Mr. Yinka Odumakin, Publicity Secretary of the Pan-
Yoruba socio-political organization, Afenifere and a
delegate to the National Conference. In this interview
he speaks among others on the gains of the confab
and why it may be difficult to scuttle the report as
being allegedly planned by some people. Excerpts: By Clifford Ndujihe FIVE months into the confab, what has been your
experience?
I think it is a mixed bag. For those of us who have
over the years agitated that we
need to discuss the future of this country, it was a
dream come true when President Goodluck Jonathan on March 17, 2014 inaugurated the conference and he
gave us the charge to discuss every issue as regards
the future of Nigeria and to reach a consensus on how
Nigeria should be rebuilt. And there he turned to the
National Assembly and said, ‘I hope you are talking
about a referendum? Even though you are amending the constitution, if there is a need for a new
constitution, do not shy away from it.’ We spent the first few days of the conference over
rules and procedures. And the conference was going
to break up over voting pattern, first it was 75 per
cent, then later we had to settle for 70 per cent. After
that we broke into committees. We broke into 20
committees in all. There are many of us who thought the committees were unwieldy and to be honest with
you many of the issues came out under policy issues.
Many of these policy issues are what a presidential
candidate can commission a team to prepare for him
in a manifesto-light, road, etc. Some of us believe the
conference should discuss hardware, the policy issues are software. When we came back from the committees we spent
quality time looking at the policy issues and left the
critical issues towards the end. With benefit of
hindsight, I think it was a good decision because if we
had put devolution first, maybe it would have been
the end of the conference. This conference is a major improvement on past
conferences. It discussed the issues of Nigeria in
depth. The quality of delegates was quite impressive.
Most of the delegates would not have got to the
conference if we had gone through the kind of
elections we hold in Nigeria. There was quality debate. We dealt with reports of 19 committees,
passed about 500 resolutions and three-quarters of
devolution until we got to the thorny issue of
derivation, which had always been the Achilles heels
of every conference since 1988. Eventually, we
passed the buck to the president because centrifugal forces, who are suddenly aroused by the governors,
came and tried to cause confusion after being asked:
What are you doing? Why did you allow local
government to be de-listed? Why did you allow state
police, state constitution, etc? *Yinka Odumakin *Yinka Odumakin How did it happen?
When we got to the conference some of us were
invited to a meeting called Consensus Building Group
which was facilitated by Prof Agboola Gambari and Dr
Raymond Dokpesi. We were delegates across the
zones. We tried to build consensus around the various committees. We took the report of a committee,
discussed and reached a consensus. Eventually, this
developed into a meeting of minds, first between the
South and the Middle belt. So a document was
produced detailing the points and the position of the
various zones on each point. At a point, it was agreed that the entire six zones should have that kind of
consensus and a report was drafted. Delegates from the South put a motion before the
conference, which was moved by Senator Aniete
Okon and I seconded it. It was signed by major
leaders from the South – E.K Clark, General
Akinrinade, Olu Falae, etc. that was the time they
were trying to shut down debate and said now there should be no more debate, that we should adopt
every report. We said no and the leadership agreed that we should
continue the debate on reports. That was the day
Gambari sent a message to Dokpesi that they would
no longer attend the meeting. The next meeting that
was called, it was only the South and Middle Belt that
attended. The next thing we saw was that they started
sponsoring all kinds of publications in northern
papers-that there is a hidden agenda, there is an
already prepared constitution, Dokpesi has been
circulating the constitution, that Prof Bolaji Akinyemi,
the deputy chairman had called some northern leaders to persuade them, that money was being
shared, etc. That was how the issue came to the floor of the
conference and the conference was going to have a
lock down again. Prof Akinyemi explained what he
had been doing-to call all sides involved in knotty
issues and resolve them before it comes to the
plenary. Dokpesi gave the background to the whole meeting
and pointed out that Prof Gambari and his team were
trying to scuttle the conference, that the document
has nothing to do with constitution but consensus built
around issues discussed. By the time we crossed that hurdle, they now came
back to say the position we took in adopting some
critical issues was not right. We should not have used
voice vote, we should have voted using 70:30 and we
should reopen issues we had taken decisions on. The rule of the conference is very clear: any matter on
which decision has been taken cannot be reopened.
Eventually, we got to derivation. All along, there had
been all kinds of discussions trying to reach
consensus. The South-South came with 25 per cent;
the consensus group recommended 21 per cent and by the time we got to the plenary, what was agreed
was 18 per cent. We now said the reason there is so much hues and
cries over derivation is because not everybody is
bringing something to the table. In the First Republic
when everybody was bringing something to the table,
derivation was 50 per cent. Nobody complained. We have the geological map of Nigeria, which shows
there is large deposit of mineral resources in every
part of Nigeria, that if we give five per cent increase to
derivation making 18 per cent, we should devote
another five per cent to development of mineral
resources so that we can share prosperity instead of sharing money from one part of the country. Friends
from the far North said no. Eventually after a series of meetings and discussions,
they said they agreed to that but there should be
another five per cent for insurgency, which was called
intervention fund. First of all, we cannot make terrorism economic
feature of our life. If you say you are giving this
money to terrorism, you are telling other parts of the
country to go and start terrorism so that they can
access money from the centre. And the money should be called National intervention
fund, to take care of problems, disaster in all parts of
the country. Eventually, we agreed, let’s have this
fund starting with the North-East and other parts of
the country.
When we got to the floor, General Nwachukwu was called to present the report of the committee. He
called Prof Gambari, who gave the report but when it
got to the National Intervention Fund, he said it was
meant for the North-East, North-West and North-
Central. That was how the meeting broke up. They were asked to go and come back nothing was
achieved until the last minute when it became clear
that some of our friends were looking forward to use
this to make the conference inconclusive. We said if that is the case let’s throw the matter
back to the president to set up a technical committee.
But the truth of the matter is the president does not
need a technical committee to fix derivation, he can
do it by fiat. The 1999 constitution says derivation
shall not be less than 13 per cent, it did not say not more than 13 per cent. Definitely, fair is fair. You cannot deny the South-South
derivation because it is in their area we are exploring
now, tomorrow we may explore in other parts of the
country and they will ask for these things.
But the challenge we have as a country is we have
started accepting indolence as a way of life; wealth without work. Between 2009 and 2012, four years, when you look at
the revenue that accrued to this country and how it
was shared, you will see that in those four years the
South-South gave the federation account an average
of 68 per cent; the South-West contributed 23 per cent
and South-East, eight per cent. The average for the North is zero per cent in those
four years. When you go to local government
allocation, the North took 54 per cent. The South that
produced 100 per cent of the revenue got 46 per cent. We now said, let’s democratise prosperity, let
everybody go and look for gold, calcium, limestone,
etc in his area but they said no. they want to make
terrorism an item for derivation but by and large the
conference management prevented people from
scuttling the conference. We will now go back on August 11 to dot the ‘Is’ and cross the ‘Ts’. But there was agreement that derivation should be
increased from 13 per cent to 18 per cent. What
happened to that agreement? Some consensus was built but we had not voted on it
at the plenary before they brought the issue of five
per cent for terrorism. On reports that some northerners are plotting to
scuttle the report of the conference
I want to say to those our friends that you cannot do
an abortion after the baby has been born. The
template for new Nigeria has been laid at this
conference; to now say you will abort it is to commit murder with consequences. So any attempt to scuttle
this conference now is to murder the future of Nigeria
and I do not know whether we will fold our hands and
allow you to murder the future of Nigeria. If there is any book that should be read in Arewa
House at this moment, I will recommend Barbara
Tuchman’s “The March of Folly” where the author
brilliantly showed how nations work against their
enlightened self-interest. He gave many examples, one of them was Britain. As
British colony, all America was asking for was four
seats in the British Parliament. In those days, it took
three months to travel from America to Britain. But
Britain refused. That refusal led to one thing and one thing led to
another until America fought the war of
independence. So, the far North should know that
there is a new dawn in Nigeria. The spirit of the people
has been unleashed and you cannot hold it back, you
cannot bind the people under the old order. Any attempt to do that will be courting unpleasant feelings. The people of Nigeria have decided at this conference
how they want to live as a people. If you now think
because you lost on some items you want to scuttle
the exercise, it is either you don’t want to be part of
the new Nigeria or you want to opt out of it. To think
you alone will reverse the will of Nigerians is a joke taken too far.

Source: VANGUARD