INEC Went Into 2023 Polls With Already Prepared Results — Dalung. (Independent)

Comrade Solomon Dalung, former Minister of Sports and Youth Development, has urged president -elect Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and his APC to put Nigeria first by forming a government of national unity, GNU and not revel in victory, as there was none. In this valedictory interview to bid his mentor, President Muhammadu Buhari, farewell to Daura, Dalong said he was not disappointed that Buhari failed on his second term in office, finishing as President of the Villa and Traveller of Nigeria. Excerpts by TONY EZIMAKOR.

 Permit me to start by asking you what is happening on the Plateau, this inces­sant killings. You’re big stakeholders in your state. Every other day we hear of twenty, thirty , fifty killed . Are these humans or animals ? What is happen­ing?

Well, let me begin by thanking you for finding time to take up this very serious perennial conflict that appears to have domesticated now on the pla­teau. Everyday human live is more or less statistics. Infact,10 killed is in­significant number now . Most of the time such numbers are not reported. Forty, fifty, hundred, more than that. And it is either daily, within a period or sometimes weekly. That has been the scenario. And this started in 2001 when our peace was ruptured with the infamous Jos Crisis, and it started in September of that year in Jos , from there it migrated to the Southern part of Plateau and remained there for three years. As a result President Obasanjo declared a state of emergency because the government of the day was not giv­ing attention to the killings that was going on. We may blame Obasanjo for breach of the constitution, declaring a state of emergency and removing the governor but we fail to look at the attitude of government when human lives were lost daily. That nonchalant attitude that infected the attention of government has remained with us since 2001 till date. So if you continue to look at the figures you must also compare any change in attitude of those respon­sible. What angered Obasanjo was that there were killings going on for over forty-eight hours and the governor was not in the country and when he came back, he couldn’t go to Jos , he went to watch football. That was the peak of executive irresponsibility by the then governor, Chief Joshua Dariye. Now , did Obasanjo’s action produce the de­sired result? Yes. Obasanjo’s action can compare with this popular Ugandan case where the CJN of Uganda asked this legal question, was the constitu­tion made for the people or the people for the constitution. Then he said if a constitution which is supposed to pro­tect the people does not seem to be pro­tecting the people, should the people fold their arms and watch the constitution destroy them? He said the answer is in the negative. And he raised the poser , what should the people do, he said they should destroy the constitution. So, what you see happening on the pla­teau and by extension the catastrophe taking place across the country is that we have a legal regime that have been ambushed and subverted by the very people who were created by this same constitution. So the governors in their various enclaves do not give attention to what benefits the people. When I was growing up as a young person in 1979 during the second republic, once there’s a crisis, even when no life was lost, the civilian governor will visit the area, the presence of the civil authority there cre­ate hope and a sense of belonging for the people. In all these killings you rarely hear that the governor or his deputy vis­ited the place. Even chairmen pf LGA of the area are nowhere to be found. All you see is the security speaking. You don’t see the governor speak. But under the military regime, once there is crisis anywhere, the administrator takes full control and briefs people regularly. The problem now is that nonstate actors are working in concert with the clueless­ness of political leadership. The non­state actors have better knowledge and intelligence of the weakness of political leadership. That is the reason why they strike with precision and act with impu­nity. Of all the arrests you are hearing, of all government white papers on the crisis in the Plateau, no single person has been prosecuted. This too is a con­tributory factor. There are people that have been indicted by the commission of inquiry set up on the Plateau crisis but nobody has been prosecuted. We are governed by impunity.

Who takes responsibility for these carnage. It gives one goose pimples to imagine that a government is in place while people it claims to govern are cut down in numbers, and this is not just in Plateau State.

You have to interrogate the motives of those who seek political office. Their motives are very fundamental in under­standing their behavior in office. Now, every person that aspire to be a gover­nor will also select through the manipu­lation of the primary of his party those who will emerge to the State House of Assembly and ensure that they are his surrogates. They invest more in the se­lection process than their own election . Why do they do that? Of course, if you have a genuine intension to govern, you must also allow the process to produce those who can guide you, chastise, challenge and direct you on how to best serve the people. In the all these that has been happening on the plateau, there’s no scrutiny on the administration. Where the Speaker who even though he was a product of this manipulation but have conscience. When they killed people in Naraguta, in numbers , and the government did not do anything , did not issue a statement and did not even send relief materials. The speaker mobilized the house and gave the gover­nor ultimatum to immediately act and provide relief material to address the humanitarian crisis. What happened to him? The speaker was later im­peached by five people out of twenty four lawmakers. He went to court, the court returned him but till date he has not assumed his seat. The house of as­sembly has been shut down, police have taken over the place. So who is going to check the excesses of these people. I don’t want us to reduce these problems to the conduct and political maleficence of the unpatriotic elements that occupy the seat of power. My conclusion is that this is the fallacy of presidential system in a multicultural society where politics of ideology is absent. The presidential system in itself is driven by ideology and principles but in our clime, it is the size of your pocket that drives political ambitions. Our politics here is better described by a book by a Kenyan jour­nalist: It is our own turn to eat. So you look at every set of oppressors, they are align to their likes.

Then something is wrong the way politics is played here or is it the system generally?

If you look at the list that is flying all over place of people that are being considered for ministerial appointment, they are the same people. These are people that failed as governors and you think they will succeed as ministers in the new administration. Is that possible? So our problem is the presidential sys­tem of government which mechanism of accountability is the legislature, but the political actors have learned, so they prepare to contest election with a list of people that will emerge from their party. So, party politics in Nigeria has destroyed democracy. Yes, Party poli­tics. It has even subverted nationalism and undermined patriotism. Loyalty to the party is more important than loyal­ty to the nation. So, when you listen to the members of this national assembly who have suddenly become born again members of their party, they will tell you they have now stepped down and are loyal to their party . Now do you think this set of leaders will ever do something in the interest of the country, Nigeria . If their party would tell them to undermine the constitution which has always been the case, they will will­ingly obey. Unless and until the political culture is driven by ideology, principle, patriotism and nationalism, Nigerian will continue to swim in a quagmire.

You participated in the 2023 general election and many have had varying views of the exercise What is your assessment of the poll that produced President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and other leaders?

Personally, I hate being asked to eval­uate the 2023 election because it is the worst electoral experience I have seen in my entire adult life. I was dragged into politics when I was in Form 2 in secondary, in 1978 by my mentor, late Chief Solomon Lar. And I have been in it even though I went into the security services. I didn’t detached myself from it even though I paid dearly as a result. I’ve consistently been either active or passive monitor of political evolution of Nigeria since 1978. First, the ballot paper of the 2023 election was of the lowest quality ever. My knowledge of a ballot paper is that it was like a cheque. It took me time to be able to identify the logo of political parties, including my political party. And in elections where I don’t have candidates, it was a big challenge. It was very blue, very shod­dy. The size of a good Friday is set on Wednesday. The evaluation of an elec­tion is not just the conduct of it ,but the material used. So if the ballot paper is from the lowest quality of paper, is it the BVAS that would give guarantee, which was given by Prof Mahmood Yakubu? What happened at the 2023 election was that INEC deceived Nigerians to turn out in their numbers, expecting that their votes would count. But INEC, in concert with rogue elements, indeed, from different political parties, went to the election with already prepared results. And those were the results they declared. I want to just pick two instances so that those who may want to challenge my submission should be able to also provide answers. The be­havior of Prof Mahmood Yakubu in declaring the presidential election and the behavior of the REC in Adamawa in declaring the result governorship elec­tion there which was later cancelled, were the same. They’re par material: Prof Mahmood adjourned collation of results at the National Collation Centre for 10 O’clock the following day. By 4 am , he declared the winner. In Adamawa, the REC also adjourned collation of re­sults for ten O’clock, by 8 O’clock, the REC went and announced results. The response of the REC when he was asked was that he did not violate any law, that what he did was what Prof Yakubu did. Why has Prof Mahmood Yakubu not been arrested?