The Senate Leader, Ali Ndume in this interview with DAILY POST in Abuja, defends President Muhammadu Buhari’s efforts to reposition Nigeria. Excerpts!
You will recall that there was controversy among federal lawmakers from Northeast over where the headquarters of the Northeast Development Commission Headquarters will be sited. Has that issue been resolved?
The House of Representatives is done with it; the headquarters issue has been resolved; it will be sited in Maiduguri. In the senate, a small committee was set up by the Senate President and I don’t think the issue of the headquarters is also a big deal. I can tell you authoritatively that the headquarters is going to be in Maiduguri.
Although six states are all entitled to it and politically everybody will struggle, that is why we are here to represent our state’s interest or the senatorial district from which we come from to represent, but apart from that, the members of the National Assembly from Northeast or the people from the Northeast are more concerned about the Commission, not necessarily where it has to be located but then we all know that the epicentre of the insurgency is in Maiduguri and the headquarters of the Northeast, abinitio, even six Northeast states when we were together, used to be in Maiduguri.
But why insisting it must be located in Maiduguri?
Because the most hard hit area among the six states is Maiduguri. It is like you want to build hospital in other to treat patients, you build it where the patients are or the epidemic is more severe. You cannot build, for example, you have the patients in Abuja and then you go and build the hospital in Gwagwalada. It will serve as a hospital but the patients will go through extra pain to leave Abuja to go to Gwagwalada in other to see the doctor.
The casualties are more in numbers in Borno State than any other Boko Haram afflicted States in the Northeast.
You seem to be very close to President Buhari on personal ground. Are you worried that there is hunger among Nigerians in his administration than any other administration in the past?
You are right to say am close to Mr President and I am one of the strong supporters of the President because I know that the person of President Muhammadu Buhari has very good intentions for this country. He didn’t come to power in other to make anything for himself but to fix Nigeria and move Nigeria forward. The first three priorities of the government is what his administration is pursuing.
Now the issue of people suffering especially in terms of the cost of living is well known and no leadership can pretend that it doesn’t know this.
But the question now is, is the solution there and is deliberately being refused, the answer is no. First of all, when this government took over with the intention to make this changes and move the country forward based on its dreams, it met paucity of funds.
We are a mono-economy, the price of our dependent source of income which is oil went down from $100 to below $30 at one point and it is now gradually trying to recover. That is our major source of income and when the price of crude was gradually rebounding, the issue of Niger Delta Avengers cropped up where pipelines were blown up and production went down from 2.2 million barrels per day to close to 1.4 million barrels per day, of course, one could imagine the consequence of that.
So how does Mr President react to the effect of low revenues profile and worries of Nigerians?
Now you look at the options, the option is to be prudent to block all loopholes which you know this government is doing. So, there is nothing new that you can tell Mr President about the situation we are in this country and is not that he doesn’t know or feel it. In fact, he is worried about it. Many times I met Mr President and he said what do you think we should do, he reacts to most of this things immediately. I give you an example, last time I went to Maiduguri and I could visibly see that the issue of hunger and malnutrition and poverty is ravaging the state. I came and after discussion he asked me what do you think we can do and I said it is better to release grains from the strategic grain reserves to cushion the effect of the issue of hunger, especially in Borno, Adamawa, Yobe and Taraba.
He immediately called the Minister of Agriculture and asked for the release of all the grains they have in the strategic grain reserves and about 300 trucks of grains was released to the six states and divided among the six states withBorno state having 113 trucks.
And there was allegation of diversion of grains meant for Borno by contractors transporting it. What is the outcome of the issue now?
Yes, we discovered that some people again diverted 60 trucks out of 113. We are chasing the contractor and we have been able to track it down and is now confirmed that out of the 113 trucks for Maiduguri, 53 trucks have been delivered, 31 have been diverted or stolen and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission is doing everything to recover the 31 trucks. So the President is aware and he is doing everything within his powers and I am optimistic of good days to come especially now that the price of crude oil is picking up and I think it’s $50 as at yesterday, that is good news.
The Niger Delta Avengers have ceased fire and that is a good development and they are willing to talk with the Federal Government, that is a very good development. We are hoping that there would be stability and the economy will improve. So there is light at the end of the tunnel and the good thing is that I can see that we are near the end of the tunnel.
Last week the former Military President, Ibrahim Babangida said if he had his way, he will ensure that Federal legislators were made part time in order to reduce cost. What is your take?
I support anything that can improve governance to reduce cost in this country. So, if making the job of the National Assembly part-time will make a difference, so be it. I don’t have problem with that. But that is not where the problem lies. Honestly, if you look at the whole budget of the National Assembly, vis-a-vis what we spend in governance, the whole budget of the National Assembly you know is 1.8% so if it is a loophole and you blocked the 1.8%, you still have 98.2%. So, do you say that if you can block 1.8% then you are making any difference?
The Judiciary is about 1% and their annual budget is 70 billion and that of the National Assembly is 150 billion this year, in a budget of 6 trillion where 70% of that 6 trillion is recurrent and personnel cost. Let me tell you the 98% that goes to others, go into the few hands but that does not circulate, but the 1.8% which is 115 billion, even you people are beneficiaries; it circulates and are you saying you are going to reduce cost, you are adding hardship because by the time you squeeze the National Assembly or you block the National Assembly, you are denying many people that are benefitting from here.
We are not here by force, we are not here by the barrel of gun, we are here by the PVC, vote of the people and if tomorrow or during the next election and even now if people don’t want Ndume as member representing them from Southern Borno, there is a constitutional provisions that you can recall me. The issue of whether National Assembly is part-time or full-time is to be decided by Nigerians.
The 8th National Assembly was said to be heavily indebted to the extent that they cannot meet some important financial obligations. How will you react to this?
Well, I know that the whole country is in a financial difficulty and not only National Assembly. Even in the National Assembly which I have been since 2003, there has never been a time it was rosy. Every time things get worse. Last time our monthly salary was paid on the 16th or thereabouts. It is not peculiar with the National Assembly alone, but some states cannot pay salaries for 6 months, one year, some were even asking their workers to go and farm for two days in a week and work for the other three days and some were asked to be bailed out before they could pay.
So it is not different in every sector, even in the Presidency they have tightened their belt on their expenditure and it’s a general phenomenon in the country. I am not surprised at what we are going through because I can feel it myself. We used to receive the running cost or allowances quarterly. Now it is monthly and it doesn’t come as at when due. I don’t know the details, I read it in the paper today but I know that ever since, the National Assembly has been having difficulty in meeting some of its financial obligations.
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