Balogun Segun Feyisola is a Labour Party chieftain in Ogun State. In this interview with Assistant Editor, AKIN SOKOYA, he talked about the state of the nation, why he is throwing his weight behind APC led government, his assessment on Lagos and Ogun State governments among other issues. Excerpts
Your voice has not been heard in the political terrain for a while now, what’s responsible for this?
I’ve been very much around in my professional duties all this while and we are monitoring the situation of things in the governance of the country.
This administration has been criticized by those who think it did not perform up to the expectation of the citizens, how would you assess President Buhari’s cabinet after over a year in office?
It depends on the yardstick those who think this government did not perform are measuring it. I don’t know where they were when the previous government was postponing the elections and was sharing Nigerian money, or because they knew they were going to lose the election and they were looting the country. The global economic recession did not help things again when President Buhari came into power and the socio-economic situation of the country got worse. I think we should be thanking this government by coming to power because it would have been worse if the government that left recently was still in power because it was very obvious at a point that they’ve already lost focus and all they could concentrate on was looting. I don’t see this government as non-performing one but this government is dealing with the failure of past government whether their motto is change. I don’t want to know, change is change, change has to come obviously from the look of things and the way they are handling it, especially from the angle of curbing corruption and curtailing all the loopholes that the previous government has opened for corruption. Eventually, Nigeria will get there, I am so sure. As far as I’m concerned, this government is performing.
What’s your view about the way President Buhari is tackling corruption?
Obviously, you will not expect this government to come and be questioning me because I was not part of the government before. Definitely, the people they will start trailing are those that have been in the government previously and looted the country’s fund. If anybody is now saying it’s being one-sided, or it’s not comprehensive, I will disagree; it has to start from somewhere. The only anxiety for me is that by now, we ought to have seen people in jail after they are found guilty of looting the country’s fund. This is where the judiciary is not helping matters at all, especially the practising lawyers in this country. After the tenure of this government and we don’t see anyone who has looted the country’s fund prosecuted, we will know that all of us would start to go to the school of corruption and we would change the name of Nigeria to corruption. I expect the president to have put some looters in jail to serve as a deterrent to others.
What’s your take on the state of the nation vis-a-vis the economic hardship Nigerians are currently undergoing?
Of course, some of us know that the economy will go through hardship. As a civil engineer of over 30 years’ experience in this country and all around the world, I saw it coming and I’ve been shouting it, so for a failed economy to be revamped; it’s not a day’s job, especially an economy that had been destroyed over years. The global economy recession is affecting us and the price of oil that has been our major source of revenue is dwindling in the world market. The avengers are there defending the corrupt people that have misled the government. We need no soothsayers to tell us that there are avenging for people. It’s unfortunate that the masses find ourselves in this situation but I don’t think there is any other alternative way than to endure and co-operate with this government.
With the ongoing hardship, do you think APC Government could still retain their presidential seat in 2019?
At this point, we should take politics out of the issue. Only God knows tomorrow but so far so good, government has not alternative than to go the way they are going. If people have an alternative, let them bring their suggestions to the table to help this government. It’s when this government is not listening that we can say government is failing. Whether APC will retain its presidential seat in 2019 or not is not the issue. I don’t want to delve into that for now, only God knows tomorrow. The Federal Government relaunched cargo train carrying cattle directly from Kebbi, Sokoto, Zamfara States to other States. This was done by the minister of Transport, Rotimi Amaechi and His Excellency, the governor of Zamfara State, Alhaji Abdul Azeez. I almost shed tears because this kind of cargo train carrying cattle from the North to other parts of the country took place last in the 60s. Meanwhile, the platform has been there but previous governments have been neglecting such good gesture. They looted money to buy trailers to convey the cattle thereby spoiling the road because of the too much pressure on the road. They made the railway transportation useless and this government is revamping it. We may not be seeing the effect of this government’s policies immediately but as time goes on, we would be seeing the effect. APC is also trying at the state level; see what Governor Ambode is doing in Lagos and what Governor Amosun is doing in Ogun State. Even though they can’t satisfy everybody because of the global recession affecting the whole nation, nevertheless, governance is now an open affair unlike before that it was a secret cult.
What do you think is the way for our economic recovery?
From my own perspective as a professional, I will implore all of us to rally round this government to be sincere and honest. We need to go back to the olden days where moral instructions were taught in schools. Education is knowledge and knowledge is power. It will help us a lot. Both the leaders and the followers have to be sincere with ourselves.
People are talking about restructuring but it starts from home. Let us restructure our home. We have to embrace morality to regain our glory.
We know you to be a leader of Labour Party in Ogun State, but we once heard a rumour that you wanted to cross over to APC, what’s your reaction?
Some of us went into politics, not because we wanted to enrich ourselves but because we had foreseen what’s happening today. We have to come into governance when we could not swallow what was happening during Jonathan’s regime. We have to leave our comfort zone to participate in changing things. Today, I am one of the people who are thanking God for the situation in this country, knowing fully well that our tomorrow shall be okay. We are thanking God that professionals are coming boldly into politics by not leaving the drop-outs to participate in politics. Now, people of repute and people that have background and have succeeded in both professional and business careers are now coming forward in the governance of this country. Talking about the rumour of crossing to APC, I am still a card-carrying member of Ogun State Labour Party. But the administration of Labour Party in Ogun State during the last election performed below expectation. Some of them lured into politics because they are just there as fraudsters. At a point, some respected politicians that have governed at state level and at the national level in Ogun State came into Labour Party. They wanted to relaunch themselves via the platform of Labour Party; just few weeks to the elections, they ran back to their root and today where are they. I’m talking of PDP people. It was at that point that people like us that didn’t come into politics because of food, money, or corruption said if this is the situation; we would not follow you back to your party. They came to Labour Party and destroyed it but we said that instead of following them to their party, we would rather follow the ruling party and support them, especially that we have seen the light that the party that was ruling Ogun State would take over the national governance and we never prayed that Ogun State should be an opposition because of development. That was why we supported the APC; we now formed Labour Party in APC. None of us is carrying APC card, we are still carrying our Labour Party membership card. We have come into politics to save our State, the local government and the people.
What’s your plan politically towards 2019?
All of us can’t be in government but all of us can’t participate in governance. We are praying for this government to be able to do whatever we have in mind. Like I said, with the trend of things that’s going on in the governance, things would get better.
