ADS 300px;height:250px
Barrister Monday Onyekachi Ubani, 2nd Vice- President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) in this interview with TEMIDAYO AKINSUYI, speaks on current developments in the polity, such as restructuring, automatic ticket for President Muhammadu Buhari, Mainagate, his foundation for the less privileged and other issues of national interests. Excerpts: You are one of the prominent Nigerians who supported the ouster of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and emergence of President Buhari in 2015. Over two years now, are you regretting that decision you took? Not in anyway! I don’t regret the decision of supporting the emergence of President Buhari because at that point in time, he was a better alternative. He contested against former president Goodluck Jonathan and of course, later on we have heard revelations of what that government did in terms of monumental corruption. If we had allowed Jonathan to continue, it would have been monumental disaster for us. Now, President Buhari may not have met my expectations in terms of quality governance that I expect but that will not in anyway affect that particular decision I took at that point by supporting him. Yes, the president needs to improve on governance, he also needs to correct some of the anomalies and then fulfill all the promises he made to Nigerians during the electioneering campaign. That is my focus. But I am not regretting voting him because he is far better than the man we removed out of government. Some APC governors few days ago endorsed automatic ticket for the president. Are you also in support of that? I am yet to be convinced about allowing a second term for president Buhari unless between now and next year, I see the fulfillment of all the promises the president made to us. Now, four years is long enough for you to lay a solid foundation. I believe laying the foundation is key and the president is not expected to fulfill all the promises, but what I am looking at are the measures the president is taking to fulfill the promises he made that convinced me that he was a better candidate than Goodluck Jonathan. Looking at the fight against corruption, I am yet to see the structure that is in place because that is very key. You may arrest few persons and probably prosecute them but if I don’t see a structure that is an enduring one that you have put in place so that even if you leave government tomorrow, some other persons can continue from there, then I will not score you good on that. I think by next year, we will now sit down and look at all the promises that this government made when they were coming in in 2015 and then begin to tick them one after the other to see whether they have fulfilled them, especially on the issue of restructuring. There are many issues that I think they should deal with and give me the impression that they have satisfied me to warrant me having confidence that they should continue in order to fulfill other promises. It also depends on who is running on the opposite party that will contest with President Buhari. If I don’t see a credible person that will give him a fight, I have no other choice again because the issue of choice is also very key. If you have to choose between two devils, you choose the lesser devil. So, I am not going to give President Buhari automatic ticket for now. I will still watch his style of government and see whether he has succeeded in providing the things he promised while coming into . If he does not, then he will not get my support. But if he succeeds in attending to them and laying a solid structure for building upon by the subsequent government, of course, I can give him my vote for a second term.
No comments:
Post a Comment