Barr. Kabiru Dodo was recently accused by the Taraba State governor, Danbaba Suntai of betrayal. The governor alleged that Dodo had secretly recorded their conversation with a recording pen. In this interview with JOHN MKOM, Dodo bares his mind on the allegations.
Before now you were the special adviser to governor Suntai on special duties, but recently you were relieved of your appointment and the governor sighted betrayal of trust as his reason for your sack, what is your reaction to this?
It is quite unfortunate that I am forced into engaging my former boss in this war of words. I have as much as possible tried to avoid taking our differences to the public domain but now it has not only become necessary but pertinent for me to react to his public outburst against my person. I wouldn’t know what he means by betrayal of trust, is it trust in crime? Is it trust in contract or trust in thesaurus liability? I don’t actually know the yardstick. Is it a subjective tense or an objective tense? But whatever it is I beg to disagree with him vehemently. If there is anybody who should be crying of betrayal I should be the one crying of betrayal and I will give reasons and instances. Topmost of them is that he knew me when I was already an elected member of the state house of assembly under the platform of the Action congress. He persuaded me to relocate to his own Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). I insisted on remaining in the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) but he insisted that I must join his own party and that my interest will be protected. I considered his request upon pressure from all over the place. My political associates had to see him with me and expressed the predicament of changing from an opposition party to the ruling PDP but he insisted that we were one family and I should not harbour any fear. He went ahead to make this pronouncement in the presence of the sixth assembly. By this, we were convinced that since politics is all about interest and my interest will be protected, we then moved to the party against our wish because the teaming supporters from ACN were not comfortable with that. But I made up my mind that I could loose or win. It is always like that in politics but it turned out to be a different thing all together. My interest was not protected. It became clear that there was no genuine intention of togetherness if there was he wouldn’t have treated me this way, I can go on and on. If anybody should complain of betrayal between me and my former boss, I should be saying he betrayed me.
What are these instances?
Like I stated earlier, having cross carpeted to the ruling PDP which I am a member now, I was left with just about eleven months to face elections. I entered PDP on the seventh day of February 2010 and I was confronted with the burden of a primary election on the 3rd of January 2011. So you can see the duration, it is only God that knows how I managed to cross the primaries. I had a lot of challenges with stakeholders in PDP and I could not see the intervention of someone who promised to protect my interest. My victory at the primaries became my personal project, nobody cared to seat down with me to map out any joint strategy in preparation for the general elections which was contrary to what I know in the ACN. We were supposed to seat down and map out our own strategies on how to confront the challenges of the election and it is only through this that you can get to win an election but this did not happen in my case. Whatever my vote was at the election, I got them based on my relationship with the electorates outside of any influence and I think after God I should be grateful to Engineer Ahmed Yusuf because I learnt a lot from him. He exposed me to both the smooth and rough terrain of politics in Jalingo, otherwise, it could have been a push over against me. This was the first betrayal from somebody who is supposed to be my boss. He pulled me out of my political party where I enjoyed its popularity a few days to election. He promised me every support and abandoned me, now who is a betrayal?
Certain events preceded the announcement of your sack, at a point in time you were said to have been arrested for your alleged involvement in Boko Haram what do you have to say about this?
This is the second betrayal. It is so unfortunate if my former boss can resort to using religion to blackmail me and scuttle my political fortunes. The story is on the 5th day of August this year. I was doing my official duties in my office when the Taraba State commissioner of police led a team of police men that arrested me on a baseless, unfounded and frivolous allegation. I am saying so because as a lawyer who has put more than ten years in the bar, I also have my law firm situated in the capital city of the state, an active politician who contested election twice won once and lost once, I have my family members in various educational institutions acquiring western education, I have also associated myself with modern world educationalists, to be plunged into this baseless allegation is laughable. It is in fact a serious matter because I realized they wanted to set up a death trap for me. Look at the issue of Boko Haram as a lawyer I am aware that it is a treasonable offense and who ever frames a treasonable offense against you is someone who do not want your life. Obviously these are people that are waging war against the state and for anybody to just wake up one day and decide to baselessly associate you with such a group, is terrible. I have been part of the champion of democracy at all levels, I believe in the entire concept and dictates of democracy. As a lawyer I know as a fact that an arrest cannot be effected in government house without the knowledge of the governor, there are some percentages of immunity attached to government house.
Even a dog cannot be arbitrarily arrested inside government house the way I was without the prior knowledge, consent and authority of the governor. So, the governor connived with the commissioner of police to arrest me but in order to fool me he designed my arrest to be effected in his absence. I was arrested on the day that he left town but unfortunately for them God who knows my mind vindicated me because he knows that I don’t hold anything against my people and my nation. It will interest you to know that I was picked in his house and detained for seventeen days. I am supposed to be his son but could you believe he did not deem it necessary to either come or send somebody to see me in the cell, neither did he send anybody to visit my family. Even if I did what was alleged, it was yet to be established and as a son he knows that I have a family. What was their own offense that he excommunicated them because they are supposed to rely on him. I was shocked to my bones when the governor told me that he does not have the details of why I was arrested. I knew he was fooling me because I know the chief executive and chief security officer of the state whom I worked for, arranged my arrest in his house but was denying it before me. This act has created a lot of doubt in my mind about him, this also amounts to the betrayal of the trust I had in him.
Can you recall your last encounter with him before your arrest?
My last encounter with him was in official capacity when we the special advisers and the commissioners held a meeting with him in government house. That was my last encounter with him prior to my arrest, this was on Monday and the day after, I was arrested.
What about this story about you recording him in one of your conversations?
This was after my release from police detention and I deemed it fit to bare my mind before him because I realized he had already formed his opinion about me. I also had it at the back of my mind that I was going to investigate the brains behind my arrest with the intention of instituting an action. I told him most especially, that the commissioner of police who arrested me denied publicly that I was not in her custody probably that could be a kidnap. That was why I went to him on that day. But he rather said I used a recording pen on him and that was his reason for sacking me. But I asked if I had used pen on him there are two possible interpretations; if I used the pen on him and he fires me it is possibly because he did not want public consumption of our discussion but that is to say he does not have confidence in himself. Again, if I actually used a pen on him how does that amount to offense that he had to send seventy police men, well armed, to arrest me in my house and also my family members. Did my family members also record him? The police violated my right to privacy as a Muslim. I am married to two wives they entered my house without any authority from any competent court of law to search my house. Not even observing criminal procedure code prescribed for northern Nigeria. You see it is unfortunate if my former boss resort to this kind of falsehood in the media. It therefore means people are making mistake of having confidence in him. The police told my younger brother that they were in my house on the governor’s directive; seventy of them, they turned my house into a warfare. As for my younger brother I don’t know what he did that he was also arrested. He (governor) has told the public that I am supposed to be his son, this I am not arguing and that is the more reason why he should treat me also as a son but in this case, he is not sincere if he refers to me as his son.
Do you have any regrets about your experience with Governor Suntai do you have any regrets?
I don’t have any regrets. I look at it as a lesson. I have learnt great lessons so I will not regret anything. Rather, I regard it as a school to help me prepare for my future. If I must venture into any political project, I should be extra careful of who I am partnering with. I have no fear about my past. They should dig deep into my past, I have lived in Porthacourt; I have lived in zaria; I have lived in Abuja and in Jalingo. So I am not afraid of any probe in all these places. There cannot be any trace of any shoddy deal against me rather I contributed immensely to the development of my state and country.
There is this saying that in politics there is no permanent enemy or friend only permanent interest, what is this interest that you and your former boss as you prefer to call dodders on?
Well I wouldn’t know because I harbor nothing in my mind. I may not know their own interest at their own end but as far as my interest at that time was concerned, it was to promote the government of PDP.
But you see if I continue giving instances of my former boss betrayal this interview will not end. I could remember two days after the declaration of President GoodLuck Jonathan as the president elect of the country, my house was vandalized. I reported to the security operatives and the chief security officer of my state but up to this time that I am talking, he did nothing about it.
You practically saw that the man did not mean well for you, why did you not quit?
God has a way of doing things. I had made up my mind to quit a long time ago but one thing or the other kept cropping up that delayed me up to this time. When I came back from Abuja I wanted to quit but my elders, political associates wouldn’t let me do it. They kept pressurizing me that it was not the end so in order not to betray them, I remained but it was not from my mind because there is no way this governor can convince me that it was not his plot to get me arrested, no amount of explanation can convince me.
You are now in court. What are your prayers before the high court?
I went to court to enforce my fundamental rights. In this suit, my demand is for the court to stop the governor and his security operatives from harassing me with arbitrary arrests and continuous violation of my house as a Muslim. All these things are enshrined in the constitution of this country. So, as a citizen, I should be a benefactor of the provisions of my constitution not just to be arrested because the governor wants me arrested on a flimsy excuse that I used pen on him. Even if I used pen on him, let him show the visuals to the whole world to prove his point and even at that, how does it amount to crime supposing I used pen on him as he claimed? What is that discussion that he did not want public consumption of? Let him know that government house operate twenty four hours and seven days a week and whatever business done in government house is public. And I am not even stopping there, I am prepared to go to United Nations Human Rights Commission for them to listen to my case, my lawyers are working round the clock over the prospect of getting what we want at the human right commission.
Is it true that when you were arrested and your house searched fire arms were recovered from the house?
Not even a pin. Nothing was recovered from my house that is why I was release without any condition. The governor is doing this to me just because I am a Muslim. This fact can never be erased from my life. I felt bad if he can condescend to use religion against me.
Will you be willing to come to reconciliation table with the governor in spite of all these?
That will be a decision after my lawyers carefully study the terms with the aim of ascertaining the genuinity of the reconciliation, if that is established why not since reconciliation is even part of my religion.
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