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Confab report’ll grow Nigeria, if… – FalaeElder statesman, politician and economist, Chief Olu Falae, believes that the recommendations of the National Conference would help to unite Nigeria if rigorously pursued. In this interview with BAMIGBOLA GBOLAGUNTE in Akure, Ondo State, the former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), bares his mind on some sundry issues. Excerpts:
The Chibok schoolgirls are yet to be released, as an elder statesman, what do you think is wrong?
We thank God that we still exist as a nation. We don’t celebrate failure; we don’t celebrate tragedy. What is happening is tragic; 218 girls were abducted more than six months ago and we don’t know where they are. We read one of them was already pregnant.
I suspect when the abduction took place, those evil men were going to destroy these girls by gang raping them and pass to them infectious diseases and make them pregnant and later release them. My fear is that one has been released pregnant, the remaining 218, where are they? I don’t know where we are heading and I only hope God will intervene and change the direction we are heading.
Do you believe we are still making progress in Nigeria or not?
We must admit as honest people that progress has been made, quantitative growth has taken place in Nigeria. We have built more roads since 1960, the population has grown tenfold, more universities have been built and the numbers of graduates have increased tremendously.
But qualitatively, where do we stand? Many roads have been built, but what is the quality of the roads? In some areas, progress has been made, in others disaster. It will be dishonest to say it is all disaster yet it is not rosy like the rest of life, it is a mixed bag.
Our worry is that there are more negatives than positives in terms of quality and safety of life and in terms of opportunity to get employment and to actualize their potentials. As an undergraduate about to graduate, I had three offers. I was a federal scholar, Federal Government offered me a job. I got a job from WABC, Ibadan, and from Shell Company. I had to choose one, but today you graduate, two, three years you are still struggling. In that area, it is a complete disaster. Progress has been made in certain areas and retrogression in others.
What do you think is responsible for Nigeria underdevelopment?
My humble opinion is that we inherited a constitution malformation, an unbalanced federation which was not designed for success. As soon as the British left, the instability began; emergency declared, rigging of elections, coups, civil war and all that. We got it wrong from the very beginning.
The second point is that because of the ethnic, religious and cultural composition of Nigeria, there are deep suspicions within the ruling elite and those in government quite often only take care of themselves. They hardly think of Nigeria as a country. I am yet to see a civilian President or governor who is passionate about developing Nigeria as Chief Obafemi Awolowo.
When Chief Awolowo was planning his free education, I leant that every minister in his cabinet had to go home to go and supervise the construction of schools in towns and villages in his area. It was as if the life of government depended on the actualization of that programme. Where is that zeal and commitment today?
People are more interested in getting big contracts, make money and become billionaire and hide the money in Switzerland and all those funny places. Once your focus is not in the development of the society, you cannot achieve much in the area of development. You can achieve more when your thoughts and energy are channelled to development.
As a participant in the National Conference, how optimistic are you about the implementation of the reports reached at the conference?
I believe God himself had a hand in that conference, otherwise how could we have succeeded in passing more than 600 resolutions without division, I was surprised. Yes, we worked very hard and negotiated, we built coalition and consensus but how come we succeeded in all the cases?
What emerged in my view is a beneficial blueprint for reinventing Nigeria, because when you look at the report, in every area we analyzed the problem and offered possible solutions that are beneficial to the people. Take railway for example, a country of a size of Nigeria has virtually no rail network to talk about, the single line we have from Lagos to Kano for the past 20 years have become non- functional.
That is why we are not growing as we should, why employment is not growing. The railway in India carries up to 20 millions a year and close to two millions work in the railway. We have virtually none here and it is because the Federal Government is the only agency that could establish a railway system. At the conference, we decided that the state government can now participate in developing railway network. What does that mean?
Take the South-West, we have six states and one of the decisions taken at the conference was that although we did not agree with regional government, we agreed with zonal commission under which the zone can do whatever they want, develop any industry, build anything they want. To me, it is like an experimental regional government.
What is wrong if the recommendation becomes law, Yoruba people who are the same race set up the zonal commission and gives it as a first assignment to build railway to link towns and communities in Yorubaland.
The construction of that network alone will provide at least half a million jobs and the effect on the economy of that area will be tremendous. It will make it easier to move people and goods for industry to develop. This is just one recommendation from the conference that can transform the country; other zones can do the same and do other things together.
The report also says, ports which the Federal Government monopolized can now be built by state government. We have three coastal states in South-West; Lagos, Ogun and Ondo states. Each of the states can build commercial port that will employ thousands of people to facilitate the movement of goods and services around the South-West.
Even solid minerals which had been the monopoly of the Federal Government since independence, what have they done about them? Next to nothing. The conference decided that mineral development can now be the joint efforts between the federal and state governments.
Take Ondo State, we have bitumen, the employment potential is at least one hundred thousand people and our people are unemployed. They wanted to employ 2,000 and 200,000 people applied.
We have a commodity which if developed can employ more than that number, in the light of this good potential, I can see people pressurizing government to implement this programme so that the benefit can be enjoyed.
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