Cabal Behind Saraki’s Travails – Sen Egya

Sen. Salihi Egye represents Nasarawa South senatorial district in the Senate. In this interview with Ruth Choji, Egye, an architect, states that there is a cabal that does not want to see the present leadership of the Senate in power.

How do you react to calls by some Nigerians on the senate president to resign his position until his case with the code of conduct bureau is over. What is your take on this?

As you are aware, constitutionally, anybody that has allegation against him or her is not guilty until proven so by a competent court of law. The issue of whether he should resign or step down does not arise. To that extent and as far as we are concern, the president of the senate is not guilty for now and therefore remains the president of the senate.

Some have pointed accusing fingers at different people for being behind the senate president crises.

I emphatically don’t think the president is behind it because most of us do not see any shred of evidence to support claims that the president of Nigeria is behind it. We have said times without number that there is a cabal that that does not want to see the present senate leadership in power. Therefore they are muzzling the institution of the state to see that they are removed since they could not do so democratically. The president of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari, has no hand in what is happening.

It is believe in some quarters that if the senate president will give in to the party’s wishes, the accusations against him will be dropped or made to disappear. Do you agree?

The president of the senate did not elect himself into that office, he was elected by senators. This is the business of the senate. I think that probably the party did not handle the matter the way it should have. If it did, we won’t be having this crisis right from the beginning. I think the party made some errors in handling the issue from the beginning.

Don’t you think the leadership crisis of the senate is effecting their duties as lawmakers considering that no Bill has been passed since inauguration?

It is wrong to say that the senate has not been working or that we have not passed Bills. The passage of Bills take time. More than ten Bills have passed second reading, it is not something you see in the headlines every day. The public might not have a view of what is going on, but we are working. For every arm of government, there must be leadership.

Don’t you think the inability of the APC to manage the senate crises has proven that, they are not able to manage the success of the party?

I agree with you on the management of success. As you are aware, the APC is made up of Nigerians of all calling and different groups and you are also aware that the party has to govern Nigeria before, therefore what is happening now is not unexpected and if it doesn’t happen that means something is wrong. So these bickerings are part of the process of getting everything right.

Some senators have kicked against some of the names in the ministerial list submitted to the senate. How do you see this?

You must understand that we are practicing by-partisan politics. I will be surprised that a state dominated by PDP will accept an APC candidate as minister readily. It is normal that in such cases, there will be protest. The PDP people will prefer a candidate from their state but unfortunately because the vehicles which we rode to power are different therefore, the perception we want to give Nigerians will be different.

How do you address concerns by young Nigerians who were surprised that the list was made up of recycled politicians?

The president has his vision and Nigerians believe in it, that is why they voted for him. Therefore we must give him that chance to fulfil his plans for us. If he brought a 90year old man, it is the result, and not who does what that should be of concern. I think Nigerians would be happy if a 90year old man takes us to the Promised Land. The president himself is an old man at 72 or so and we believe that he will take us to the Promised Land. We should be patient and wait and see where the recycled people will take us to. It is important to learn from history and that we should not bring them back, but not all of those people that put us where we are today are bad people. We should be able to take some of them and use them.

The South East/South South are complaining of not being carried along in the senate. If this is true, do you think this has something to do with the pattern of voting during the elections?

I don’t believe that the South East/South South is being schemed out because the formation of the government has just started and a lot is yet to be done. South East/South South are very important and some of us will shout loudly if they are excluded. Nigerian belongs to us all and we cannot do without them.

How will you assess the government’s fight against corruption? Do you think it is being fair to everyone?

I don’t think it is vindictive in that sense. The senate president is before a tribunal and he is part of us, as a matter of fact, I haven’t seen any opposition member that is before a tribunal or court of law. What the president is doing is not even a probe, if we stumble into crime, we should punish crime. What he is doing is investigating and it will not be fair to Nigeria for him to just cover up and move on. We need to recover funds stolen from Nigeria and I think this is what is happening, so if you are a PDP person and it is discovered that you took money, it should be recovered, the same with the APC man. I don’t think it is vindictive.

Nigerians are worried that the spate of bombings are increasing in spite of assurance by the APC-led government that, within three months after inauguration, they will stop insurgency?

The president is succeeding and if you remember before he came in, there were territories that we could not go in, now almost 95% have been recovered. This is not a conventional warfare. We have seen other countries in Iran, Afghanistan and the rest. If you are dispersing them, they become desperate and the fight becomes individualistic and therefore those of them who carry or can still control one or two person within the group use them to cause mayhem. That should not weaken our resolve because the bombings are a sign that they are being decimated.

But do you think this government is capable of ending insurgency in Nigeria

Insurgency is a very difficult war to win, however with the way it is being done now and the experience of the commander in chief, the military will win it. What remains is the psychological part of it and I think that the president should start looking at this issue. You can win militarily but you have to look at the heart and soul of those element who are engage in this heinous act.

Going back to the Niger Delta, the amnesty program will be ending in December. But some of the militants are insisting that it should be extended?

The Niger Delta issue requires serious attention, and for some of us, we have lots of pity and worry as to the state of environmental issues in the Niger Delta. Unfortunately for us, while the government is doing its best, the elites that come from there, I am sorry to say, have not done enough because we know the kind of resources that has gone to the zone. The result is not commiserate with the resources. The amnesty must be multi-dimensional. If The FG intends to stop it at the expiration date, then we must step up developmental activities. If we cannot do that, then the amnesty that is in place could be extended. But we cannot continue to do this for ever, I think that our brothers and sister from Niger Delta that are in position of leadership should step up their game and do more to ensure that the corruption is stopped along governmental level and ensure that the ordinary man enjoys some level of comfort in terms of health facilities, portable drinking water and other things we take for granted in other areas.

What is your reaction to an allegation that the Nasarawa State governor Almakura is not carrying everyone along?

Everybody has his or her own perception about him. There are those who once they are not part of any decision making, they criticize. Then there are those who think that for every movement the governor will do, he must consult them and such are the people that will make such comments. But what is important is whether he is providing roads and development? Primary those are the issue we are concerned with. I think that he is doing well.

What are your plans for your people?

The plans laid down during our campaign has been to ensure that anything that my constituency is entitle to is delivered to them. This areas could be empowerment issue, health and educational issues that my state is supposed to get. Most of these things are being provided for other states but we don’t get it and we keep asking why? Perhaps it is because those who were here before us were not keen on getting those things. Therefore, we will keep our eyes open and see that whatever we will get for them will be taken to them.

Credit: Leadership