Dr. Benjamin Onoriode Irikefe is the National Patron of the Youth Wing and Board of Trustee of the National Coalition for Jonathan/Sambo Presidency (NCJSP), a group with the mission to campaign in all the nook and cranny of the country with the aim to ensure that President Jonathan emerges the next President of Nigeria in 2015. Our crew of Nyerhovwo Oghenetejiri and Francis Sadhere spoke with him recently in Warri about how they were going to achieve the mission of the group and other hot topics in the polity. Excerpt:
Please introduce yourself to us.
My name is Dr. Benjamin Onoriode Irikefe, National Patron, Youth Wing and Secretary, Board of Trustees, National Coalition for Jonathan/Sambo Presidency (NCJSP). I was a former member of Presidential Panel on National Security in 2002. I was also the Statement Chairman of the first Presidential Retreat that was held at the International Center in 2001. I was involved in the training of non-militants and ex-militants in the Amnesty Programme of President Jonathan. I was training them on learning various skills so that they can have a sustainable livelihood.
What is the mission of this your group?
Our mission is to mobilize massive sustainable support for President Goodluck Jonathan. Our goal is to achieve a landslide victory for President Jonathan in 2015, even more than what he achieved in 2011.
What is your spread?
We are in the 32 states of the country and the federal capital territory cutting across the 774 Local Government in the country. Apart from having the local government structure we equally have the ward structure. We cover the nook and cranny of the country. We also have the Diaspora branches outside the country.
How do you intend to achieve this mission seeing that it is a herculean task?
The fact is that our association has over 727 political associations, cultural societies, civil society groups and even ex-militants. Our driving structures that we have at the ward and local government levels have started advocacy visits to key stakeholders across the country. We are equally carrying out stake holder consultations, sensitization and awareness campaign informing the people that President Jonathan is the only person that can lead us to the Promised Land. What we are saying is that, there is no alternative to President Jonathan.
What will you do if PDP refuses to pick Jonathan as their candidate?
The fact is that PDP has no alternative to President Jonathan. Why I am saying is that except you are a blind man, if you are shown a black and white paper you will know the difference. The track records of President Jonathan can speak for themselves. We have found out that some disgruntled elements, unpatriotic persons are making deliberate efforts to frustrate and sabotage the good work he is doing for the country.
Please tell us one good thing he has done for the country that will make the people want to vote for him?
We all know about the situation of power in this country before he became the president. They say seek ye first the kingdom of power and all other things will follow. Right from the time of NEPA, PHCN and the rest of it, power has been epileptic in the country. President Jonathan took a queue from the telecommunication sector and realized that it is not the business of government to be handling power. So he went on to bring in investors into the business and to a large extent, in the history of the country, he has been able to pursue this issue of power to a logical conclusion. Both the generating companies and the distribution companies have been sold to world renowned generating and distributing companies. The Niger Delta distribution company is trying to sell out all its infrastructures to core investors. And we know that people are bringing billion from their country and the money is not for joke and the will want to see returns on their investment. It is true that power seems to be going down but this is expected because it is what I call the post privatizations blues. For instant, let us look at Ughelli Power plant; Elumelu is the one that bought that place. But they have not been able to get up to five percent of the power capacity of that station. They need turbine to generate more power to benefit them. I expect that the price of electricity will go up because good things do not come easy. For this interregnum, I am appealing to people to bear with President Jonathan. The reason why so many people are crying that they do not see what he is doing is because of what we call operations management. Operations have to do with raw material as inputs, semi-finished goods as work in progress and output, as finished products. Most of the things the President Jonathan is doing right now are at the stage of semi-finished product. In due time these things will now come out as finished products.
How do you see the way President Jonathan is handling the abduction of school girls by boko haram?
As you know I am not a layman in security issues. I am aware of the national security operating procedure and the national security infrastructure. Now if people get up and begin to commit crime, it is not the fault of the president. It is obvious that what is happening in the north-east is not domestic crimes. These are sponsored crimes and they have foreign components. It is being alleged that these foreign components are dropping weapons along our borders with aircrafts. Certain persons are involved in smuggling of weapons to them. It is worthy of note that these things happening here also happen even in America and even Israel who have all the security apparatus to fight terrorism. You cannot stop evil men from perpetrating evil. There are people who are head bound in frustrating his second term bid and they are collaborating with foreign element to achieve their aims. But I can tell you that the Egyptian you see today, you will not see them tomorrow. So it is not an issue of failure. Nigeria is one of the safest places on earth because if you go to other places in the world it is worst. People are trying to bomb America everyday but just because of their security network, monitoring and the internet, they have been able to track them down. So it is not a sign of failure about insurgency. Insurgency is alien to Nigeria. When the Niger Delta people were fighting a just cause because of the neglect of their region and they were told to come out and lay their claims, they came and say, develop our lands and their will not be single bullet. The federal government went ahead and set up an amnesty community and said, ‘look they have dropped their weapons, let us see their grievances and how to address them.’ But in the case of boko haram, they never responded. Instead they made jest of it and say they were the ones to give federal government amnesty. So it is most unfortunate that people have taken it upon themselves to do evil. Like here now, all of a sudden if people start abducting people, shooting and bombing people, are you going to blame the federal government? He is not God. There are laws governing rules of combating this forces because if you do it wrong, they may even accuse you of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The army under general Minima is very much on top of the situation. In Sambisa forest where they say the militants are living, that place is a home to many communities. So if you go there and say you want to do aerial bombing, it will be like killing a fly in your scrotum with a sledge hammer. It is a complicated issue. And the worst thing is that there are some people who are stoking the fire. Everybody can prepare a bomb but the question is, will you do it? So Jonathan is not the cause of what is happening and he has not mishandled it in any way. He is just been careful. Up till today he has not removed the governors of the affected states. It is unfortunate that some governors like the Adamawa Governor is trying to create confusion by making statements that is unbecoming of a governor. It is most disgraceful comment. Is it Jonathan that put words into his mouth? His own people are even fighting him asking him why he is making such statements.
Large number of people are defecting from PDP, how will this affect President Jonathan’s chances?
This issue has been settled. It will amount to grass irresponsibility if a man who has the platform of the PDP to become a governor, a minister, a federal legislature, a state legislator and after raising you to that level you now say you are leaving the party and joining disgruntled people. What you are saying is that the people have made a mistake in electing you. So they are biting the fingers that feeds them and in due cause nemesis will catch up with them. Some of the bad eggs have left. It is like when you remove a cancerous tumor from your body, you become very free. Now PDP have more genuine supporters unlike some people who have double loyalty. It does not affect the chances of President Jonathan. What we are trying to do is that, we are not trying to tell you whether President Jonathan is going to run but we are telling you authoritatively that we are working for him. Two, it is not a question of whether President Jonathan is going to win or not but what we are saying is that he is going to beat the record he scored in 2011.
How effective is this your group in the north?
It is obvious that it is the most formidable political, civil society group organization that has its structures built all over the country. At the inauguration, the South-South National Publicity Director was there. The inauguration was done in the glare and all the states were in attendants and from the video, you will discover that it was the northerners that were even more in attendant because they have realized that most of the elites were using them as canon powder to achieve their own selfish games. So the masses in the north have now seen the light and they have now dissociated themselves from those that have been misruling them because one of the insecurity failures in the north is lack of leadership failure. Leadership failure is a very serious thing that bothers on national security because of disempowerment; they will be available for use by any disgruntled group and power seekers. And it is obvious that they are finding solace in this group. PDP are in total support of this group 100%. You can go to the National Chairman and National Secretary and ask them about this group. On a final note, I will tell you that President Jonathan is the only man that can save Nigeria from this quagmire.
What is your message to Nigerians?
Nigerians have now known the difference between an enemy and a friend. President Jonathan is a great integrator, a peace maker, a harmonizer, a mobilizer and he is a man that has a lion’s heart and is patient enough to manage this crisis that is on ground. If he were some other persons, the country would have long disintegrated.
Thank you sir.
