Interview
Corruption rampant in Nigeria because legislature, Judiciary have failed – Amb. Adejare Bello
Ambassador Rafiu Adejare Bello is a politician who has served in several political positions in Nigeria. He was Nigerian Ambassador to the United Mexican States; he was a two-term Speaker of the Osun State House of Assembly, where he spent 12 years, four years as Minority leader, and eight years as Speaker.
In this interview with Olusesan Laoye, he delves into various national issues concerning the corrupt practices in the Legislative Assemblies of the states and the National Assembly, which he describes as the number one encouraging corruption in Nigeria, followed by the Judiciary and ranked the executive as the last. He also talks about indiscipline in political parties…
Excerpts:
With the crisis in the major opposition parties, many people think that the country may be heading towards a one-party state. Do you nurse such fear too?
I don’t nurse any fear about that. And the reason is that our constitution, the 1999 constitution does not postulate that. The Constitution recognizes a multi-party system. That is, there should not be one party or two-party system but three or more parties. Meaning that if we will become a one-party state, we will need to amend the constitution.
That some political parties have crises does not mean that they are not in existence. But it is even the APC that should watch it carefully because the kind of peace we have in APC is like that of a graveyard. There could be an implosion. We don’t pray for it anyway. And those parties having problems now, that may allow them to come together and rally around and fight APC dirty in the future elections.
That is to say, it is the APC that must watch its back because the opposition parties are already down. It is those of us in APC who are up already that should be fear of falling. Whoever is down can only rise.
Some people are insinuating that it is the ruling party that is causing problems in the other parties. It is a blanket lies. Where did they get that from? You see, a small crisis that they should have settled internally, they allowed it to explode. And those crises you are seeing in the opposition parties are because of ambition. Remove Atiku from the contest of 2027 now, you will see that there will be peace in PDP. Remove Peter Obi from being the sole candidate of Labour Party in the 2027 election and you will see that there will be no crisis in LP. From NNPP, if you take Kwankwaso’s domineering role from that party, there will be peace in the party.
So, those are the issues. It is the internal wrangling about ambitions in those parties that are causing problems.
So, I want to urge members of the opposition parties in Nigeria to come together, resolve their crises, and let us have a very strong and virile opposition. It is good for the government. And I like this: our current president, doesn’t see them as enemies. He sees them as people who should tell him what next to do. Even at times, when they carried the joke too far, saying what is not in existence, he doesn’t even care, he doesn’t even bother. His own is I have set my agenda. The 8-point agenda in the Renewed Hope Agenda Policy and I must take them one after the other. So, he doesn’t feel distracted in any way.
So, it is good to have opposition, so that they would remind us of where we are lacking. Where we have to concentrate. And what we need to do, so that we will be watching our back and say, oh, we are not alone, some people are ready to take over from us.
It is believed that there is indiscipline in most political parties and party supremacy is declining. What do you think?
Well, it is very true and correct that there is no party discipline again, even in the APC that is ruling. And I think it is because of the system that we are running, the presidential system. If it were to be parliamentary, that would not happen. Though I am not saying I prefer the parliamentary to a presidential system. I think the way out of it is for all the parties to take the bull by the horns, sanction whoever must be sanctioned, and instill discipline into all the members. Let them know that there is no room for erring against the laid down regulations and rules of the party and get away with it. If people are made scapegoats, everybody will sit up.
See what is happening to the former Osun State governor, Rauf Aregbesola who ruled between 2010 and 2018, he was shown the way out because it was believed by the party that the role he played in the 2022 election was ignoble. It was not expected of a leader to the extent that the government of the day under Governor Adeleke did not hide it by appointing some of the APC members that followed Aregbesola to his cabinet.
That is very clear enough, that they sabotaged the efforts of the party in 2022. So, now that we have shown them the way out, you and I in APC will think well before we do anything untoward, because you know there will be sanctions. If it could be done to Aregbesola, that means nobody could avoid the sanction of the party in the state.
So, all the political parties must stand their feet firmly on the ground and not mind whoever is involved. They should go all hog for any recalcitrant political party members so that there will be sanity in our politics.
Aregbesola is out of the APC you have said. Don’t you think this will affect the fortune of the APC in Osun State in the next year’s governorship race?
Well, I will look at that in two ways. We indeed need more people in the party but we don’t need saboteurs. If we look at the role they (Aregbesola and his group) played in 2022, it was the role of saboteurs. We thought we were together, but we were not. So, this one now that we know they are not part of us, we will share the duties in units, Wards, and the state, so that we will know how many of us are remaining in the party. It is better than to think you are part of us and you are not. That means selling and leaking our secrets to the outside World. That is where I stand on the matter.
But I don’t foreclose the possibility of our coming together. We can come together again. Why? Because, if Aregbesola becomes a father – figure today, after God that created him, it was Tinubu. He should not have allowed the crisis between himself and his former Chief of staff, former governor, Oyetola, to snowball into getting Tinubu involved in the matter. Even though we know blood is thicker than water. if Tinubu is backing Oyetola, his cousin, when the crisis started, it doesn’t matter. Two of them, Aregbesola and Oyetola, after God Almighty created them, it was Tinubu that made them to be whatever they may be today.
Aregbesola was Commissioner in Lagos, he was a governor for Eight years and was a Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Oyetola was a Chief of staff to Aregbesola, he was a governor for four years and is a serving Minister of Nigeria. What else do they want? What has God not done for them?
So, like the Oyinbo people would say, ‘ never say never. I don’t see it that Aregbesola could not come back. And I want Aregbesola to apologize to the president. He was not fair to the president at all. The man did not deserve what came out of Aregbesola. He should apologize to him. I think after apologizing to him, those of us who are not happy with the situation will come down including Oyetola to ask what else we want from him. If he has discovered that he has wronged President Tinubu, not because of today but because of the yester years. What has brought them together, what they have done together, and what they have achieved together in politics? That alone should force him to apologize to the president. Apart from the president being his elder, apart from the president being his former governor and being the president of Nigeria today, I think the president has done much for Aregbesola, so he should apologize to him so that we can get better.
In the last 21 months, how will you assess President Tinubu’s administration?
I can swear that I will not talk as an APC member but Nigerians should be fair to President Tinubu. The man has done what the military rulers were afraid of doing. Decisions that they were afraid of taking, he has taken them and it has started to yield fruits.
Ambassador Rafiu Adejare Bello
Let me give you an instance, let me tell you authoritatively about the situation 12 months ago in Nigeria. Can you say the same today in terms of prices of goods and services? If your answer is no, then the system is working. That means the president has approached governance from the right direction. Those who were close to him when he was the governor of Lagos State told us that he is a man who will talk and do. That all the things he had written in his Renewed Hope Agenda were not for fun and that he would follow them to the letters. And tell me, is it the subsidy removal, is it the forex policy, is it about paying for services that are being rendered? Look at the light, If not that I am having you as my visitors, I will not put them on. This is how it operates in Europe, America, and other foreign countries. While we are in the afternoon, why are you putting on lights? And we have been doing that because we were not paying for it, the government was subsidizing everything for us, including sending our children to school. If it is about sending our children to school, it is the duty or the government to do that. But for some of the things we do to make money – the government will subsidize welders and hairdressers. But now that we are paying for the services, everybody is sitting up. If you get to the toilet abroad you put on the lights and you come out without putting the lights off, no matter the respect your host has for you, he will call you back to go and put off the lights. What I am saying in essence is that things are getting better. Before this time next year, it must have improved tremendously.
How will you assess the performance of the legislature both in the states and at the National Assembly?
Concerning the performance of the legislature, both in the states and the National Assembly, I will say that we have performed woefully. I spent 12 years in the Osun State House of Assembly, four years as minority leader, and eight years as Speaker, my experience tells me that if we have done what is expected of us, the State governors will not call the bluff of us. The same is true that if the people at the National Assembly are doing what they ought to do, the President will not call their bluff of them. The states are even better but that of the National Assembly is terrible.
Do you know as powerful as Obasanjo was as the president between 1999 and 2007, Obasanjo was forced to agree with them on some things he did not like? I mean the constituency project. We all remembered what made him say, “I dey Kampe” when the national Assembly threatened him with impeachment, over the constituency project but at the end of the day, they were able to do away with that amount of money.
When we introduced the constituency project in Osun State, you can ask anybody, the EFCC wrote a beautiful report about the Osun State House of Assembly on constituency projects between 2005 and 2011, that I left. There was a petition that stated we were using N2.5 million to build a block of three classrooms and when the EFCC came to investigate, we went to Abuja but they did not detain us. I led other members and when I was going I went with the files of the budget estimates year by year and showed everything to them. I made them know that it was not a contrived thing. When they saw the files, I wrote my statement and my colleagues too wrote their statements and after that, they said they were coming to Osun State for further investigations. When they came, I asked them to start their investigations from my constituency, Ede North. It was my late Press Secretary, Olumide Ajayi, that took them around and they visited all the constituencies at the end of their visit and investigations, they wrote a beautiful report that if this is the way things were done in Rivers, Bayelsa, and some states, the EFCC, would not be after any legislator in Nigeria, as far as constituency project is concerned.
I am not saying that I have done the best or the wrong thing but I can beat my chest that i did what I was supposed to do, with the public funds.
But go to the National Assembly, you will see projects meant for Osun State in Rivers, and projects meant for Bayelsa in Borno state. You will see a project meant for the Ila Orangun constituency in Osogbo here in Osun State. All of that in Nigeria, and it is about money, money….. with the problems of Nigeria. In fact, if I were to rank the three arms of government in Nigeria, I would rank the legislature as number one, the one mostly causing corruption, the judiciary second, and the executive third.
If the legislature and the judiciary are not collaborating with the executive, they won’t have their ways. If the legislature stands firmly on the ground and says Mr. President or Mr. Governor, this is not what our people sent us here to do, they will not have their ways and definitely, they will sit up. But that is not what is happening in Nigeria today. A situation where the people in the judiciary allowed the executive to dictate to them, is not the best for Nigeria.
Why corruption is rampant in Nigeria today because the legislature, both at the states and the National Assembly has failed Nigerians. Also, the judiciary has failed Nigerians as well. I wonder why the cases of corruption involving billions of naira or dollars would take more than six months to trash out for any judiciary. I just cannot understand.
Honestly speaking, I want to call on the body of Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SAN) that they are also contributing to the problems of the country. You know that I belong to the legal profession. A situation where, take for instance, Adewale steals, let us say, N10 billion, from the coffers of the Osun State Government and if EFCC arrests him, he gets the services of say, six SANs to defend him. So, if he parts with N2 billion for his defense, is he not with the gain of N8 billion? Then, the SANs would go to court to defend what is not defensible. Honestly, that is part of corruption. The best for those of us in this noble profession is to rise to champion how best to govern Nigeria without joining the embezzlers. That is what should be the best thing for Nigeria.
About the roles of the legislature that you asked about, we have failed Nigerians. I want them to sit up, that is those of them that are there now.
I have played my part for 12 years and I left in 2011. The roles I played whether rightly or wrongly the rewards are there and I do refer people to it.
Those that are there today, must improve on what many of us have done in the past. Everything is not about money, it is about helping the executive to move forward.
The situation should not be what is going to be my share of the national cake as it is happening today in Nigeria. We should all be committed to ensuring the growth of Nigeria. May God help us.
At the weekend we heard during a radio program that you commended Gov. Ademola Adeleke that he is doing well. We know that Governor Adeleke is your brother from Ede but the election is next year and you are an APC chieftain, what is going to happen to your candidate in the election?
Unfortunately, the program was in Yoruba. I don’t know those who translated it. At any rate, I am not bothered about it because it does not concern me. I have a record of what I said from the beginning to the end, for almost an hour. I said our people in APC are saying, that Gov. Adeleke has not done anything, and I said that is not correct. If you say he has not done anything, that is the beginning of telling lies. You can say he is not doing the right thing or is doing the right thing, but to say he is not doing anything is not correct because whoever is not doing anything is a dead person. It is that anything that I am circling and emphasizing. I said that I lived in Osogbo but born in Ede and that I am not blind or deaf not to have heard or seen that roads are changing in Ede and in Osogbo where I lived, as well and that we are seeing bridges. I also said he is doing something because, the state government is getting more money than before, under the APC federal government, which is times two or three, than what the previous governors were getting, therefore, any state government that is not doing well now, his people should call him out and ask questions as to why he is not performing for getting between 16 to 18 billion naira per month and still not performing or not doing the job. That was what I said, and not that I was praising him. It will not come out of my mouth that he has not done anything because we can all see that he is doing something. Whether he is doing it to the level expected or not, that is a different thing entirely.
I also said further, that either from APC, PDP, SDP or whoever said he has not done anything, that person is a liar for saying that for over two years, he has not done anything, which is a blatant lie.
You have been a Speaker of Osun State for eight years, you are also an ambassador, you are still young and can still do more for Osun State and at the national level. What is your next plan now?
Well that is the bane of this country. Some people have been ministers, governors, senators and still believed that it is a must, that they must be president. That is the problem most politicians in Nigeria face. By my own definition, tomorrow belongs to God Almighty. As I speak to you today, I don’t have any ambition either in 2026 or 2027. Only God knows where he would take me after now, as such, it is not for me to say I want to be governor, president, senator, member of House of Representatives, or this and that. What is important to me, is good health and to be alive. That is what i always ask from God anytime I wake up. So, let us leave what belongs to God for Him because tomorrow belongs to God. Even today, we can’t decide ourselves, not to talk of tomorrow. As far as I’m concerned, I don’t have any political ambition for now.
You know the present governor of Osun State is from Ede, Adejare Bello is from Ede, if they drop the ticket of governorship on my table I will pocket it . Even that of the senate I will pocket that as well. To run around and start begging people for anything, that is not me. This is because what I wanted in life and what I wanted to be, God has done it 100 times more than what I asked from Him.
If I now say this is what I want or I want to design my life and future by my self, God will just be looking at me and would want to remind me that you Rafiu Adejare Bello you remembered the day you came out of of the Nigerian Law School in 1995, precisely, on the 22nd of March, while on the 3rd Mainland bridge in Lagos, what you asked from me and what you are today, have I not done far more than that and if the answer is yes, God will say you don’t appreciate me and whoever does not appreciate God, He will destroy the person.
The essence of not asking for something on my own, is that God has done more than what I asked him to do for me. So, that is my resolve about the future.
The issue of some Muslims agitating for Sharia to be implemented in the South West, where we don’t have differences about religion, how feasible and how genuine is this agitation?
It is quite unfortunate that we Nigerians go about and do a lot of priority misplacement. Is the issue of Sharia operating in the South West our priority, is it the same with the agenda that people are hungry? They should not even be talking about Sharia when we have not faced what is on the table for us now. Is Sharia not even optional? Any State that thinks it can operate Sharia nobody should disturb the state.
I am a muslim, I want to urge and beg, the Ulamas, the Alfas, and all the Islamic cleric leaders that they should leave the situation the way it is and should not cause another problem. We have had more than enough problems in Nigeria, and we should not afford to add more to what is already on the ground. The issues of Boko Haram, banditry, kidnapping, ritual killings, and other vices are still with us unresolved and that is why we are urging them that they should please not to bring the issue of of Sharia to compound the situation because our security agencies are overwhelmed already.
We can’t afford any crisis with the Sharia, which could cause killings and mayhem. If that should happen, where do we go from there.? It should not even be in the whole state there are some local governments, which are predominantly Muslims and predominantly Christians. For example, in Ijesaland, in Osun State, where they are predominantly Christians, so if we apply sharia in Ijesaland, will that not cause problem? If it is in Iwo or Ede where we have majority as Muslims, they could adopt it but the state Assembly will have to pass the law that any local government that wants it and knows that it won’t cause problem, could go for it. But to adopt it generally for a whole state, that will cause problems.
With your experience as an ambassador, how do you think Nigeria could boost her trade and and attracts direct foreign investments?
Direct foreign investments could only be encouraged with the arrangements we must have put on ground in the country. I like what President Tinubu is doing. Though some people are complaining that he is jetting out of the country every now and then but as far as I am concerned, we are getting results. If you get to our Stock Exchange Market today, you will see a lot of improvements, within the period that President Tinubu has been in government. As we are talking now, investors from UAE are in Nigeria looking for where to invest in stock exchange. The trillions dollars the man is talking about is going to be majorly from the stock exchange and that is part of what would boost the economy of Nigeria.
Direct foreign investments would come when we emphasize the ease of doing business, with the ground that is level, for foreign investments and investors, they would come. Look at what happened before President Tinubu came, to the extent that foreign airlines refused to come to Nigeria, because we could not pay back their money in dollars and this government has cleared all of that now.
Some people did a lot of havoc in Nigeria; what happened in Nigeria before Tinubu, no investor would hear that and come to invest in Nigeria. They will not come to invest where they can’t repatriate their profits, when the need arises. Those are the things that they are putting in place now and it is yielding results.
I brought some investors in the month of November before I left Mexico in 2023. Mexicans and some people from Hong Kong who wanted to invest in oil, gas agriculture and mining. All the expenses for the trip was catered for by them.
People are eager to come to Nigeria to invest now. I am sure if the efforts of President Tinubu continues, it would yield positive and fruitful results and Nigeria will be better for it.
