The presidential candidate of Labour Party in the 2023 general election, Mr. Peter Obi, is the Pro-Chancellor of the Dominican University, Samonda, Ibadan, Oyo State. Obi, who was at the university’s combined 3rd and 4th convocation ceremonies held at the university campus last Saturday, spoke with journalists on a number of issues. SAM NWAOKO, who was at the event, brings a transcript of the interview.
How bad do you think corruption has affected our society because you have been very emphatic about this?
I have always said that the issue of corruption has killed the three key things that make a state a state. Corruption has killed entrepreneurship. This is because nobody works hard in a corrupt country. If your politics is more profitable than your industry, you are finished. Secondly, corruption has killed professionalism. I say this because today, not many people are working hard to be a professor or to become anything, because why would you suffer when you can earn life without it? Corruption has killed hardwork. I recall telling somebody that we need to deal decisively with the issue of mismanagement and stealing of public money. I used the opportunity to urge our agencies in charge of fighting corruption to always do proper investigation. So, when they tell us that they have seized this or that asset, this property or that money, we would need a proof that these things were stolen from public resources. With that we can learn how to prevent such stealing in the future. It is not enough to say ‘we recovered N100 billion’. How did the N100 billion come about? Can we link it to any missing money at the local government, the state or the federal government? It is important that we look at this.
During your presidential campaign, you were emphatic about removing fuel subsidy. Now it has been removed. With what is happening between the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPCL) and Dangote, how does this make you feel?
There is a difference between a planned, gradual removal and a haphazard one. If you had done it with proper planning, it would have been better, and people wouldn’t have been feeling what they are feeling. What I always say about removing anything is that there must be a replacement. So, if you say you are denying us lunch, what are we getting in return for us not to starve during that period? You cannot just remove something without thinking of or making a replacement available anywhere. If we say we are removing anything, say subsidy from a particular thing, are we putting more in education? Are we putting more in health? Are we putting more in the development of other specific sectors of the economy? These are equally important.
What then would you give as a word of hope for Nigerians because there is so much despair in the land, because Nigerians are going through a lot?
I have always said that it is a choice. Everything is about the choices we make as a people. A Nobel laureate said this year that Nigeria is one of those countries that know what to do to prosper but refuses to do it. He also said that your development and your growth are linked to your political process. That means it is linked to leadership. Leadership is critical; it is something you need to take serious. There is nothing wrong with Nigeria, like Chinua Achebe said. There is nothing wrong with the country called Nigeria—nothing is wrong with our environment, the air we breathe, the food we eat. It is only the inability of our leaders to rise up to their responsibility that is the problem. That means that everything we have seen in Nigeria revolves around leadership. We must get it right so we can move Nigeria from consumption to production. We must be a productive country. Today we are not.
We have the fuel subsidy removed now and we also have all the issues surrounding the action. If you had the opportunity as president, what would you have done differently, how would you have done yours?
I said it should have been an organised gradual removal. It is even in my manifesto. I didn’t say I was going to get up one morning and just announce that I am doing this or I am doing that. You have to do a detailed plan before you could say you are going to remove this or that. Like I keep saying, if you must ask the people to fast, you should not be feasting. If you are fasting, everybody should be fasting and you could see that everybody is fasting. That should be it. I’m moving around today trying to help. Let everybody should come and move around at the same time.
What will you tell the young men and women who have just graduated from the university as they begin life in earnest?
They must live a life of value even if it is in a society where they have to use those values that have been imbued in them during their studies in building a new Nigeria that is productive. They must prepare to give more to the society than what they want to take out of the society.
