Media entrepreneur and former presidential aspirant, Chief Dele Momodu, in this interview by SAM NWAOKO, does a thorough examination of the Nigerian polity and comes to the conclusion that the country is on the cusp of a one-man rule.

Some people have said that the issue involving Nigeria’s First Lady, Senator Oluremi Tinubu and the governor of Osun State, Senator Ademola Adeleke, was a convivial episode between two former colleagues in the Senate. Do you agree with this contention by some observers of the matter?

You know that spin doctors will spin anything no matter how unreasonable it is. Everybody, including Mrs Tinubu, acknowledged that what happened was wrong. Whether she now apologised or not, I am not aware, but she herself said it was a minor misstep and that we should not escalate it. So let us not debate what is not debatable.

When my favourite writer, Uncle Dare Babarinsa, said that the video of the incident in Ile-Ife was AI-generated on Facebook, I replied to him and said it was not. I gave them the original video that was shot by Ovation TV and said: “This is an original video that was shot by Ovation TV and not AI-generated, Sir. The governor was clearly disrupted and momentarily lost composure.”

The whole saga looks like it is not going away. What would you advise the First Lady to do at a time like this?

It is not going away because we are all prone to mistakes – nobody is perfect, I am not perfect, the First Lady is not perfect and when we are wrong either knowingly or unknowingly, we should just apologise. That is all. The thing would have gone down immediately. However, the thing is that her spin doctors are busy trying to window-dress the incident which is ordinarily a scandal because you embarrassed Governor Adeleke in his own state because you momentarily got him confused. If you look at the video, you will see that she disrupted him and the governor was momentarily confused. The governor was flustered because he was not expecting such an intrusion during his speech. Even if you were in a hurry to leave the palace and all that, you could have sent someone or just asked someone to write something on a small paper that ‘We are running late, please hurry up’. It is not that you will now stand up on your own. The First Lady stood up, and we saw her conversing with the Ooni of Ife before then, reporting that ‘I want to go and tell this man to stop singing’.

However, I know the reason she is angry, because she used to enjoy his singing and music when they used to dance together in Osogbo and all that. I have video evidence of that. She is angry because the governor refused to join the All Progressives Congress (APC). You know, APC has this entitlement syndrome afflicting it. APC believes that every governor should be in APC. The only thing that will give them joy and comfort is for every governor in Nigeria whether from the North, or from the East or from the West – wherever – should join APC. Then Tinubu can become an emperor in word and indeed. That is what they seek to do. They succeeded in Lagos and they wish to succeed at the national level. That is what is going on. Anybody who does not join them is considered an enemy.

Don’t you think that he has succeeded in doing that in many other places too because we only have one governor of PDP left in the South, so to say?

To me, this does not matter. Some people will choose to be voluntary slaves while some people will choose to act like freeborn. Everybody has a choice, that is what democracy is all about. Some people are coerced; some people are cajoled. When they get there, I hope they get whatever they are looking for.

Could this thinking be the reason Governor Ademola Adeleke did not go to APC but chose to go to Accord instead?

They tried to woo him into APC but he decided that he would rather leave his fate in the hand of God instead the hand of man. He didn’t get to where he is today by himself, it is God that made it possible. In his first attempt, he claimed that they stole his votes. He went away quietly. He didn’t destroy Nigeria, he didn’t destroy anything. He didn’t even fight Tinubu. He went away and he came back stronger. In fact, this Mrs. Tinubu incident has played to his favour because he has been trending since Sunday. Governor Adeleke has been trending because of this “little mishap” according to Mrs. Tinubu. And, can you imagine that it coincided with the time he was joining his new political party, Accord. Everything in life works perfectly once God has a hand in it. I see Governor Adeleke as a very lucky man and that is why he is always singing. He said nobody can stop him from singing and praising his God.

Now that the PDP has all its flanks broken, what would you advise the party as an observer, when you remember what it used to be in the Peoples Democratic Party?

I left the party much earlier because we already saw where it was headed. It is not the fault of the party, it is the fault of the fifth columnists within the party who sought to keep the party in ICU and hope to switch off the ICU machine and kill the party if it is no longer useful to them, or keep it alive in the ICU until the day they will need the party. So, what those people have been doing is to gradually kill the party on behalf of Tinubu, because it is Tinubu that has that kind of power. It is not people like Nyesome Wike that are wielding that kind of power.

From your thinking, you seem to agree with Nigerians who are of the opinion that the problem with PDP and the other opposition political parties is the handiwork of the government, Tinubu himself and his people?

There is no government in power. Tinubu is the person in power, no other person is in power. Tinubu does not share power with anybody. I had predicted in 2022 that if he gets power we have a potential dictator in our hands. This was in October 2022, I said it on a TV programme and it has come to pass. When I speak, people would react and abuse me but I don’t mind. My body is that of a porcupine, nothing worries me that much, I don’t even bother. I saw this because I was trained in Ife on how to conduct research and I am conversant with how to go about postulations, permutations and all that. I might not be able to use it effectively for myself to win elections because I don’t have the resources, but I can tell you what will happen in 2027 and give you different scenarios.

So that is what is going on right now. Tinubu is a one-man mafia and all the other people under him are afraid because of that. Paulo Freire, a Brazilian author, wrote “The Pedagogy of the Oppressed,” in which he contends that the oppressed man respects and loves only one man: his oppressor. So, it is a theory in political psychology. So, all the people you see rushing to Tinubu are doing so out of fear in advance. Tinubu does not even need to tell them that if you don’t join me something is going to happen to you because of the reputation of Tinubu as a one-man mafia. So nobody wants to cross the line and even dare to try. So, it is in the nature of the oppressed to be fearful in the presence or in front of the oppressor. The oppressor does not need to say anything, just his eye-look alone is enough to scare them, so they are all scared and you know that the average Nigerian does not joke with power, position and wealth.

So, this second term nonsense is as if, if you don’t have a second term, you will die. That is the attitude of an average politician. But Donald Trump was defeated by Joe Biden. He went away. Is he not back today? President John Mahama was defeated by Nana Akufo-Addo in Ghana. Is he not back today? So, I don’t know why people are so desperate. If Tinubu will not allow you to come back, for as long as you have life there is hope. You can go away and come back later.

So, the fear of a one-party Nigeria is real – the fear that Nigeria is drifting into a one-party state is not unfounded?

We are not drifting, we are there already. The situation in which the entire South-South has been captured by one man… and a lot of them who didn’t even need to go there are running into the APC. Look at Akwa Ibom State. Akwa Ibom has no business in APC, Akwa Ibom is a traditional PDP state. It can survive on its own, it does not even need the Federal Government. Akwa Ibom is so blessed with resources that every governor of the state has always been considered very important in Nigeria. But when you have a man who was brought in by PDP and he ran away from the PDP even by the second year… What is chasing him? And now he is saying that only APC people can get jobs in Akwa Ibom, it is unprecedented. History is awaiting all of us. Was it APC that worked for him to become governor? If he wanted to give everything to APC, then he should have waited for APC to vote him for a second term then he can transfer everything to APC. But for, what he is enjoying is from PDP, it is not from APC, so why are you now shutting out those who brought you to power? And he is a pastor, he knows that God will judge him. I know it is his democratic right to go wherever he chooses but he cannot use what you have gained from someone else to give to another person.

Look at my home state, Edo State. There, if you are not a member of APC, you are declared a persona non grata. That is not right. The governor is free to choose his friends and so on, at least there the APC brought him to power unlike Akwa Ibom, where PDP brought him to power and suddenly you want to kill PDP in your state. I think that is ungodly.

The contention out there is that you are for Atiku Abubakar and not for any political party, including the ADC. How true is this and can you throw light on this assumption sir?

I have always chosen candidates that I admire and believe can deliver. I am not one of those who would do otherwise because of some parochial considerations. I have been very fortunate because God brought me from different backgrounds, my father came from Edo State while my mother came from Osun State. So I am very detribalised and I am a full Nigerian. I fought the military alongside other people for Nigeria to remain one. So, I would not allow any politician to brainwash me into seeing any Nigerian as my enemy. This is a ploy by some politicians to use us, and use divide and rule to continue to dominate the country and dominate our life, I am not involved in it. If I like you, I like you. I see Atiku as a shining star and I saw it from 1993 when he stepped down for Chief Abiola at the SDP convention, I have always admired him since then in 1993, it is not because of today. To me, whether he becomes president or not is not the issue, if I wanted a president as my friend then I would have chosen Bola Tinubu because I am one million times closer to him than to Atiku. But I am a principled man, I have chosen to support Atiku. If you don’t like him, support your own candidate. I cannot force anybody to support Atiku. There are democratic traits which I see in him, he is a thorough democrat, a man who will never promote thuggery, a man who had been Vice President and delivered outstandingly and spectacularly. When he was the Vice President, he was able to assemble some of the brightest stars in Nigeria wherever they came from. He did not populate his office with Fulani or Hausa or any tribe in particular. A man who left governance in 2007 and till today he is successful as a businessman investing in education, in agriculture, in health and so on and so forth. If every politician has a job or a business like Atiku, we will not be where we are as a country today. An average Nigerian politician has no job, has no business, and has nothing doing other than to feed on the government. That is part of my admiration for Atiku. Atiku has been able to elevate and upgrade himself intellectually by going back to school as a student. He has been able to maintain and carry himself gracefully at his age. So, Atiku’s experience is not something that we can throw away and he is one of those people who have contributed to the growth and development of Nigeria. So, why should I not express my support for him if he chooses to run?

Is he going to run in 2027 or is he going to back a candidate?

Definitely, he will run if he gets the ticket of the party. If he doesn’t get the ticket of the party then he will have to join someone else and support the person. He has always been a very forthright person and he was the first person to bring Peter Obi on the national platform, but people forget that.

But the ADC seems to have been largely quiet. It might be strategic, but the party is seeing the onslaught on the PDP and has been quiet. What would you say has been happening in the ADC and what should Nigerians expect in the near future?

ADC has not been quiet. They are working from state to state. Even in Edo State where the governor did not expect any opposition, we have worked hard in Edo State and we are gaining ground. In Adamawa, and I saw how people from different walks of life are joining ADC. Recently, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar went to Jalingo to launch ADC with them there. So, we are working and I am sure a lot of people who are leaving PDP now to join APC, when they finally get frustrated by especially Tinubu, they will come over to ADC. ADC is the only national platform that is available and it offers Nigerians better and credible options.

So what would be your advice to Nigerians considering the changing political landscape of the country?

They must resist a one-party dictatorship in the country and they must resist Tinubu. Tinubu’s ambition to have Nigeria entirely to himself the same way he has Lagos should not be allowed. I assure Nigerians that if he is allowed to get away with it then we shall all end up in servitude.

But he is said to be managing the economy better, and that the security situation is improving under his administration. Don’t you see these?

When people love you they will love you blindly; that is what is happening with those saying that Tinubu is performing and that the economy has improved. The situation in Nigeria now is far worse. What we have seen are statistics; statistics that do not have effect on the people or reflect in their standard of living. We have removed the petroleum subsidy which has thrown most homes in Nigeria into the worst poverty, yet we are not seeing what they have done with the money and they said the economy is improving. They should come out and tell us what they are doing with the money. Now, we have incurred unprecedented debts globally and we are still acquiring more almost on a daily basis. What exactly are we doing with the money? So, those who are talking about the economy improving don’t know what they are saying, they are just talking for the sake of talking or because, maybe they hope they will also benefit from the largesse of the government.

Culled from The Trubune