Nationwide protest: I believe in constructive engagements with leaders, let’s give peace a chance–Umenzekwe
Hon (Chief) Modestus Umenzekwe (Onwa Achina) is a well-known ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) Chieftain with passion for nation building. In this interview in his office in Lagos, he speaks on the nationwide protest, and advocated constructive engagements with the leaders rather than protests that are always hijacked by hoodlums. CYRIACUS NNAJI reports. Excerpt:
The nationwide protest is still on, it was meant to be a peaceful protest, but now lots of things are happening, lives are being lost and properties worth billions destroyed, your view on all these
Ab initio in my last interview I advised against the protest, not that the people don’t have points, but when you look at the series of protests that have gone on in this country, they normally end up in violence and along the line, properties worth billions of Naira are destroyed, and lives you cannot qualify are wasted, so I believe that we are still maturing to use protest to make our demands known. If I say we are not mature, it would be a very expensive word; that is why I used the word maturing. So it is quite unfortunate and painful that lives were lost for one reason or the other. I am not blaming the protesters, neither am I blaming the police. But I blame those who muted the idea because they were not able to block the infiltration by bad elements and hoodlums. If they were able to block them, these sad events wouldn’t have been experienced.
However it has happened, it has happened, I commiserate with the families of the diseased, those who lost their lives, they paid the great price in the pursuit of what they feel was good for the entire citizenry. May the good Lord repose their souls and may the blood they have wasted to reposition this country and reposition the economy never go in vain.
The President Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, on August 4th, addressed the nation, some are commending the president, while others are criticizing it, where do you belong in all these?
As I said before, the protest wasn’t necessarily necessary. I always prefer constructive engagements with our leaders and that is why I advised against the protest. Now it has thrown us into mourning by virtue of those that lost their lives. I am not talking about the quantum of properties that were lost, that were destroyed even the national assets. Look at the carnage in Kano and other parts of the country, it is heartbreaking. Now the President took time to address the nation. Under normal circumstances if you are agitating for something in your household, and your father comes out to say, stop, I have heard you, the normal thing is to stop and watch his action. So the president intervened at the right time.
Don’t mind those calling him all sorts of names, he didn’t do this or that; he intervened at the right time and addressed the nation. I was listening to one activist on the Television; I can’t remember the name again, he was saying that the President did not address hunger. Then the presenter was asking the activist what have you expected the president to have done immediately, he starting jumping from one pillar to the other, I got disinterested. But when you look at the president’s speech, he said I am using my own word now, I am not quoting him verbatim, that they are putting down long term measures, but that does not mean that they are not putting short term something to quench the hunger, and that is why he distributed rice to every local government in this country through the states.
You see, Hunger has been in Nigeria, but let me say this, you can’t quench hunger without cooking, what I understand the president is saying is, they are preparing this food, give us some time, but in the meantime take this, we know that this is not enough, but take it to hold yourself while we come up with the food that will satisfy everybody. But you see the problem we have in this country is mindset, when you have a particular mindset, it is always difficult for people to change their mindset. That is exactly what is happening. And the people fueling the protest are on their toes, pushing hard, forgetting that if violence breaks out throughput the country, it will be a very very very dangerous wind that will blow no man any good.
So the President in his speech, to me, was passionate enough, he chose his words very carefully to drive home his message, because he himself was an activist, a great one for that matter. So he knows the terrain very well. Go and read that address line by line, but the thing like I said, is mindset, once somebody doesn’t like you, even if you give him your wife, he will still say that you are not doing well. I am not holding brief for the President, to say that he has gotten it all, but for the fact that he has come out to address us as a father, we supposed to back down and listen to him, that is the right thing to do. When your father has spoken, you must listen. And on that note I appeal to the Nigerian youths, I appeal to all of us, to please give peace a chance, let us watch and see how the president will meet the points he reeled out during his speech.
In his opening speech the President called for dialogue, but at the same time telling the protesters to suspend their protest and that the law enforcement agents should do their job. So the protesters are saying, you can’t hold the olive branch in one hand and a dagger on the hand.
No, no, no. The same thing boils down to mindset, negative one for that matter, which anyway is their right. But you see, no responsible government, all over the world will fold their hands and see the nations’ assets being destroyed in the name of protest for hunger. You can see there is no nexus there. You are hungry, and you are protesting and then you are destroying all the properties in your father’s house, it doesn’t tally. Because when you destroy those things, it won’t bring food rather it would create more hardship for your father to even provide food and your father has come out to say, calm down. So you can’t eat your cake and still have it.
And the police all over the world are known to be maintaining law and order, so I have not seen any mistake the president made. Even if there is no protest, the police must maintain law and order so that there would be peace. So it depends on how anybody interprets it. But as I said, I feel the president means very well for us, he should not allow this kind of carnage that is going on, that is the way I look at it.
I want us to look at this issue that whenever there is a protest in the country, the first thing people do is to burgle private and public warehouses, especially where there is food items, Do you think this is as a result of hunger in the land?
It is a combination of so many factors, but then that does not mean that the law permits you to do break and entry, but if government has released items for people and somebody went and packed it somewhere, repackaging it for his personal popularity or whatever, the person is inviting trouble. So it is a two way thing. If the FG has released something, go and give it to the people, because if you are hording it, you use people to do that and those people would go and tell people that these things from federal government are packed in so so and so warehouses, what that means is that at any slightest opportunity they would break and enter. So my advice is that the federal government should put in place a measure to checkmate the hording of palliatives being released to people, if those things they are carrying away are truly palliatives from the government, but when it is an individual effort and you break and enter the warehouse, you are a thief.
In all, I do not advise any youth, any Nigerian, any human being to enter any warehouse by force, anything illegal is illegal. But then the government should do something, both the federal government, state and local governments, must find a way of releasing items given to the people immediately. Remember, once it is released it is announced, and when the people don’t see it, and there is protest, they leverage on that, and once they break into such warehouse it becomes an all comers affair.
Following that question, whenever federal government says it released palliatives, money, material; since my many years of practising journalism, I have never seen nor heard a friend or neighbors saying they got such palliatives, what is actually happening?
I have never been in position to take custody of any palliative released by either the federal government, state or local government, I can only account for my own personal palliatives which I have given to people. So as a journalist, I advise you go deeper, and interrogate those who release those palliatives, the people they gave and those that supposed to get them, because I have never taken custody or shared any palliatives from the government. I can only account for what I have shared to people out of my own personal sweat in the little way I can to participate in nation building.
I know you have been against the protest, of course, huge and humongous amount of money have been wasted as a result of the protest; government offices are not opening, individual business, especially where the protest is heating up, are not opened
These are the effects of the protest. As a matter of fact, violence has not solved any problem. You can organize yourselves in groups, formally book an appointment with a leader, and that is what the president, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is talking about, if you are writing and he is not giving it attention or some people are blocking the letter or blocking the way, because it normally happens, then you give him an open letter on the pages of newspaper, he will see it and still call your attention, rather than going into protest with genuine intention then bad elements will infiltrate and truncate your good motive, and you will be labeled as someone who participated in destroying national assets.
Do you have other things in your mind
What I am saying is that the president has spoken, let all protests be suspended
What are you advising the public, because people are really suffering?
Nobody has denied that, even the president, even myself speaking to you, it is not easy for me at all, but that would not warrant me organising certain gathering that might lead to unrest. The president has told us what he has done and what he intends to do, let us give him time, something is on ground. And you see, when people say he didn’t do this, he didn’t change policies, you see, there are certain things that are constitutional; the president hasn’t the right to get up one day and change certain things that are constitutional, until people realize that, we are heading nowhere. Someone came to my office and say the president should make statement, do restructuring, do devolution of power, do this, I said, these are constitutional issues, it is democracy which the national assembly must debate, discuss; it is even the national assembly that will do that, the president will only give his assent.
Until we understand the type of government we are operating, we might be making a mistake. But what baffles me is that some elite who understand these things either they are afraid or for whatever reason, refuse to advise some of the young ones who are not informed enough to know what we are practicing.
On a final note, Asiwaju, everybody knows him as an activist, and he has not denied it. Now he is on the throne, it is expected that we should give him sometime as an activist to do what I may call constructive and legalised revolution in line with the constitution to give Nigerian citizens what they want and it will take some time.
