In this interview with State House Correspondents, Special Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati reviews the achievements of the present administration in 2012, saying lots more will be achieved in 2013. He also describes his boss as an impeccable democrat who will not allow criticisms regarding his style turn him into a dictator. Abdulrahman Abdulraheem was there. People have described President Jonathan as being slow in taking decisions and achieving results. What would you say are the things that have been done differently since he became President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria?
Since President Jonathan assumed office, a lot has changed in this country and a lot is still changing. You should have asked specifically what has been done differently. I think principally, Nigerians have seen a change in style of leadership. For many years, even after the military rule and return to democracy in 1999, Nigerians have been used to a dictatorial style of leadership. They have been used to the idea of a leader as a brute. Because of the circumstances that attended President Yar'Adua's administration, Nigerians didn't quite have the time, the opportunity to comment on his style. But what you can see is that with President Jonathan, the kind of criticisms that people are putting across, simply indicate that many Nigerians still have a military hangover. Nigerians are not yet used to the fact that a leader can be a gentleman. Nigerians are not yet used to the fact that a leader can respect the rule of law. They are not yet used to the fact that a leader can observe and respect due process. Now, under this President, there is a new reality. The age of impunity in terms of the style of governance has since ended. We have seen in this country for so many years a situation whereby government goes out of its way to break the law. I once read a book about how government breaks the law. But under President Jonathan, you see the President and his administration respecting the rule of law every step of the way and where you can find this demonstrated more graphically I think is in the conduct of elections and bye elections that we have had under President Jonathan. Under President Jonathan, free and fair elections have become well established and transparency in elections has become well established. When last did you hear of lorry loads of policemen being sent to any state on the orders of anyone in Abuja to go and force the issue in a particular election? It has not happened under this President.
Have you ever heard of President Jonathan sending soldiers to go and remove a governor or to go and sack a State House of Assembly? That has not happened. So, significantly, there has been that change and I think that with time, Nigerians will begin to get used to the reality that when you say you are running a democracy, there are certain principles; there are certain ethics that are foundational and fundamental. And what this president has done in terms of the structure and process of government is to ensure that democracy is consolidated because, for him, that is the basic foundation. In terms of how government impacts on society, first there must be transformation at the level of attitude and mentality. That is one major thing that is being done differently and I have not seen anybody who does not agree with this.
The second major thing that we have seen is that under President Jonathan, this has become a much more open society. The right of the individual to choose, the right of the individual to speak, the right of the individual to express himself or herself has been very well maintained under this administration. Somebody was saying there are some foreigners who come to Nigeria and when they read our newspapers or listen to the media, they wonder what is going on here. Of course they do that in terms of comparison with where they are coming from. So, the press in Nigeria is very free. The government allows a free inter-play of ideas. You will recall that since 1999, before President Jonathan, that was not always exactly the case. So, how do you now criticise the leader who is allowing free space for expression, who is allowing the flowering of the human spirit and who at the same time is humane in his approach to issues. Now, another leg of it; when you use the word slow, a lot of people say this in terms of what they consider to be what the government is doing, but I have answered this question again and again. When a government takes power, things do not just happen overnight.
There are processes; there are projects that we need to scrutinize because due process would have to be followed. But at the time people were making that point, that was early in the life of the administration when people were impatient and they were just looking for all kinds of adjectives with which they could discredit the administration. Some of the people behind that propaganda- because that was also propaganda- were trying to change the perception of the public about the capability of the administration. Those people were also doing it for political reasons. But I think that Nigerians are better informed now. I think that the majority of Nigerians have a different opinion now because if you look around in the last one year, so much has changed.
When the power supply situation improved, it wasn't government that carried a loud speaker to go and tell people that there has been improvement in power supply. Nigerians themselves started talking about it. And as at this December, close to 5000 mega watts have been generated and anybody who wants to be honest with you will admit that indeed there has been improvement in that area. Even the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria held a meeting with the government to say they are thankful that the power situation has improved, but government should still do a lot more to support the real sector. In the last two months, if you look at some of the incentives that have been given to the real sector, these are meant to encourage productivity within the economy. All of that is not a result of slowness. It is a result of deliberate planning and purpose-oriented leadership which President Jonathan provides.
Look at foreign investment. If you look at the report, there has been more Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in-flow into Nigeria in the last two quarters of 2012. There are even plans to bail out the ailing airlines because part of the problems we are having is that there are not too many airlines operating at the moment. It is not just the aviation sector. The railway has been revived; the same railway project that some administration in the past were just toying with. People are now talking about rail travel. When we were in the secondary school or so, in social studies, we used to draw the railway lines of Nigeria. But there was later a period in Nigeria when school children did not even know anything about railway stations. That has changed under President Jonathan.
There has also been a lot of investment in education. The Almajiri school concept is meant to get so many kids in the Northern part of Nigeria off the street and to reduce the number of kids who are available for recruitment for dastardly purposes. Above all, this is a government that listens. When the furore over the deregulation of the downstream sector became an issue, government listened to the people. When there was an outcry over the likely introduction of N5000 notes, government listened to the people. So, I don't know whether some of the people who are still saying government is weak or slow take weakness to mean that the President listens. Maybe what they are saying is that they prefer a dictator to a leader who is humane and who is purposeful. If that is what they are asking for that would be unfortunate because once you are elected to run a democracy, you should abide by the principles and ethics.
I have just mentioned a few sectors. If you look at agriculture; if you look at the entrepreneurship empowerment programme; all these are designed to create jobs, to create opportunities and change the style of doing things. In this same country, anytime people talked about agriculture, what came to mind is fertilizer scam. There was a time the Ministry of Agriculture specialised in the distribution of fertilizer. But now that has changed; there is nobody to collect rent on fertilizer anymore because under President Jonathan that has been stopped. The agricultural programme of government cannot be a fertilizer scam process. Rather, agric has become real business; it has become one of those key targets for the empowerment of the Nigerian people. And because these changes are happening, a number of persons who feel shut out are likely to become desperate and they are likely to sponsor all kinds of misperceptions against the government. If you were making your money from the fertilizer scam and government has changed that, you are not likely to be happy with government. This government has decided that it must focus on service delivery and not rent collection; not the entitlement mentality of old.
Now when you want to change the system like that from within, people are bound to resist it out of fear, out of desperation and out of mischief. And the thing to tell Nigerians is that once you have accepted the idea of transformation and you voted for it, then you must be prepared for that transformation and transformation will come with its own cost because it means that certain things just must change. A President who preaches transformation, and who is leading a democratic system cannot be the kind of bully that people are saying they want. You can't say you want a democrat as a leader and at the same time you say you want a leader who can dictate and push people around. You see that this President doesn't push people around; he respects them and always, that is what we need; leaders that are humane, that are God fearing and in whom we can see a reflection of ourselves and who give us every reason and every cause to be hopeful and that is what this President represents.
What is the level of the implementation of the 2012 budget and how does the President intend to improve on it in 2013, including the different policy programmes like national tax policy, policy on housing among others?
There are policies that have been introduced this year in terms of taxation, in terms of housing, in terms of job creation and in terms of even the real definition of the foreign policy orientation and processes of the Federal Government of Nigeria. If you look at what I have said earlier about the aviation sector, the whole policy is to transform that sector. Much earlier, the President had a seminar on the foreign policy process of Nigeria to strengthen the focus on citizen diplomacy, if I may borrow that term, and on the investment side. Now, if you look at all his trips this year, those two issues had been in the front burner and Nigeria now has a more productivity driven foreign policy process. Each time the President travels, he is looking for business and investment opportunities for Nigeria and he uses the opportunity of his travels also to engage Nigerians in Diaspora. There is no country that he visited that he didn't squeeze out time to meet with Nigerians there to know what the issues are. All that came out of the quality reorientation. And you can go like that from one sector to the other: solid minerals, the policy of greater productivity, the petroleum sector, the PIB. This government has sent the PIB back to the National Assembly and it is optimistic that under this administration, that piece of legislation will be passed. Reform of the justice sector; a lot has been done by the ministry of justice to fine tune the justice delivery system and to strengthen Nigeria's place in the world. It was under this President that Nigerians won appointments into major international legal institutions. So, what we have seen demonstrated this year is that in terms of quality, this is a government that is capable, that is determined to formulate policies and see those policies through. And you can be sure that in 2013, that is going to continue. The budget for 2013 has as its theme such issues as fiscal consolidation and inclusive growth, which means that most of what has been done this year will be done and a lot more will be done to even make growth more inclusive. You talked about budget implementation. People ought to know that budget implementation is a process and that is why some people have been recommending a situation whereby we have budget cycles rather than this yearly thing because once you start a procurement process, the procurement process is a process so defined. So, it doesn't mean that when a ministry is embarking on a particular cause of action, it will just collect money and the money is spent like that. No. Processes will be followed. Nigeria has had over the years many abandoned projects and unfulfilled dreams. It is because the processes were not followed and because there was no discipline in budget implementation. Under this President, that discipline is being enforced and that is why this year alone, President Jonathan did something novel in Nigerian history. He got the ministers to sign a performance contract. He got the ministers to state their key performance indicators. A ministerial appointment as the President has made clear, is not an opportunity for you to come and moonlight. And the assessment is still even continuing. It is one of the first major things that would be concluded in the New Year; taking a look at what has been done; if there are challenges, how can those challenges be addressed. You minister A, how much were you given? This is how much I received; these are the things I said I will do in my performance contract and this is what I have been able to do. These are the challenges I faced. In the coming year, my ministry will do this. I don't think there has ever been anytime in the history of Nigerian government that ministers are subjected to this level of rigour in terms of accountability. And I think that Nigerians should note that, because this is one thing that happened this year and it was very well reported in the public domain. It is an innovation that President Jonathan has introduced that should be copied even at other lower levels.
Why is the President yet to appoint the ministers of Power and Defense?
The thing to note is that when people ask that question, they give the impression that maybe because those two ministries do not have substantive ministers yet, there is a vacuum. But the truth is that there is no vacuum in the real sense because the ministers of state that are there are running those ministries. If there is any vacuum that people are looking for, people are probably saying certain states are to get those positions or the quota and they want it filled so that those states can benefit. All of that is coming out of this our federal character approach to appointments. But in terms of the functioning of those ministries, in terms of the running of those ministries, nothing has been lost and nothing has been sacrificed. But I can assure you that the President in his own time will fill those positions because it is not just that you fill positions, a lot goes into it. I have not had the opportunity to appoint anybody, but from watching the President at work, I know that you don't just wake up and just appoint people. There is a lot that goes into it and once the time is ripe, you can be assured that the President will do it. So, people should stop putting him under pressure. Those ministries are functioning; if you look at power, since the minister of state for power took over, that ministry has been functioning. In fact, progress has even been made. If you look at Defence, the woman who is there has been running the ministry. So, it is not as if because two slots have not been filled that anything has happened and in any case, people must also realise that ministerial positions are delegated positions. Under a presidential system, all authorities draw from the top, at least within the executive branch. So, the President delegates authority to ministers and he can delegate authority to whoever he so wishes for the smooth running of government because he is both Head of State and Head of Government.
What concrete step is government taking to unravel the cause of that helicopter crash that killed six Nigerians on December 15th in Bayelsa?
What President Jonathan has done was that immediately after the incident, he ordered a probe.
Immediately after the incident, he called a meeting; the minister of state for defense, the service chiefs, the minister of aviation and all the relevant government people and he gave directive that he wanted a probe of what may have led to the accident or what may have been responsible. I think we should allow the probe that is ongoing to be concluded. I do not think that what happened was a comment on the aviation industry; it has nothing to do with that and I think that the FAAN and the ministry of aviation already made this clear that there is a distinction between civil aviation operations and military operations. That distinction is important, but people jumped and claimed that this was a comment on the aviation industry. They are two different matters. But as I have said, President Jonathan spoke immediately after the incident that same day and he ordered an investigation, after he had ensured that the various families have been contacted and informed.
I have also heard comments that people first heard of it here and there. Government doesn't work that way. Lives were involved. If people died in an accident, government will take the precaution to inform the families, to take steps to ensure security and to make sure that everything was in order before making statements. I cannot give you details in this regard, but I see that in terms of the comments that a lot of people make, they really don't know how government works and they really also do not understand that where human lives are involved, there are certain preliminary steps that must first be taken. But of course the incident is very sad.
People's Daily
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