Accord Party governorship candidate in Oyo State, Rashidi Ladoja, tells OLUFEMI ATOYEBI that fraudulent practices marred the April 11 election which produced Governor Abiola Ajimobi as the winner
What is your view on the victory of Maj.-Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd) at the presidential poll?
I wish him good luck and hope that he is the right man to make Nigeria better. He is not starting afresh because Buhari is not a new comer in government. We have seen him before and we know him as a disciplined person. We believe he will be able to put some sanity where necessary.
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What kind of people would you advise him to accommodate in his government?
The President-elect should accommodate only people of like mind who can help his mission when he gets there. He should make sure that he works with people who will make him achieve his objectives as a president.
The president is free in his choice of cabinet members. He is not bound to pick politicians alone or people from just one political party to run the government with him. His objectives are to redress Nigeria, bring peace and development better than what we have now. The only way he can do it is to provide employment for the youths because that is the major developmental challenge. A lot of youths are out of the universities without being gainfully employed. It is necessary to address that.
Another major challenge to our nation’s growth is the issue of power. If he can make electricity stable, it will enhance development. Many companies have packed out of Nigeria because they cannot have access to stable electricity. Maybe Buhari can move faster in terms of power and the companies would come back to Nigeria.
Will it not be asking too much from Buhari if we expect him to tackle the problem of electricity in four years?
It is possible to tackle the problems associated with power in four years. The power ministry has a lot of information with it. They know what to do exactly. We have been talking about coal power generation system, hydro-electricity system, solar-powered electricity and other forms of power generation. If Nigeria moves straight and confronts the problems facing power generation immediately now, it should be able to solve them in four years.
Don’t you envisage a major financial challenge for the next government because of the dwindling income being generated from oil?
Our problem does not come from how much we generate from oil but what we spend the money on. Why is Nigeria spending so much on food importation? If we are serious in this country, we should produce our food here and export for foreign-exchange generation. With this, we can create a lot of jobs and solve employment problem. Our problem is not too much money or too little money but wastefulness.
Where do you think history will place President Goodluck Jonathan in Nigeria?
I commend him because he fought well for re-election. When the game was up, he acted as a statesman. Have you ever seen a presidential candidate in Nigeria since 1999 who lost an election and did not head to the election tribunal? In 1999, Alliance for Democracy and the All Nigeria Peoples Party presented Olu Falae against Olusegun Obasanjo. Falae lost and went to the tribunal.
In 2003, 2007 and 2011, Buhari headed to the tribunal to challenge his loss to the Peoples Democratic Party’s presidential candidates. Hence, Jonathan is the first to congratulate his successor-to-be. I am sure that there are reasons for Jonathan to go to the tribunal. In a situation where we had 1.9m votes without anyone of them void or nullified being credited to a person, how do you explain that?
There are reasons that everything did not go well during the election but Jonathan just accommodated peace by accepting the loss so that Nigeria can move forward. He should be commended for showing us in Nigeria that we can do things differently.
Some have advocated for the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof. Attahiru Jega, to be placed on the same page as Jonathan. Do you think Jega is worthy of statesmanship status?
I don’t think so because Jonathan is bigger than Jega in all standards. What has Jega done? He conducted an election which was fraudulent by all standards. It’s just that people are saying that we should just accept the elections. It was not credible. In many places, voters did not get the Permanent Voter Cards. The number of PVCs that were not given was enough to change the course of the election. Are you saying that Jega has done a good job?
He had the opportunity of mapping the constituencies with the 2006 census. We conduct a census every 10 years with a view to using it for national planning. He did not do it. In Oyo State, constitution supports that we have 40 seats in the House of Assembly but he did not obey the court order and the constitution. We have 32 seats and the state challenged it and got a ruling which Jega ignored. Please, do not compare Jonathan to Jega, Jonathan is far bigger in personality.
During the elections, we had polling units and wards where accredited voters were not up to 50 per cent of registered voters and less even voted. Do you think the total votes cast during the election were enough to say that the people trooped out to vote?
If we have 50 per cent of voters coming out to vote, then we can celebrate an average turnout. The election in Oyo State recorded 40 per cent voters’ turnout. When we start to review the elections, a lot of things will be revealed to the public. How many eligible voters had PVCs? That is where things went wrong. Many of the PVCs were stolen by people who denied others of exercising their rights to vote. How many card readers were used? These were the problems during the elections. Jega should not be congratulated for conducting free and fair elections. In Nigeria, we are not sincere with ourselves. We want to take advantage of every situation and make a lot of noise about it.
Do we have to restructure the INEC to solve these problems?
I don’t know if the array of professors we have appointed as INEC chairmen is what the commission needs to perform better. The fact that the chairmen are professors made them behave arrogantly in some cases. It does not show that a professor is a better manager. We should look for people who know what the job is all about. The ability to manage is what is important in the position. You can find a non-professor who will do the work better.
I would have preferred a chairman who will give INEC in the states the right to print the cards in their states, buy the card making machines for them and supervise the process using the State Security Service to check fraud. When the process is complete, he can come out and announce his election timetable. We should solve local problems locally. We don’t know how many cards are outstanding now. INEC did not compare the cards received with the number of registered voters.
In Afijio Local Government of Oyo State, one-third of the cards were not received by eligible voters who registered. It is not compulsory that a professor must head INEC because they have no knowledge of what is happening at the grass roots. They are far from reality on the ground.
When are you going to the tribunal with evidence to support your claims of rigging in the Oyo State governorship election?
We have about 20 days before the allotted time expires for the filing of petitions. We will do so at the appropriate time.
Are you optimistic of victory at the tribunal?
If we are not optimistic, we will not be doing it. Take a tour of the state and look at the people’s mood. Go to Oyo, Iseyin and everywhere else in the state. The people are mourning because they are saying that we did not vote for him (Governor Abiola Ajimobi). I don’t know where he got the votes. That is what we are going to ask the tribunal to find out.
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