Mr. Ezekiel Izuogu is a member, Board of Trustees (BoT) of the All Progressives Congress (APC). In this interview, he speaks on the National Assembly crisis, the power struggle in the APC and bribery allegation against the party’s National Chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun. DGossip247 reports
Your party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), has been engulfed in crisis less than two months after its victory at the polls. How do you feel with the development?
First of all, I am very happy that I took the right decision to support another candidate than President Goodluck Jonathan. I was part of the formation of the APC. I am happy that I supported Muhammadu Buhari; I sacrificed four months to go round with him, to make sure he wins. I am also happy that I went back to Imo State to campaign, to make sure that we delivered Imo, not only to the incumbent Governor Rochas Okorocha, but to Buhari. I am very happy. Above all, I am happy that Buhari won the election with a very wide margin. What is happening in the APC today is that we are trying to manage our victory. We are weak at managing victory. What this crisis is showing is that we are not managing our victory excellently well.
But it is a problem we can overcome. Every person who has won victory knows that sometimes managing victory is difficult, depending on the kind of people you are managing. We have not been in the party for a long time and people are still trying to study one another. There is also the struggle for future power, which is right because we have just won the Presidency. Let us relax and give the president time to manage the affairs of the country. In order words, even though we are victorious, we should be humble victors. We should sit back and allow Mr. President to perform. We should not behave in such a way that will make performance becomes difficult for him because we are trying to entangle him, from one problem to anotherThat is not good.
I do not like it. It pains me. I wish that this problem can be resolved overnight. When the National Assembly election took place, some radio stations approached me for interview and I told them I am very happy that we have won the victory during the presidential, governorship and senatorial elections. We should now manage it like gentlemen. If you are not a gentleman, you will scatter the whole thing, if you are too radical. Some of us are becoming too radical and that is not good. Some people are equating what is happening now with what will happen in 2019 and are already struggling. If you start this struggle this early, it is going to damage a number of things. Our greatest trophy is APC, and the party should not be damaged because of our carelessness. We should not be arrogant. If we have won the victory at the National Assembly, let us humbly perform our duties.
There are insinuations that APC crisis is being fuelled by the vaulting ambition of those who feel that because of their contributions to the party’s victory, they should be given free hand to decide who gets what. What is your take on this?
The issue is, whatever anybody feels, what does the constitution of Nigeria says? The constitution says that the president will select those who will work with him in the Federal Executive Council. President Buhari is a human being. He is going to listen to guidance and advice. But the final decision is his own, not anybody else. In order words, those who are advising Buhari, they are right to do so. If you have recommended Mr. A to be the Minister for Education or whatever, it is a recommendation; it is an advice. I know most of those who are into this trouble or the others in the National Executive Committee, the Board of Trustees (BOT) or in the National Caucus. I know them. They are my friends of several years. My humble advice is, if you have won the victory as we have won, please be humble about it. Don’t be arrogant. If you are arrogant, you spoil everything. Arrogance can even mean that what you won before, you can no longer win it. Suppose the party scatters and we go into individual small parties again, we will have nothing to brag about. So, you must preserve the party, the oneness, the unity of the party.
The presiding officers of the National Assembly don’t seem to be toeing the line of the party leadership in the choice of principal officers of the chamber as recommended by the party leadership. What is your take on this?
My advice to them is that they should remember that they are products of the party. The party is the platform upon which you have gotten what you have now. So, please listen to the basis of your being there. Bukola Saraki is somebody I have known for a long time. I am very close to the Saraki family. However, I will advise Saraki to take things easy. You cannot be a victor over your party men. It is the party that made you what you are. So, please, remember the party. Whatever decisions you are taking, remember the basis upon which you stand to become Senate President. That basis is the APC, not any other.
Some people are accusing the APC National Chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, of collecting bribe to support the emergence of the National Assembly leadership. How do you feel with the development?
Oyegun is a man I know very well. Anybody who is accusing him of taking bribe does not know Oyegun. Oyegun cannot take bribe to do anything. Oyegun is a transparent and honest human being. He will not take bribe for anything. Oyegun should be celebrated for the victories of APC at the general elections. Any human being in APC should celebrate the man who brought such victories. Talking about removing him is unfortunate. Anybody who is talking of removing him is being unfair; being unfair to the conscience of Nigerians. Oyegun midwifed everything. I am not saying that Oyegun is a perfect human being. There is no perfect human being. Oyegun should enjoy the victory that he has won. He, with all the members of APC, should enjoy that victory. Anybody who wants to remove Oyegun at this time does not mean well. Such a person does not wish the APC well because if you start removing the National Chairman after we have won the victory, you don’t want the party to make progress. The party will move from one crisis to another, before we can handle it.
Some believe that after the Buhari government is not moving fast one month after inauguration. Do you share this view?
I think I understand their feelings especially coming from the point that President Buhari is an action man. He is not a man known to delay certain things. So, I am actually surprised that ministers have not been appointed, I am sure that President Buhari must have good reasons for not appointing them so soon. A lot of people expected him to appoint ministers that same week he was sworn in as president; Ministers designate awaiting confirmation by the Senate. In fact, that is what many modern chief executives of countries do. Immediately they are elected, you see a line-up of those who will take over so that they can start liaising with the incumbent of the past administration. So, I sincerely suggest to Mr. President that he should look at it again. Some people are even saying that he would not appoint until September and I think that will be very late. I know that if there are delays, the president must mean well but let him find ways of overcoming those delays so that ministers’ names can be announced and Senate will start working on confirmation. That is my sincere opinion.
Many believe that your name should be one of the names on the ministerial list but you had such offers in the past and you turned them down. Will you still do the same thing now?
Yes, to be honest with you, I had three offers to be minister in the past but because of the research I am doing, which is very important, I didn’t want to accept those appointments, but now I want to say that I am humbly available now. I have done the best I can in this research area. If it is the wish of God that I serve in any capacity in this government, I will be ready to do so. I am not one of them who go to advertise themselves for appointments. No, I wouldn’t do that. I have had sufficient experience in Nigeria politics.
You talked earlier about the completion of your latest research. When will you avail Nigerians of what the research is all about?
Well, we have kept the secret for many years and that is purposeful because we didn’t want it let out till now. But by the special grace of God, in a short while, it shall be out. Emagnetor dynamics is another way of saving energy. Man needs energy to survive. This is another way of producing energy for your work. It is another way of producing electricity. It can produce electricity for Nigerian use, for 24 hours of the day, seven days in a week, 30 days in a month, 12 months in a year nonstop for the next 60 years and it will cost you nothing because God has given the energy free. From Emagnetor dynamics, God has given man energy free, from magnate. This comes from magnate. ‘Imagnat’ dynamics is a way of arranging the magnates in such a way that they will produce their energy.
The energy they produce cannot be finished because it comes from God. And that energy can be used in other areas. It can be used to drive cars, it can be used to fly plane, the train, and so on and so forth. That is what it means. When Nigeria is struggling with only oil revenue, there are other revenues that God has made available but we have not explored them. So, it is a help to the government of Buhari, that under his regime, there is another source of energy. This research is going to reach out to both the rich and the poor because the difference between the rich and the poor is that the rich has more energy. If energy is free, the poor man can get as much of it as the rich man. So, things will begin to ease out. There will be justice, equity and all the things that are good.
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