The President of the Credibility Group, Ide Goddy Uwazurike, has asserted that the conviction of Simon Ekpa for terrorism in Finland was a good development for the South-East.

Reacting to Ekpa’s six-year imprisonment in Finland for terrorism, Uwazurike said he hoped Ekpa would permanently stay out of Igbo affairs.

In an interview with VINCENT KALU, Uwazurike, a former president of Aka Ikenga, warned the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) against taking the opposition coalition for granted, noting that it was such show of contempt by former President Goodluck Jonathan against the then fledgling APC that shoved him out of power in 2015. He also spoke on other issues.

Simon Ekpa, the self-acclaimed factional leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), has been sentenced to six years imprisonment in Finland for terrorism. What is your reaction to this?

My view is very simple. You don’t stay far away and instigate violence where you come from. It’s called terrorism. Over the years, we have known about Simon Ekpa and his role. For those who do not know, he was never really an IPOB member; he rushed in as soon as Nnamdi Kanu was arrested in 2015 by the Buhari government. He rushed in to help, especially with the financing of the Radio Biafra. They took him in as any other person, and the next thing they knew, he had already formed his own group claiming now to be the new leader of Biafra; the prime minister.

The mainstream IPOB recognized what he was doing, and immediately distanced itself from him. I remember the IPOB Spokesman, Emma Powerful, warning that this man is not one of them, and is causing havoc. So, when this issue of Monday sit-at-home came up, the IPOB denounced him immediately without wasting time. But because he had control of the radio, he kept on using that to broadcast anything and those who were listening to him and obeying him were not IPOB members; most of them are criminals who live inside the forest and come out to cause havoc and then go away.

Simon Ekpa had his own unknown gunmen, just like the original unknown gunmen came up in April 2021 and everybody suspected they came from the Nigerian government. They came to Owerri, destroyed many things; freed some prisoners, they went to Oshogbo and did the same thing; went to Ibadan, did the same thing; in Kaba and Kogi, they did the same thing.

They are among those destroying Igbo land, and the Igbo are not happy with this Monday sit-at-home.

By way of information, on Mondays, even the military and police do not come. In other words, they yielded the space for Simon Ekpa and his people. They really damaged our economy. I can say this without fear of contradiction. He and his men damaged our economy. So, let us pray that he stays permanently out of Igbo affairs.

What lesson should his followers learn?

His followers actually are criminals. They had no ideology, but they all had one deceptive manner. Once they strike, they announce that they are IPOB, fighting for Nnamdi Kanu. So, his followers should know that now that their master is out, that they themselves are in trouble; and if they are smart, they will pack up and go home. They have caused enough damage. For the average Igbo man, we do not support Simon Ekpa and we will never support him. But those who live abroad are the major sources of income for Simon Ekpa and his people. They were donating money believing that Simon Ekpa was actually fighting for Kanu. But, he has never fought for him.

I have been to court several times for Kanu, and we never knew of any of his involvement. The defence of Nnamdi Kanu is expensive; yet, Ekpa was collecting money, left and right, but he never sent any to help in the court matter. Everything was there for himself, himself, and himself.

What is your take on the coalition building up to wrestle power from President Bola Tinubu in 2027?

Change is a permanent thing in life. Remember that there was a gang up in 2013, and by 2014 they had already formed what is called All Progressives Congress (APC) today, and they were able to through fair and foul means remove President Goodluck Jonathan.

So, for 2027, I know that a lot of groups are merging and demerging. In 2013, 2014, everybody took it for granted that APC will not work because it was amalgamation of ANPP, ACN, and of course CPC, and Rochas Okorocha coming in as the sole man of APGA, and claiming that APGA was part of it.

When Buhari took over, he made sure he ran a CPC government. So, today, those who were part of the legacy parties are feeling disenchanted that ACN is dominating in Tinubu’s government. So, most of them have moved out. They used Buhari’s name initially, but he said, no, don’t do that.

Finally, they have ADC, which ab initio had problems, and now they are zeroing in on two people, as far as I know, Peter Obi and Goodluck Jonathan.

Those prompting Jonathan, I’m sure they know the implication of what they’re doing. In other words, they want to destroy Peter Obi’s base. That is my own understanding.

We have a loquacious minister, who is always talking every day, pontificating. I believe ADC will act.

PDP is like a man with one leg. That’s the only way I would describe PDP because the same minister is in charge of who becomes secretary, who becomes chairman.

And as long as he’s there, PDP will never move. So those who moved to ADC have read the writing on the wall. Many of the PDP members, who are governors, will eventually move to ADC. They will, because if you are in a party where there is no road, what do you do? You shift and go on. I don’t want to discountenance anything going on. Labour Party has a man who still claims to be the chairman when the Supreme Court has said that his tenure is over.

A recent report gave details of President Tinubu’s project allocations, with Lagos getting the lion share. But the presidency countered it by saying that the president is treating every zone equally. What do you say to this?

As a lawyer, the fact speaks for itself. If you want to know whether Tinubu is running a federal character or is ruining a federal character, or he’s destroying a federal character, look at all the revenue generating agencies. The heads of these agencies are from one side of the country.

Without exception, the Chief Justice of Nigeria goes by seniority, but what about the others?

All the heads of the security agencies, the police, the army, the DSS, NSCDC are from one place, the same with the EFCC, ICPC, the Customs, and FIRS, etc.

Do you need to tell a blind man that there is no salt in the soup? The fact speaks for itself that President Tinubu does not care. All he knows is parochial appointments, and he is making no bones about it.

No matter how minor the appointment, you can bet where that person will come from. If other regions are complaining, they have every reason to do that. From time to time, the president exposes his real inner circle. Buhari did the same thing.

I don’t know that it’s part of the plan of APC, that whoever is president makes sure that only his people, only those who speak his own dialect, not to talk of language are around him all the time. And that is why Buhari failed tremendously. And his men, who are alive are struggling today to say, oh he tried.

Tinubu had a chance; he has been an agitator for a long time for good governance, but now that he has a chance, he has messed it up. Bayo Onanuga and his people who are issuing statements are very funny. One thing I know was true was that the South-East received a tiny bit of attention and I’m happy that they even said it there in their post.

So, it is not the Igbo man complaining. No, it is the government showing that the Igbo man is marginalized. When we noticed this kind of parochial mentality under Buhari 10 years ago, I remember I told him that the Igbo will survive. And I can say this to Tinubu, the Igbo must survive.

People complained about Buhari’s alleged nepotism, and Tinubu is being accused of the same thing. Do you agree? Are there similarities between the two?

Tinubu is still unfolding. You can’t judge a man who has gone just a little over halfway of what his intentions are. I know elections are coming up. The primaries are coming up next year. By then, I’m sure he will dissolve his cabinet and then try to show that he’s a federal character man. So let’s keep our fingers crossed.

Buhari was a colossal failure. He was a congenital failure. It’s not so important that you must know, but you have to be ready to learn.

Buhari did not want to learn. All he knew was that he knew, and he knew nothing.

How can you describe the state of the nation?

The state of the nation is that the Naira has been destroyed from 2015 to date. Anybody who had one million naira in his bank account in 2015, when one dollar was N170, and that money is left untouched in the bank, and you now convert to dollar, you have the shock of your life.

Let me even give you a small example. When Jonathan was there, minimum wage was N18, 000. The basic civil servants would simply buy a bag of rice for N7, 000, give his wife N5, 000, keep out the other one for his transport, and then put the other one for gallivanting and still have money. But when Buhari came, he moved the minimum wage to N30, 000. It was not enough to buy a bag of rice.

Now, Tinubu came to correct everything, to renew the hope, and it became horrible.

What of schooling? The biggest disaster of this country, of this regime today since the day of this nation is the vicious attempt to destroy education.

What do I mean? For years, the average panel beater, the vulcanizer, the fuel attendant, the mechanic, etc., could send their children to school, to universities.

And each time I see the children graduate, you see some come to the workshop in the academic gowns. Some come with bands. I still remember a woman frying Akara, and her daughter arrived in her youth service attire, saluting, and said: ‘Mum, let me take over the frying.’ Her mum said, ‘no, no, you will dirty your clothes’. And the answer was simple and direct by her daughter: ‘It is this dirty Akara that gave me this attire. So, if it gets dirty, it’s no problem. It is the pride of the nation.’

Today, education has been made to be beyond the reach of the average person, and we are gallivanting. When they were destroying the manufacturing industry in Nigeria from 2015, no reasonable manufacturer is left here, and those who are here are Nigerians.

I give one example. Innoson is busy assembling cars, manufacturing and doing everything without the government support; instead you have one bank trying to kill it and what does the government do? The same cars that Innoson could have assembled for them, the government went and imported them from South Korea. The first beneficiaries are the engineers, artisans in South Korea. The second beneficiaries are the Nigerian importers, while the Nigerian economy is the loser. You now noticed that Unilever, John Holt, AJ Seward etc. have gone. When Buhari closed the borders, he destroyed the small-scale manufacturers who go through the borders to service the markets in the West African sub-region. Some Nigerians traders quickly moved to Ghana from where they could do their businesses because we have myopic leaders.

They send their children to school abroad and bring them back, and give them big posts where they mess up. If you doubt me, go to any nightclub, and see who and who are there.

Nigeria is on a doldrums, it is teetering on the precipice of a big mountain looking into the valley, wondering whether it can ever come out. Agriculture is one thing every country looks for because if a country cannot feed itself, it has a problem. Why can’t the government send tractors to various states to go into the farms for one week and farm anywhere it does not matter who owns it, plant massively and by the time the plants mature we enjoy it as the cost of food will be reduced, but the government does not do that.

Will the leaders in government eat Nigerian-made food? No. Will they drink Nigerian-made wine? No. So, there is a big problem. Nigeria is in trouble.

Former Coordinating Minister of the Economy and Director General of World Trade Organisation, Dr. Ngozi Okonji-Iweala, applauded Tinubu’s economic reforms. Is this not a confirmation that he’s on the right path?

That news was released by the media team of Mr. President. It was an abridged form of that interview. She later released the full coverage, where she said Nigerians are suffering, and that the president should put in place programmes to alleviate our suffering. She said so. Whenever a visitor goes to Aso Rock, they allow only the official photographer and official video man to be present and then Bayo and his team will write a statement and release it to the world. This is what happened. Ngozi went with her own team. So, the federal government released its own, while Ngozi later released hers. She made it quite clear that Nigerians are suffering. The APC government is very good in propaganda, and if you are going there, please, go with your own team.

The National Assembly has been having town hall meetings for the review of the constitution. What is your position on this?

Well, the greatest tragedy that befell this country was when Jonathan failed to get re-elected. When we were at the 2014 National Conference, we even prepared a proposed constitution. We had various motions drafted. We had everything, changes, and Jonathan received it and said, since election was coming in the next couple of months, there’s no way I could embark on it. After election, I’ll do that.

As soon as Buhari came, Buhari said, I won’t even look at it, and he never did.

So what APC has been doing is once in a while, they just borrow one page and then announce changes. Buhari hated restructuring, even though he campaigned on the basis of restructuring. The 2015 manifesto of APC said, this country will be restructured, and Buhari, as soon as he came to power, he denounced it.

Now, Tinubu was a champion of restructuring, so we expected more. He should begin to do something about that.

But the National Assembly today, the way they’re going, they may not even effect any changes in our constitution. The issue of creation of states was handled at the national conference, but today they’re messing it up. Because, to create a state is not just a question of motion of those in favour say, aye; those against say, nay. The constitution is very clear on how to do certain things. And I don’t think the APC-led legislature is ready for that. Every four years, they have a jamboree, they go around the country to excite the people, incite some orders, and before you know it, the tenure is over.

By next year, everybody will be worried about primaries. By next year, primaries will come up. Most of these legislators will not even be there in Abuja.

Remember that to amend the constitution, it is not just the National Assembly; the states will have to be involved. It is like the State Police that we talk about, some of the governors are involved, some are not involved, and so, it is just hanging. So I don’t think the present legislature is really serious about any changes in the constitution.

What’s your view on the security situation in the country?

I am lost for words. Our companions today when it comes to insecurity are South Sudan, Sudan, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and of course, Venezuela.

These are countries you compare with Nigeria; they are running neck to neck. We have General Officers Commanding (GOCs) in the Nigeria Army. What is wrong with the president telling them, move and in one week they would clear all these criminals? When the army retreats, the terrorists and other criminals would come back. I will give you an example with the South-East.

There is a forest between Imo and Anambra, which is the base of the criminals led by Simon Ekpa. From time to time, the army will be based in Onitsha or some other place, and they would announce the next place they were going. And the criminals would run away. The military operatives hang around for some days and then go back. Nature abhors a vacuum and once they go back, the criminals will come back, so the business continues. There is even one called the Biafran Liberation Movement, led by a well-known kidnapper. The word out was that he was sponsored because he tried to scuttle elections. In 2003, he did everything, telling people not to come out to vote and that affected the voting strength of South-East. If you remember in 2007 or so, we had what was called the Biafra Zionist Movement. This group chased out those who were doing census and that affected the figures from the South-East.

Insecurity is a way of life in Nigeria today. If somebody is going to Ibadan, I tell the person, please, keep sending me messages once you cross certain places. If the person is going to Oshogbo, I will tell him to keep calling me.

Do you still remember when parents would gather at the National Stadium, Surulere, Lagos, to entrust their children about 12 years old to bus drivers who would take the students to Federal Government Colleges in Maiduguri, Sokoto, and Katsina, etc? And they would bring them back during the holidays. Can you do that now? If a person in Lagos is posted for national youth service in Maiduguri or Zamfara, he would object to it. In the same way, send a person in Imo to Katsina, he will tell you that he won’t go. That is the state of insecurity we have. For one reason or the other, the powers that be are very happy with it. (Saturday Sun)