Executive Director, Development Specs Academy, Prof. Okey Ikechukwu, has described President Bola Tinubu’s Independence Day speech as “not a good speech,” saying there are concerns over whether the administration’s economic reforms are structured to deliver the promised prosperity.
Ikechukwu, who spoke in an interview with ARISE NEWS on Thursday, said while the government’s reforms might have been introduced with good intentions, their impact on citizens requires closer attention and practical measures to reduce the hardship.
He said, “There are concerns about whether we’re heading to prosperity, but if you look at the sequencing, reforms is the first, then the middle one and prosperity, that should ordinarily be the correct trajectory.
“But before I make my comment, I’d like to situate everything I’m going to say in the course of this conversation. I believe we are here to discuss the progression and trajectory of the nation in the last 66 years, as distinct from regime assessment.
“So in the process of that, we’re going to talk about different regimes, and I believe that what we’re taking up with the Tinubu speech is that the president has made statements on a critical national day which we should assess.
“Point number one, he set out with reforms with very good intentions, because no government would design a reform in order to punish the people or to make itself unpopular.
“In terms of impact, there have been very strong pinpoints for citizens, and the consistent argument of government is a lesson. These are temporary challenges and pressures we need to endure through because in the end it’s going to lead to prosperity.
“I wouldn’t argue about that. What I would say is, can we look at the detailed mechanics and see whether it’s being structured actually to lead to prosperity?
“So those quarrelling with reforms are not getting it right. Those talking about impact are making the point that government should look more closely and discover that there are things it can do to ameliorate the worst parts of the pain without denying the necessity of the reforms.
“But adding that if these small but critical things are not done, it will not lead to prosperity. So those are the concerns.
“It’s not the kind of speech a president should make on a day like this. The intentions of the government are captured in the trajectory of his perception of it.
“Where would we put these reforms for this to happen? This is a long-term view. Are we likely to get that long-term view?
“If everybody thinks the answer is yes, then everything is well. If everybody thinks the answer is no, it’s to make specific suggestions on the things that could be handled differently.”
Ikechukwu also criticised aspects of government communication, saying conflicting or aggressive public messaging could undermine confidence in the administration’s policies.
He said, “When you look at government communication, at the risk of repeating this often, the Minister of Information has consistently been the most, without due respect to others, sense-sounding and sober-talking communicator in government.
“Now when various other speakers offend our sensibilities with their verbosity and aggression and self-denial, it undermines the reputation. It doesn’t show there’s enough explanation. That’s part of why things are a little disturbing.
“So, in summary, it’s not a good speech. There are concerns about whether the realities are going in that direction, given the absence of some people in government.”
On national unity and Nigeria’s 66th independence anniversary, Ikechukwu traced some of the country’s present divisions to the disruption of the regional system and the military interventions that followed independence.
He said, “Let me contextualise it. Because we’re talking about 66 years. At the dawn of independence, Nigeria celebrated as a nation.
“While democracy, while independence came, we had three regions, and the governments, each of those regions had their coat of arms, had their constitutions, they were competing on who would be better than the other. They had thriving economies. They had a solid leadership recruitment pattern.
“That got disrupted by the intervention, reprehensible intervention of Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu. Nobody sent him. When I say nobody, neither his colleagues in the army, nor his religious colleagues, nor Igbo people, nobody sent him to kill anybody.
“And you could see that that coup was totally unstructured, because besides the announcement on radio, what other plans did they have?
“Now, the aftermath of that first coup affected national unity. First, it damaged the economy. And thirdly, it destroyed the basic process that existed.
“Because remember that before that coup, an Igbo man won an election in Kenya. So a kind of man won an election as mayor twice in Enugu, voted by Igbos. Those who contested, the man who contested against him went around, he said, ‘You know, I’m your brother.’ They say, ‘You’re a brother, but he’s more responsible than you.’
“‘We live here with him, we see what he does, he will govern Enugu better for us.’ And he was totally in charge, land allocations, he was mayor, everybody obeyed him. An Igbo man won a seat in Lagos.
“That was Nigeria. The rails were working, so the rail lines became the arteries, carrying blood throughout the country. That’s how I knew most of the places I know, Samaru, Kajuru, all of those places, we travelled by road.
“I knew my country. We were Igbo, that coup occurred. So what we’ve seen is a progressive reversal of the quote-unquote united Nigeria we used to know.”
According to him, the creation of states further weakened the country’s leadership structure, while the rise of indigene-ship has deepened divisions.
He said, “First states were created, that undermined leadership. Because today, that single space that was administered by Samadu Bello, today is administered by 19 people, each of them with enough personnel, more personnel than all the administrations we had in the independence era put together. What are they delivering?
“Lower education outcomes, overseas distribution and consumption, and to a larger extent, corruption, and that applies to all of them.
“So you see that with that progressive denationalisation, what has happened and come down to the point of today is that we were talking of regions, we were talking of states. Today, people are talking about indigene-ship.”
On what could be done to promote national unity, Ikechukwu said government actions, rather than policies alone, would be crucial.
He said, “Now, when you say about a policy that can make that happen, people make the mistaken assumption that a policy has a compelling effect. It doesn’t. It’s often a document on paper.
“The only thing that can strengthen a policy and make it apply is the actions of people in public office. And so, policy of government, no. What are the actions government can take to create a reassurance?
“And you look in the past, we’ve had it. Now, you saw the Buhari government with massive ethnocentric and religious leaning in all these appointments. The current president is also being accused of ‘urbanisation’ of government offices and positions.
“And some are saying, well, when Buhari was there, you didn’t complain, so why complain now? They go to meet the Igbos to say, look, we should join hands. The Igbos will tell you, no.
“You see, if you’ve been in the rain all day, it’s only the man who is coming out immediately that will be talking about umbrella. We are familiar with all of this. What did we get?
“We got the lowest allocations throughout the tenure of Obasanjo. Buhari was here. It’s as if he didn’t exist.
“So, we’re used to being on the fringe. Now, is in that context, somebody is asking what can be done? There’s no magic.
“Regime government appointments so that equity is seen very clearly. Make bold public statements about what you are pretending doesn’t exist, which is ethnocentric leadership at all levels, where people will come and make a statement about their region, where northern governors will only speak when a misfortune like the one in Niger has occurred, when the Ohanaeze will speak or the Southeast will speak in matters only affecting it.
“When, you know, there are so many things on the table, I believe that leadership signal is the only thing that can help.
“Now, not policy. Already in the constitution, there’s more than enough prohibitions for equity. When you ignore the constitution and you’re asking for policy, I don’t know what it is you’re looking for.”
He also extended the argument to state governments, questioning the conduct of governors in appointments and governance.
He said, “So, right now, what’s the behaviour? What are the reflexes of those in government? Leave federal government, come to the state level.
“Are the governors also not being, if you like, myopic in their appointments and how they are behaving and in saying that, oh, it’s our turn this time?
“The challenge is of principled leadership. The mistaken assumption that access to public office is licensed to create a freedom on your own and they’re not paying attention that those before them have no foreign address to them.”
Ikechukwu said Nigeria also needed to revive the type of leadership associated with earlier national figures whose legacies, according to him, were built around ideas and public service.
He said, “So, those are the issues on the table and we must, finally, on this, why do we still talk of people like Azikiwe, Awolowo, Katsina and [other] people, all these people, they left legacies and their legacies were leadership legacies.
“Awolowo is not remembered because he gave money to anybody, yet an ideology, a philosophy. Who do we remember today?
“Those are the issues. Men of stature, they will always stand out.”
The analyst also used the interview to celebrate former Minister of Information and National Orientation, Chief Chukwuemeka Chikelu, whose birthday was being marked, recalling his experience working with him.
Ikechukwu said, “Coming to Chikelu and to say happy birthday to him. He remains a man of exceptional integrity. The first one of the few you work with, if there are 80 files or 200 files at the close of work, by the next morning, he has deleted all of them.
“He lived in his personal house throughout his tenure as Minister. As his special assistant, I didn’t use an official car. I lived in my own house.
“There were no special allowances. He said, ‘OK, we are here to serve God through serving this country.’ And so everything, contracts, we have to stay away from it for a simple reason.
“If you take one couple, you can’t query anybody who has bundled up all the resources. And Meka remains exceptional. And his personal dignity remains intact because you don’t see him running all over the place.
“Right now, he’s in his private business, highly respected, still consulted. But these are the people who belong in the future.”
Turning to the historical constitutional discussions around Nigeria’s independence, Ikechukwu said the country had long debated questions around regionalism, state police, executive powers and political structure.
He said, “What we had has not been done. We were not even for administrative convenience. It was out of fear of domination, out of suspicions of not being strong enough, out of fear of irrelevance, in a big environment where people are not equally capacitated.
“If you recall, the South was more in a hurry for independence than the North. And the leader of the North said, people are not ready. They didn’t have the human capital to compete on their grounds.
“And so give us a little time, among so many other things. So that talk actually is not that we didn’t know the issues were clear on the table. Probably there was an agreement on the basis of which independence came.
“Politics came. Imagine what Nigeria would be today if there had not been the incident first of January 1966 and then of July 1966.
“Before then, there was a crisis that led to the creation of the Midwest. The question would be, was the creation of the Midwest intended to improve one thing or the other? Yes, the Midwest needed to be distinct from the Yoruba people. But at the same time, it was also reportedly designed to whittle down the power of Obafemi Awolowo, who was later jailed.
“Then the unfortunate coup, born of youthful idealism, born of genuine concern for a better Nigeria, where they knew there was corruption. But on structure, from a military standpoint or from understanding of political economy or from understanding of real politics. And so it collapsed.
“In collapsing, it was handed over to a military, a military government came into being. And that military government, if it had acted very quickly on the coup makers and coup, the wrong assumptions would not have arisen that led to the killing of Ironsi.
“Ironsi’s death was not a coup, it was murder. I mean, he could have been shot, but he was tortured, he was tied to a Land Rover and all of that. He killed, they killed our brothers and here they are celebrating.
“Now, move from that point onward. In moving from that point, let us also not forget that the military made substantial contributions. Because if you look at most of the power facilities we have today for electricity, many of the core national investments, they all came under the military. And very little has been added onto them until very recently.
“So putting all of that together, what has happened is that the things that Lancaster House hoped and set out to abort have now acquired new fertilizer. All those fears are doubled. Distrust is at its peak.
“Citizenship is at its lowest. The number of people who have no capacity, they can be employed, they are unemployable, they are the majority among the youthful generation or population.
“And on top of all of that, you now have indigene-ship over citizenship. So we are further divided. That’s the bad news,”he said.
Boluwatife Enome
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