Presidential candidate of Peoples Democratic Party Alhaji Atiku Abubakar spoke with the Voice of America addressing major issues ahead of 2023 in an interview monitored by NPO Reports
If you look at all the parameters, the economic parameters , security, peace and prosperity, Nigeria has faired far far better under PDP than APC.
But people also accused the PDP of being corrupt by the time it was ruling?
But we have come to realise that the APC is more corrupt than the PDP.
So what are you telling your voters so that they would again vote PDP?
Well, I would remind them of the prosperity that PDP brought into the country between 1999 and 2007, also the poverty , the insecurity, the instability that APC has brought since they came into office.
You have said that you want to prevent the country from descending into “ frightening and decent into anarchy” what do you mean by that?
What I mean is that I am going to strengthen the security agency in the country. I am going to have more personnel, more equipment and I am also going to devolve more security apparatus to the local government and to the state so that it would not just be the federal government affair, it should be a concurrent between the federal government, state government and local government and that requires constitutional amendment.
The next president would have multiple priorities, growing insecurity , deep economic problems, rampant inflation, industrial crude oil theft , separatist agitation and all others.
Should you and your party win, what do you plan to use to tackle all this on day one?
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We already have laid out all those areas in our document which is called my “covenant with Nigerians”, and in that document, we have addressed all this issues: insecurity, poverty, oil theft and so on and so forth.
There has been a lot of report about the labour party’s Peter Obi that he is making significant in-road amongst Nigeria youth, what a powerful block to have. Does this worry you?
Absolutely not! It doesn’t worry me because the demography of youth is from region to region and it is not in all region that the youth are moving towards labour, maybe in some few areas in the south and in the south-east .
Should we expect you to have joint alliances with some of this political parties?
Alliances are no more phenomenal in political dispensation, if there are reasons for us to go into alliances we would go. For instance, I promised that even if we win with over 1 million am going to set up a government of national unity meaning that I would reach out to other political parties to participate in the government so that we can first of all bring unity back to the country, bring stability, unless we have unity and stability, all the programs we planned to line up to implement we cannot implement them.
We had done this in 1999. PDP won over 1 million but because of the circumstances of the situation in the country, we formed a government with unity, we brought AD, we brought ANPP and so on, So, I think we made a success of that , so we have the experience to do that.
What are your thoughts on what is going on in the Sahel region; fight against terrorism and the coup d ètat..
Well first and foremost it’s regrettable that Nigeria has retreated, in terms of security. West Africans, the standing form we use to have ECOMOG , is no longer in place and Nigeria is retreating its leadership in West Africa, and I have assured the leaders of West Africa that Nigeria will resume is leadership as far as security of the Sahel and West Africa is concerned.
Should Nigeria as a leader play a much bigger role in the stabilisation of the region?
Definitely yes. Nigeria has no other alternative than to play such a role.
And what do you think about how ECOWAS has handled the regional crisis and what type of role do you propose?
I don’t think the ECOWAS is as active as it used to be when we were in office and that is why I say we are going to reinstate common force to make sure there is no disruption to our democratic gains in Africa, in west Africa in particular and also we try to use the standing force to deal with issue of insecurity in any where they may arise within the West Africa sub-region.
So, what’s your take on the American alert warning about terror and insecurity and the measures in which they use to evacuate their citizens from Nigeria ?
My belief is that there should have been actually a dialogue between the American security agencies and embassies as well as the Nigerian authority so that there is a common understanding and common approach. I think that’s what should have been the case.
It is kind of funny that a foreign entity like the US will find out something that the Nigerian security or Agency couldn’t have been able to discover by themselves?
The skills was quite alright because I know there is a quiet of understanding between the American security agency and the Nigerian defense agency but it’s curious that the Americans decided to handle it the way that they have handled it.
Finally, what’s your view on the effort or the help to come up with this regional currency for the entire African continent. Is that something you support?
Well, I don’t know. First, of all, there are two things. There Is the West African common currency which we support very much, infact, I have assured some west African leaders that I will pursue very very vigorously and secondly there is also the inter African trade agreement which Nigeria has signed but is not implementing it actively. So our administration will make sure that, that is well implemented throughout Africa.