The former National Chairman and presently factional presidential hopeful of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chekwas Okorie in this interview with KENNETH OFOMA, speaks on burning national issues ranging from ethnic profiling and hate speech by politicians, crisis in APGA, challenge of insecurity ahead of the 2023 poll, INEC readiness to conduct credible elections and Peter Obi’s growing influence as presidential candidate

There is a growing trend now, the way some sections of the country and some political parties are beginning to profile Peter Obi for instance despite the fact that Ohanaeze or South-East governors and other politicians are yet to openly endorse him, yet his political opponents and even religious preachers like Shehu Mahdi are beginning to profile him as Biafran candidate or Igbo candidate. What is your take on this?

First of all let me react immediately to that Mahdi divisive and inciting address because I watched it on social media.

That man ought not to be walking the streets of Nigeria without being arrested. He ought to be arrested, if there is anything that can be classified as inciting hate speech that is likely to disturb the security and unity of Nigeria, it is the outburst of that man.

I’m so shocked that a man of his age could stand and address people in that manner. If you look at the people he was addressing, the people were completely uneasy with his address. It was not the kind of fiery statements that some people make and receive applause.

The people were just not comfortable with what he was verbalizing and so I don’t want to go further than that but honestly some people are not supposed to be walking about freely. Now, you come to the other side, I like to avoid really discussing Peter Obi and his methods.

But I can tell you without necessarily referring to him that Ohanaeze, the Afenifere, the PANDEF and the Middle Belt Forum; these are four regional sociocultural groups that have been working together for quite a long time and have made up their minds that they were going to go for the restructuring of this country.

At various times they even issued a communiqué that this restructuring must take place before the 2023 election which is now not possible. Now they have also made a statement before, because they are not going to endorse any candidate individually if they are to make the required impact since they have been working together for a common agenda of the four zones that want a better and restructured Nigeria.

And they had made it clear that they will not make a statement on Peter Obi until they are convinced on his stand on restructuring. They didn’t say they will not endorse him, but they said until they are convinced, because I said also, outside of my being in APGA, I’m also a member and a very senior member of Ohanaeze.

Even the publicity secretary of Ohanaeze has earlier made a statement that is actually in full support of Peter Obi, but that is not the Ohanaeze position. Nobody is saying that he is not to be supported, as a matter of fact, Peter Obi has really, really aroused political consciousness across board  not only in Igbo land, in a manner nobody before him in recent time has done; so nobody can deny him that accomplishment.

But just like the Middle Belt Forum said he hasn’t told them what is in it for them. And everybody knows what they are looking for. They want a situation where Nigeria will be restructured in a manner that there will be selfdetermination of ethnic nationalities in Nigeria. That’s the bottom line of the restructuring that every minority, especially those who have come under serious marginalization over the years.

We have seen a situation where we have had powerful people, who couldn’t translate to powerful acceptable government. Buhari is one of such powerful people, who was credited with a lot of things to come, being a general, being upright, being above corruption and all that. But that has not translated to the level of government that has been able to deliver; and others before him, who were powerful as individuals.

So what Nigerians want are powerful institutions and the only thing that can guarantee powerful institutions that can checkmate even a powerful man is a restructured country. And that’s why even me, even as I’m not yet fully on the ballot because of this crisis in APGA, I have never minced words on my support for a restructured Nigeria.

And until Peter sees the wisdom in laying emphasis on that as to assure a greater proportion of this country that that will be his goal and he will also state how he will do it, not just to verbalize it, he may not get that endorsement you are looking for. He can take it as advice, but I know what may be his difficulty, so that he will not be branded as being sectional.

But unfortunately without doing those things, they have gone to the extreme, those opposed to him have gone to the extreme of not just branding him sectional but separatist leader, which is very unfortunate and that is not who I think Peter Obi is. What is the current situation of

the leadership tussle in the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) following the recent pronouncement by a staff of the Supreme Court, which appear to have recognized Victor Oye as the national chairman as against Edozie Njoku, on whose faction you emerged as the presidential candidate of the party? Well, first of all there was no interpretation.

A staff of the Supreme Court, who is the Director of Communication, more like their press person, issued a press release and in the press release, indeed, he contradicted himself. First he said any judgment that carried Edozie Njoku, if you have a copy of the release you may refer to it; any judgment that carries Edozie Njoku as a respondent does not emanate from the Supreme Court.

In the same statement he referred to one of the pronouncements of one of the justices of the panel where he said that everything that happened in APGA happened at the Owerri Convention. If Owerri Convention elected Edozie Njoku and its Awka Convention elected Oye, how could Oye be the beneficiary of the Convention that took place at Owerri?

That is why I said that he simply contradicted himself, but the truth is that the justices were still in recess when they procured that statement and the justices are back. What they are going to do is left to be seen but we are not relenting and I cannot pre-empt how they will respond to that. But what has been established beyond doubt was that Edozie Njoku did not procure any judgement, did not doctor any judgement, did not forge any judgement.

The judgement that was served on INEC by a bailiff of the Supreme Court who swore an affidavit of service is the correct judgment from the Supreme Court.

Edozie applied to the court to replace the name of Oye with his own name because it was not Oye that was at the OWERRI Convention, it was not Oye that was purportedly removed fr which the court said the removal of the national chairman, Oye was not justiciable, that the person that is supposed to be there as the national chairman was himself.

And the court saw merit in that application, he did not go applying as a respondent, the application was clear and it has been made public severally. So a lot of things are happening in our country.

It’s unfortunate that while the justices were on recess, some people took parks of money to go and procure that type of statement. So we believe that the Supreme Court will come out with a proper statement. And INEC will still have to do the right thing because this judgement was given long before INEC decided to even obtain nomination forms from candidates.

So if it went ahead and obtained from the wrong persons, and it is proved that the persons whose nominations were signed by chairman and secretary that were not properly elected, INEC will still correct it. So nothing is late. Recently a court in Taraba State ordered INEC to conduct fresh primaries, so nothing is closed. For me I’m back in APGA, nothing will make me leave the party again; it’s a party I founded.

Sometime ago l left it, it’s something that at the appropriate time I will give proper explanation but everybody knew I was fighting with state resources for almost eight years. I did everything humanly possible to save the soul of the party but some people felt that it is better to leave APGA as a cash cow for their own personal benefit and see where we are. As we speak today everybody knows that no media organization rates APGA in terms of the election coming up in 2023; APGA is not rated at all not as it was third, fourth, fifth or even 10th.

There is no rating whatsoever, so anybody that is in APGA that is not embarrassed or scandalized by the state of affairs in a party that has been existing for 20 years, the person is not an APGA minded person, including the governor, (Chukwuma) Soludo, I must say.

That brings me to this pertinent question. It was under Peter Obi as  APGA Governor in Anambra State that you were forced out of the party. Now Peter Obi is the presidential candidate of Labour Party, the only person from South-East whose candidacy is gaining traction across the country; will you and APGA, no matter the outcome of the court interpretation, be able to support him as coming from a zone that deserves to have a go at the presidency at this time?

APGA was founded right from its conceptualization and which also inform the name it answered, the grand alliance, it was founded to be a platform for political engagement with the rest of Nigeria. And it’s a political party; it’s not a personal thing; if it’s to be looked at from the point of view of being a political party.

So if APGA will is to go into alliance with Labour Party, because it’s a party to party thing, not like Chekwas Okorie, Peter Obi; if APGA and Labour Party will go into an alliance, its yet to be seen, I’m not aware, maybe I don’t know whether there is anything going on between them and Soludo side, but on this side I’m not aware that any overture has been made to APGA where I belong but there is still time for all of those kind of things; because even the APC, PDP, NNPP, those once that are now being rated, there is still time for all manner of alliances and coalition. There are two scenarios that may emerge.

The two scenarios are a preelection collaboration, that is to say where election has been held and there is no clear winner and the first two parties emerge to go for runoff, of course the remaining parties will align to make for a winner.

That’s one scenario. The second scenario election has come and gone and a winner has emerged but does not have a sufficient number of legislators to form a seamless government. It will now take a coalition of parties to be able to form a government, that’s what happened in many multiparty democracies in the world.

So these are all scenarios that will determine how parties will respond. It’s too early in the day for me to even begin to consider who will support the other, because if APGA is on the ballot, like me being on the ballot there will be a different scenario coming up. I know what we have not been able to unleash, and this race is not like any race Nigeria has witnessed in the past.

This is a marathon race; it’s not a 100-meter dash. You’re looking at least six months of campaign; we are talking of politics where everybody agrees that 24 hours is too long. So it’s when we approach the month of December for instance, for election that will happen in the third week of February, that very concrete and practicable alliances will begin to emerge, but not now. So, campaigns haven’t even formally begun for people to make an assessment.

So far, it’s only Peter and his people in the field. And they have not been doing rallies; they are doing road shows, street demonstrations. When rallies begin, normally rallies are held in certain venues and people are addressed and people see people who have come in for a rally. To be able to hold rallies all over the country it’s not a child play, it’s not a tee  party.

So when the time comes you now begin to see people who have… when people talk about structure, it’s not a joke, it’s real. When you begin to see rallies, you see people from rural areas, the places that social media and newspapers cannot reach; you see them come out to show support for who they want to support.

It’s only then you begin to assess the level of penetration. But if you are using what happens in the urban areas to make an assessment in a country where more than three quarters of its population are in the rural areas, it will be a wrong assessment.

Recently, the spokesperson of the Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP), Ikenga Imo Ugochinyere alleging that there were names that were smuggled into the voter register and that there was a secret suit aiming at stopping the use if BIVAS for accreditation and electronic transmission of results. Even though INEC has responded saying that they are actually weeding out such names from the register as this is a temporary list, what is your take on this in terms of people’s faith on the credibility of the poll?

Well, I think the gentleman who came out early to raise that alarm is on some kind of publicity stunt for himself. Yeah, because the timetable is very clear; there is a date INEC will publish the list of voters for the election and of course INEC would have done all that is necessary to be done before publishing. And the way INEC publishes, I have been in party leadership for a long time, INEC will give every party, like there 18 parties now; in addition to publishing it in their website, they will give the soft copy to all the political parties that can now go ahead and print the thing out for every ward, for local government, for every state.

It is after INEC official documents have come for the election and the purpose of that publication is for the public to raise objections. INEC has never claimed that it has a final say on the list of who will vote in an election; that is why there is room and the timetable provides for the period there will be publication and objections will be considered.

The final copy that INEC intends to use will be given to every political party and also published, and it’s also expected to be pasted at every ward for people who may not have access to it, you go there and look at it. If your name for instance is not where it’s supposed to be you raise a protest. If you find a name that does not belong to that ward, that is imported from somewhere you raise an alarm. All those things this man began to talk about are premature, he has no basis for what claims he was making but for the unwary public they may see him as a man with Eagle eyes that has spotted what was hidden.

But I can tell you he was just mischievously laying some publicity stunt for himself. So I’m satisfied with the INEC response to that. As for the BIVAS, well I also want to believe INEC that nothing will make the BIVAS not to be used and I’m not aware of any secret suit and whatever is secret about the suit eventually will be tried in the open court. And then we’ll see    that human beings will come out and say that BIVAS will not be used when it is one thing that has given the people a sense of confidence that their votes will count.

People are beginning to have the fear that insecurity may affect the 2023 polls in many geopolitical zones of the country including the South-East. The President recently gave a matching order to the security agencies to end insecurity and flush out the bandits, terrorists and other hoodlums. Do you think that mandate will be achieved before the election?

The issue of insecurity is a major concern to all well-meaning Nigerians whether it is for political purposes or not. The thing is that we are looking at a general election in which there will be polls in 196,000 polling units or thereabout, close to 200, 000 polling units in this country.

There is a percentage disruption that will mean that the election will be considered not to have been held or to be repeated. But if there are isolated cases here and there, when you look at it at the aggregate it does not amount to even one percent of polling units in Nigeria, results will still be collated and announced. That’s the thing, it will be difficult for even those who want to disrupt to mobilize forces that can penetrate easily and successfully disrupt elections in 196, 000 polling units across the country.

Elections took place in the North- East at the heat of Boko Haram insurgency. Not to talk of here, how much of the disruption took place in Osun or in Ekiti when elections took place in those places. Those are even off season elections but this is a general election. So I’m confident that the election will hold and if there are a few isolated areas where people will go to disrupt the election, it may not be sufficient to affect the overall outcome of the election.