Former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Malam Nasir el-Rufai, is one Nigerian who does not need any introduction. Right from the days he was in charge of the nation’s privatisation agency as the director-general of the Bureau of Private Enterprises (BPE) to when he held sway as the chief executive of the Nigeria’s capital city, he has always, willy-nilly, attracted controversies.?During his tenure as the FCT’s minister, not a few high profile Nigerians asked for his head, with some senators, at a time, joining in the fray. But Mr. ‘Demolition’, as he was called by many, however, remained unfazed; no matter what was thrown at him, this ‘small’ man refused to back down.
Just last week he made the headlines again. This time, he was arrested by the agents of the State Security Service (SSS), who detained him for 17 hours. But is he battle-weary yet? No way!?In this encounter with CHINYERE FRED-ADEGBULUGBE and SHUAIB SHUAIB, el-Rufai speaks on the various contentious issues in the country. It is the quintessential el-Rufai. Excerpts
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You have been accused of hijacking the leadership of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) for your presidential ambition. Is that true?
I have no ambition of any type and I am not hijacking anything. I am not an official of the CPC. I joined the Buhari/Bakare campaign to add whatever value I could and I have no other interest than to see a real opposition party that will counter the PDP built. I have been in the PDP and I have become disappointed by the direction PDP has taken, particularly in the last four years.?
After my efforts in the reform forum failed, along with others, I decided to walk away from the PDP and I found myself in the CPC.
I believe it is the party of the future, but it needs to be built and organised and I will contribute my quota to that. Those saying that I have hijacked anything should tell me what I have hijacked.
At the time I became visible in the CPC, it was a period when, in the wake of the post-election violence, the party was being blamed for everything. Our leader, General Buhari, was being blamed for the post-election violence and somebody had to speak. I chose to speak out when others who had been members of the party for a very long kept quiet. So, because I have been vocal, people think I have an agenda, but I am not interested in anything. I have achieved everything I want to achieve in public life and I am not interested in anything.
Are you saying that you are not interested in ever becoming president because, looking at what you did in the FCT, many people have said in the past that if someone like you should become president, Nigeria would probably make progress?
You see, many people like what I have done and many people hate what I have done. It depends on who you speak to. Maybe because of the controversial assignments I got while I was in government, I became quite visible, from privatisation to the FCT. And because of that, people think I am this visible for something in the future. I am not interested in anything. Any job you found me doing, it was because it was a difficult job somebody thought I could do and I was invited to do it. I do not crave for any position. I have never asked for any job. I have never lobbied for any job.
Those, who look at what I have done in Abuja, or those who have worked with me in BPE, and saw what I did, make suggestions of all kinds, which have put me in trouble. The main reason why Umaru Yar’Adua went after me with a vengeance was because he thought I was taking a break to contest in 2011. So, I have been through all kinds of pain because of this suspicion that el Rufai is planning to run president or el Rufai is very smart and he is doing all these things to be president. People are going to be disappointed just as they were disappointed in 2011 when many people thought I would come out. I would have, because at least three parties, including a major party, approached me to be their presidential candidate, but I declined.
What were your reasons for declining?
I am not ready. I have done public service at the highest appointive level. I have worked very closely with two presidents and I know the burden of the office. It is not an easy decision to run for president and I would rather not bear that burden.
Secondly, I have gone through accusations, false accusations in the last four years. I have served this country for nine years, and I will swear to God and I will take the Qur’an and swear any day that throughout the nine years I worked for government, I never touched one kobo of public funds. But Yar’Adua’s administration accused of embezzling N32 billion, until they found the money in 15 bank accounts. I am on trial now for approving a plot of land to my wife. That is my crime. I have gone through a lot of persecution and pain because I worked hard for Nigeria. I have to be a stupid person to rush back to it.
So, I am going through a process of reflection and healing, and until I feel redeemed in my heart that I feel no anger towards anyone, it is not reasonable to go back into public office because I may use the power to settle scores and I do not want to that. It will destroy me in the end. So, I am not in that frame of mind at all. This is why I write now. I am writing a book; in fact, I am working on three books. This is why I write: because it forces me to think and reflect and it also enables me to vent out some of my frustrations. Hopefully, one day, I will be ready to be back in public office again, but, for now, I am not thinking about it.
If you had no political ambitions, why were you on the Buhari train?
I joined the Buhari train because of three reasons: first, conviction; looking at the four presidential candidates, I believed that he was the one most likely to change the direction of the country. And it is not because I did not have differences with Buhari. I had to look at four people and make a choice. It is like a beauty contest – you have to pick the ones that have come out.
I believed that from Buhari’s record in public service, his integrity and his persona, he is the one that is likely to fight the entrenched interests that have held Nigeria back. He has that discipline and personality to do so, much more than the others. The second best, of course, is my brother Nuhu Ribadu, whose very presence will make some criminals leave town.
The second reason, of course, is that Pastor Tunde Bakare was picked by Buhari as the running mate and Pastor Tunde Bakare is very close to me. The third reason is that I looked at all the other parties and I saw that only CPC was in a position, but with some effort, to counter the PDP. The other parties have tended to focus on enclaves. It was only CPC that at least tried to cover about four zones of the country; they made an effort.
It was not for personal ambitions. I had no interest. If I had any long-term ambition, I could have run for senator or governor on the platform of CPC in my state. I would have won.
In the end, Nigeria saw Buhari in only two lights – religion and tribe. Did those sentiments play any role in your support for him?
No, not at all; and it is unfortunate that Nigerians saw Buhari in that light. I think it is one of those things in politics in which, if a tag is put on you and you don’t fight against the tag, it sticks. Buhari is not by any standard driven by ethnicity or religion. I know him. If you look around him and see many of those close to him, you see a mix of every tribe and religion.
Secondly, his record in public service clearly shows that he is a nationalist.
Thirdly, throughout the arguments on zoning, Buhari was never part of it. He never even spoke to the northern political leaders’ forum. He even issued a statement that this arguments over zoning were nonsense; that it is not what we should be looking for. We should be looking for the person who can save Nigeria, and not choose a leader based on accident of birth. But they have forgotten all that.
Why was Buhari not part of the consensus? Even after the consensus thing had failed, did you ever hear the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) or the Adamu Ciroma group endorse Buhari? They never did. He was never, at any time, a northern candidate because he rejected that tag. But still, in politics, your opponents will try to tag you and, unless you fight, it sticks.?So, that is what happened to the tag on Buhari. It is an unfair tag but it has stuck because, in my opinion, his public relations handlers and the party did not do a good job of clarifying and explaining, and bringing the real Buhari out.
But for me, personally, that did not even come into play. As I said, the principal reason that persuaded me to make the move to support Buhari was actually Pastor Tunde Bakare, a Yoruba Christian. If that is the reason why I moved to the Buhari/Bakare campaign, how could it be that it is religion or ethnicity that influenced me? If you look at my public life, if you go to the BPE where I had the opportunity to hire 100 people to work, and go to FCT and see what I did, you will not find any one saying that Nasir el-Rufai is driven by ethnic sentiments or religious sentiments. I just don’t take that into account.
In fact, one of the closest human beings to me in the world is Oby Ezekwesili. She is not from Kaduna State and she is a pastor of the Redeemed Christian Church of God. But she is one of the people I trust with everything of mine. Religion is a personal thing and there are good and bad people in every religion. Ethnicity is an accident. Where you are born, the language you speak is purely an accident.
It has nothing to do with what you choose and there are good and bad people in every ethnic group and I think the challenge in Nigeria is for those that are good in every ethnic group to come together to save this country. Right now, we are in the hands of largely bad people. And that is why we are going where we are. And we need prayers, and for good people to put aside their differences and come together to save this country.
You used to be close to Nuhu Ribadu but there is now this coldness between you two; what went wrong?
We are very close friends. We are brothers but we parted ways politically; we had differences in political orientation, but our friendship remains. You may come from the same womb with a person and you would be in one party and he would be in another, it doesn’t make you enemies, though in Nigeria, those around you will try to make you enemies. What is between Nuhu and I goes beyond what some people around us can understand. We are still friends.
We sat down for several hours a few days ago and we are very much in touch. Politics is gone and we have to now work together. As I said, there are good and bad people in every party, in every religion, in every ethnic group and we must try and work together. I think Nuhu is one of the best people I know and we will rebuild, even our political relationship. We will find a way to work together.
We also understand that you and Nuhu Ribadu also worked together in foisting President Goodluck Jonathan on former President Yar’Adua as his deputy then. It appears now that there is no love lost between you and Jonathan. At what point did your relationship turn sour?
I think this thing about Jonathan being Yar’Adua’s vice that is being attributed to Nuhu or to me is a bit of an exaggeration. Jonathan was deputy governor when I knew him in Bayelsa State and Alamieseigha was impeached. Nuhu’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) had a role in getting Alamieseigha arrested, and all that as part of the law enforcement effort with the Metropolitan Police. And because of that, people attribute all sorts of things.
The truth of the matter is that the choice of Yar’Adua and Jonathan were made by Obasanjo. We were part of the government and speaking for myself specifically, I did not in fact play any significant role in the whole thing because I was not involved in the politics. I was more involved in handling my job and the economic team. Whatever role Nuhu may have played is obviously exaggerated.
From what Segun Adeniyi wrote recently, Jonathan was not supposed to be the vice president then.
I know that part about the Dr. Peter Odili the night of the convention, and even I was involved because President Yar’Adua sent for me and complained to me that he had been given a speech with Odili’s name as vice president but he did not want to do that. He asked for my advice and I said, ‘Get the governors involved in this. You can get their support so that the matter is postponed; so that you will have time but who do you have in mind?”
He said that he didn’t have anyone in mind but that he knew that he didn’t want Odili. But I also knew that he didn’t like the fact that it was just imposed on him by Obasanjo and the party. I know that much and I called a few people and so on but that did not mean that it also led to Jonathan. It meant that Odili was out.
Odili had big issues with the EFCC then and this was the main reason.
As far as the relationship with Jonathan is concerned, personally I still have good relations with him. I do not think that our personal relationship has been affected in any way by this. I mean, official relationships and personal relationships are different. Officially, he is the president; I have to address him as president and I have to hold him responsible if I am arrested by the SSS for instance, even if he knows about it or does not. He is the president and I have to hold him responsible.
If you were to pick a vice president for Yar’Adua then, who would it have been?
My preference would have been to pick someone from the south-east.
Who?
They are many. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala would have been a good candidate. Oby Ezekwesili would have been a good candidate. Chukwuma Soludo would have been a good candidate. Ken Nnamani would have been a good candidate. But Obasanjo did not like it. There are many good people and the reason I would say south-east is because I believe that until part of Nigeria tastes this presidency and find that it is not a big deal, we will continue to have these problems of marginalisation and so on. I just think that over 30 years after the civil war, it is time to settle some things. If we have had a president from the north, a president from the south west, I just think it should go east. That was my personal opinion and I proffered it to Obasanjo who said no,
What was his reason?
He said that the south-south had never had a shot at the presidency and he just thought that it was fairer to give them the chance.
When Yar’Adua was first elected, it was reported that you lobbied for a position in his government and, at a point, you were even barred from entering the Aso Villa. Now, you are also criticising the government of President Goodluck Jonathan, there is a feeling that you are doing this because he is not accommodating you in his government.
This is false. I have never lobbied for a position in my life; never. With Yar’Adua, as soon as he was elected, I told him that I was not available because I didn’t even want him to make the offer, and I would say no and it would cause problems. I told him very clearly that I had a law degree to finish at the University of London and that I planned to go Harvard. So, for at least two years, I was not available for anything.
and I were quite close. And the question of barring me from the Villa didn’t arise because I was seeing Yar’Adua up until September 2007 when I left for the University of London. I was seeing him regularly; he was consulting me on many issues. Our falling out happened much later. Even when he called me and said he wanted me to be a member of the energy council, I had to ask him if it was part time before I agreed. I was a member of the energy council until June 2008 when I resigned voluntarily. So, all these stories are nonsense. The feeling in Nigeria is that once you get into public office, you do not want to leave.
So, people think you will keep going and lobbying; God forbid. I will never do that. I am a professional and I am employed.
I am not someone who needs a job from the government. I worked for 28 years for myself before I got into government and, for me, it is something you do and go back and take a break and go back and do. My falling out with Yar’Adua began because of the reasons I told you. He was convinced I was going to run for president and he decided to do whatever it took to destroy me. I had to fight back. That was it.
I was criticising Yar’Adua so stringently because, also, he turned out to be an incompetent president in my opinion. I was criticising him, attacking his policies as stringently as I would attack Jonathan. The only difference is that if I attack Yar’Adua, it is Gambari kill Hausa man, no case. Now, with the division in the country, if I attack Jonathan, they will say it is because he is a southerner. That is nonsense.
People should go and read the sort of things I wrote about Yar’Adua and said about him to know the kind of person I am. When I see things going wrong, I speak out. That is how I am. It is my country. It is not Yar’Adua’s country. It is not Jonathan’s country. It is our country and we all have a stake. When we see things going wrong, we speak out and it is up to the government to explain to us why it is going that way and why they think it is right; not to arrest us.
So, what do you think is going wrong with Jonathan’s government?
Jonathan’s government is, in many ways, a continuation of Yar’Adua’s government. They are spending a lot of money and achieving very little. This is my worry. I had written a piece that in the four years of the Yar’Adua and Jonathan, $200 billion had flown into the coffers of the government.
Just ask yourself, what is there to show for it? Very little. I was in government, I know how much money we had and I know some of the things we did. I look around and I do not see a lot of that bearing in mind the resources that have gone into the government. This is my concern. The reason why I raised an alarm is because I can understand these figures; I can explain them and I hope that when I raise the alarm, the government will look at it and make adjustments and improve.
People believe that you are manipulating these figures to incite Nigerians against the government.
Are the figures wrong? They are not wrong. I am not manipulating anything. The SSS (State Security Service) came with that angle and I proved to them that my figures were right. The only thing that I probably got wrong was the figure for amnesty which I said was under the control of the National Security Adviser. It is not. It is under another adviser in the presidency. But, what is the difference? In fact, I got the figure wrong. It was N99 billion, not N98 billion. It is more than I wrote because I added it mentally without a calculator and I rounded down instead of rounding up.
Look, I am a responsible citizen and I have gotten to a position in life that I will not sit down and lie about figures. I am a quantity surveyor. My profession is to take figures and understand them. I will not lie about figures. I know where every figure comes from and how I analyse the figures, and my opinion of them, is my opinion. If you think I am inciting, look and see if there is any law I have broken; but this constitution guarantees free speech. I can say what I want. But really, my intention is to draw the attention of those who make decisions to make adjustments because I know; I have been there. Most of the time, in those positions, you do not get to hear the truth. But once it is published in the back page of a major newspaper, you cannot avoid noticing it. That is the objective.
For someone who allegedly once paid some of his aides in dollars, people are saying that you have no right to accuse the government of spending so much.
First of all, even if it were true that I paid my aides in dollars, it does detract from my right as a Nigerian to complain if someone else is doing worse. It is pathetic for the government to hire people to say that I paid people in dollars. So, they should blow $200 billion for nothing? It is pathetic. It just shows that the government has no responsibility. It is admitting that what I accused them of is right. They are only saying that since you have done it, we should also do it. Does that help Nigeria?
Secondly, it is false to say that I paid my aides in dollars. I paid many people in dollars. In the BPE, we had a programme. We had $10 million from the US Agency for International Development. It was a grant and not Nigeria’s money. It was a gift from the US government. That gift was supposed to aide privatisation and, to do so, I needed to hire people with technical skills that I could not find in Nigeria. So, I got people from the US, the United Kingdom and I hired them. It was not one person. It was more than a dozen people. I brought Nigerians from the Diaspora, paid them in dollars and they worked for me in BPE.
When I was moving to FCT, I took two of them to the FCT. Now, in the FCT, I didn’t have that source of money. So, I didn’t pay them in dollars because I tried to get the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to continue paying them and they did in the end. But in the beginning, there was a two month gap in which they were not paid and BPE stopped paying them. So, I had to find a way of paying them. And the Senate called hearings. If the Americans decide to do that with their own money, who is complaining? Who is crying more than the bereaved?
Let us assume that I paid some staff in dollars with US money, the $200 billion they are wasting, is it US money? The government should do better than go into all this below-the-belt tactics; it is pathetic. Government should not behave like that. And they sponsor all these rag tag people to write as if that will change the debate. The truth is that we have a lot of money being spent on the wrong things. This is my message; look at it and change.
What do you think the government should be spending the money on?
Look, if you read the front page of one of the national dailies today (Thursday), Ngozi Okonja-Iweala in the Senate yesterday confirmed what I said. What do I need to say any more? She confirmed what I said that we are spending money on the wrong things and we need to tighten and direct our resources to better places. She is going to be the next minister of finance, so I hope she will fix what I am complaining about. But to say that there is no problem, it is not helpful, and arresting me will not solve it.
Did it bother that while you were doing your best at the FCT, many people were even cursing you?
What did I not go through? I was abused; I was disparaged and I have had night vigils and prayers in churches and mosques against me. At the end of the day, in this life, you would only do your best and, if you are given responsibility, you try to be as fair and just as you can, and then you leave the rest to God. There is nothing else you can do. That was the mind I had throughout my four years in the FCT. I survived it all: I survived the prayers; I survived the night vigils; I survived the juju and I am still here. In fact, some people are coming back and telling me (that) I did very well in FCT. So, I am humbled by it all, but at the end of the day, you just do what you have to do and leave the rest to God.
Some of your actions in the FCT were not exactly seen as just by people. At a point, you threw a hapless old man, a retired judge for that matter, out of his home. Now, looking back, do you have regrets?
I regret many things I did not do in the FCT but that is not one of them because the story of Justice Bashir Sambo is incomplete. When you read my book, you will hear the whole story. The man is dead and I don’t like raising allegations against someone who cannot defend himself. But, in my book, I will publish letters between Justice Bashir Sambo and me that will tell the whole story without me having to say anything. All I am saying is that, as a matter of principle, every action I took in the FCT was well considered, well thought-out and driven by nothing but applying rules, ensuring there was fairness and justice, and not minding whose ox was gored. That was my principle in running Abuja.
Can you please clarify the cabal myth issue Segun Adeniyi recently brought up?
I did not want to talk about it because Segun gave just a half of the story, but this is a good opportunity. You see, the presumption out there is that there is a group, a cohesive group called ‘cabal’, that was doing all kind of things to hold power and they think in the same direction, and that they coordinate; that is the definition of a cabal. But there wasn’t any such group. Instead, there were three or four different sub-groups, sometimes working at cross purposes, sometimes hating each other. But when you have an adversary and you have to fight that adversary, you have to tag that adversary with a very simple name; it is a war strategy.
You can’t say there are four different groups and they are not talking to each other, or they are fighting one another. You give them one name because they are all adversaries and because, in various ways, they are acting contrary to your interests. That is what I meant that there was no cabal as such. There were three or four groups that were not coordinating necessarily, in fact, disliked one another, and competed for Yar’Adua’s attention, and for resources between and among one another. That is what I meant. For the details, you have to read my book.
You look so frail; from where do you get your strength from?
But I am not strong.
Really, and you are able to challenge government and get away with it?
You see, I am small man. I was a small boy, always the smallest boy in my class and, sometimes, the youngest. Because of that, there is always the class bully who goes after guys like me. If you are small in a class and you do well in the class, that big bully who doesn’t do as well will try to bully you. So, from childhood, I learnt not to accept bullying. I never fight anyone. I never pick a fight. But when you pick a fight with me, you do not decide when it ends. Though I am small, I will fight until I am dead. That is a basic principle I have imbibed from childhood. I don’t like being bullied; I don’t like being unfairly treated, and if there is anything that brings the worst out of me, it is a feeling that you are trying to bully me because you have more power than me. I don’t like bullies. I fight bullies until I have no strength left.
What would you say you learnt from your recent detention by the SSS?
Actually, nothing; the detention was just an inconvenience, I was held for 17 hours. It was just inconvenient and they were courteous. They offered me breakfast at 11.30am but I said that it was too late, that I would prefer lunch two hours later, by which time my wife had brought me food. It was okay; it was a very civil interaction. There was nothing about it that will give me nightmares.
There is also this report that you are somehow linked to Boko Haram; that some money trails have traced to you?
I have just heard it for the first time, but I want to say that it is totally untrue. I wish I knew Boko Haram because, if I did, I would beg them to sit down and talk. What is all this. Innocent people are dying and there is no religion that condones killing. Why would you kill anybody? What is the basis? You cannot settle any argument by killing. You settle arguments and disagreements by talking. They may have been maltreated. Their leaders were extra-judicially executed – the police made that mistake. But still, having made the point, I think it is time to draw the line and have peace. But I have nothing to do with them.
How do you think the government should tackle the issue?
I don’t know. It is a complicated issue. The phenomenon needs to be understood and mistakes of the past need to be recognised and remedial actions taken. For instance, the policemen who killed their leaders should be tried. Anyone connected should be put through the due process of law, because when the state disobeys its own laws, then everything breaks down.
I wonder how you ended up with three women as wives; how did it happen?
I am also wondering myself, but if you meet them, they are all very wonderful women and I love all of them dearly.
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