before. How do you feel or how do you react to the newly unveiled Naira notes? Well, I think that, personally speaking, of course, one of my personal views, I think we've been abusing the Naira. I think there are certain aspects of our culture. We're not even a culture. We can't attribute it to culture. This is an acquired culture where people spend money, people throw money on the ground and start stepping on it. We have people use money to stone people. You know, I see all kinds of funny and strange things that we do with the Naira and I wonder if foreigners were to observe us doing these things, whether they would actually, what they would think of us, you know. And this cuts across. They educated, they're not so enlightened. We all do it. And for me, it should stop. Now, that's on the cultural, philosophical dimension as to what we do with the Naira. As to the reasons advanced by the central bank for redesigning the notes to say that there's a sizable chunk of money outside of the banking system and they want to capture substantial, if not all of that, back. And I think in the first two weeks, it was reported that 52 billion Naira fundings were back into the banking system. So I would say that it's well thought out if from open sources the information we are getting acts of, it means it was well thought out but I think some people have expressed worries that the timing may not have been sufficient because we have this festive season coming and we also have elections following almost immediately afterwards. But if within two weeks, I think now it's been like four weeks since it was announced if within the first two weeks 62 billion Naira fundings were back into the banking system I think then they are beginning to actually achieve the reasons for which they know what we designed. I would just say that what is important now is to make sure that the transition is smooth. People are able to exchange the old notes for the new notes. There are no bottlenecks, there are no unnecessary queues and that doesn't constitute another big problem especially because of the festive season and then of course after the festive season people have to face queues for the new year. These are lots of questions that would have loved to answer as we continue this banter on the newly unveiled Naira notes but we want to take a quick break let's keep it at the back of our minds because we're going to have a bit of that conversation when we return how does the CBN intend to make sure that some people are not left out these are questions we've been asking over time but we're going to keep asking until we get the right answers that we need we're going on the break now the news will be up at 12 noon when we return the run-up will continue don't go anywhere stay with us