Kayode Salako was the immediate past chairman of Labour Party (LP) in Lagos State and House of Representatives candidate of the party for the Oshodi/Isolo federal Constituency 2 seat. In this exclusive interview with INIOBONG IWOK, he spoke on the state of the nation, why he left the LP, revealing why the 2023 polls failed to meet Nigerians’ expectations. Excerpts:
What is your take on the state of the country and Bola Tinubu’s administration?
Tinubu inherited a country which needs reformation in every area and sector. A lot of the sectors were already a cause for worry to Nigerians who want their country to work for them; we all want our country to work for us, it is not all of us that want to Japa.
So, Nigeria was like a dying child, a child that was suffering from many diseases, many terminal ailments. That child needed a surgeon, an experienced surgeon to perform experience surgical operation on that child, so that the child can come to live again and be useful to the parent. That child can live to become something of pride to the parent.
Tinubu came in through divine intervention because somebody like me didn’t know that Tinubu could make it to become the President of Nigeria. Many odds were against him.
I always see Tinubu as a man of destiny.
Even the way he became president was surprising to a lot of Nigerians like me.
But the man is there now and he has been talking confidently, that he is a President who is determined to do well for Nigeria.
From the way he talks, the content of what comes out from public statements shows confidence.
Tinubu gives the impression of a man who had wanted to be President of Nigeria because he had a mission, a sure agenda for Nigeria. Tinubu inherited a lot of problems on the ground and Tinubu knows that a lot of Nigerians did not want him to be their President.
He knows he got there by divine grace.
I am sure the man would sit down sometimes to ask himself; how he made it because it was tough.
I even heard there was a time the man had given up, but because he was destined it came to pass. He was able to scale all the hurdles.
The Tinubu presidency is seven months old to me, I would describe it as a surgeon still inside an operation theatre working on that ailing child, the result and success of that operation may not be visible yet until the child is brought out of the theatre alive.
Secondly, we Nigerians now begin to see that child recuperating, all the places where surgeon performed surgeon in his system are now healing up and we now begin to see the child coming alive and becoming healthy for the happiness of his parent and for the parent to see that child get up again without all those ailment anymore and living a normal live.
That is when someone like me can now come out publicly and give that surgeon kudos.
For now Tinubu is still inside the operation theatre working on how to resolve all the problems that took him to the theatre with that ailing child.
For now, President Tinubu is still reforming all the sectors, how the Nigerian societal system had been operating before now.
The kind of system we had before now was frustrating for a lot of people including me. Because of that frustration a lot of Nigerians have left the country, even those of us still here the situation is still frustrating us.
How do you cope as a businessman, importer, someone who imports what he sells, that the dollar is now $1200 to a naira.
That is a big problem which I’m sure the president is not comfortable about, I can’t be sitting down to say that he is comfortable about this as President.
I have children in America and people there, around 2010, 2011 one dollar to a naira was about N180, when Jonathan left it was about N230 when Buhari came it started going up and Tinubu devalued the naira too.
Was it the right policy?
Whether it is the right policy is not even my concern as a Nigerian, my concern is any policy of the government should be to ameliorate the suffering, the harsh economic situation of the average Nigerians on the street.
Nigerians deserve to enjoy their country.
I am not going to sit here criticising the Tinubu government, because it is him that is wearing the shoe and knows where it pinches. It is very easy for us outside the government to criticise, complain and build perfect solutions to the problems of Nigeria.
Don’t forget that those people in government today were also criticising when they were outside and had perfect solutions to the problems of the country yesterday.
Today they are in government and possibly they too must have seen what they did not see when they were outside government today.
Some of these people think when you just add one plus one it would give us too, but the dynamic civic democratic governance, politically inclined democratic governance may not be like those of us who see it outside.
So, they are in government. They are also making their efforts all I can say, I’m not in government and have not run a government before, my concern is that; any policy of government must always give Nigerians a positive impact on how they would enjoy their socio-economic lives in Nigeria.
Any policy that would make Nigerians regret for being Nigerians, policy that would make Nigerians regret looking up to God are policies the government must do something about.
So, Bola Tinubu has come in now, the first thing he did was to remove subsidies, up till now he is still justifying that the subsidy regime can now longer stay in Nigeria.
Part of the justification is that Peter Obi also promised the same thing it is on tape.
Obi said the first thing he would do is to remove the subsidy because it encouraged corruption in Nigeria.
Atiku also said the same thing; Kwankwaso also said the same thing. With what Nigerians are not comfortable with is the time.
With the removal of fuel subsidy that is the reason that to live in Nigeria is a tough job.
Let me tell you three indices that are affecting the economic situation of Nigeria now.
Firstly, the price of petrol because Nigeria is a country that is still running largely on what petrol energy can do.
Immediately food subsidy was removed, it affected the price of fuel. It affected everything because Nigerians need it for their socio-economic survival.
Our transportation system is largely powered by petrol, electric vehicles are not here yet, so many of the things we do to run our lives are determined by the price of petrol. Things are tough due to the removal of subsidy.
Secondly, the foreign exchange rate, the moment the subsidy was removed, the dollar started going up.
The moment you remove the subsidy a lot of our petrol marketers depend on dollars to import petrol. None of our refinery is working yet, except the one Aliko Dangote that is test running.
Maybe when our refinery is working our marketers would import petrol again and would not need dollars to import fuel.
Once Nigeria has its refinery our marketers would not need to be looking for dollars and that would bring the interest rate down. That is, the economic sabotage would not look for other means to sabotage the government.
The next is electricity supply, if the government can guarantee stable power supply, life would be better for Nigerians.
That is what the President is saying, so that the three indices can affect the lives of Nigerians for the better.
Nigerians have called for the reform of INEC ahead of the 2027 polls. What is your take?
Election in Nigeria is still an electoral system that is open to fragrant manipulation by those people that are supposed to be the electoral umpire and deciders of those who win the mandate.
Who are those? The three sectors of the electoral system from my experience not even the electorate are the deciders.
The voters wanted me to go and represent them. The votes they gave me made me win my opponent by a wide margin, but because that is not what wins elections in Nigeria in the current electoral system, my mandate was hijacked from me at gunpoint.
The political touts were given the power to move into the collation centre which was not supposed to be the decider in the first place. That is how it was in the past that was not making the vote of people to count.
Most of the manual rigging was done at the collation centre and INEC came out to tell Nigerians that the process had been reformed and changes had been made that gave someone like me the confidence to participate in the 2023 polls.
INEC did not tell us that it is what is done in the manual collation centre that would be the determinant factor.
INEC deceptively encouraged a lot of Nigerians to take part in that election; if INEC did not say so, someone like me may not have contested because I did not have confidence in the last process.
I had confidence in the new process they said they put in place; I was disappointed that INEC went back to that old process that disappointed us.
Why do you think they did that?
It is who we are as Nigerians; it is the nature of our socio-political operation. The way we Nigerians are aware; everybody sees an opportunity to make big money for himself.
INEC workers, anybody working for INEC during the election saw it as an opportunity to become super rich by frustrating the process that would make the election credible.
Nigerians that worked in INEC deliberately frustrated it, frustrated the credibility of the process, and compromised the process, so that it can be an opportunity for them to make money at that period. It was so painful. There are so many things that I can’t say here.
Why did you not call a press briefing after your election result was announced?
I saw it to be a waste of time. How many people that cried to the world got their mandate back?
How many people that went to tribunal got their mandate back? It was only those INEC gave certificates of returns that won in court. That should tell you that it is anyone that INEC wants to win the election that get the mandate.
INEC is a strong factor in how our electoral system can run creditably well for those who contest elections in Nigeria.
Do you think INEC was manipulated?
Systems don’t run by themselves, it is human beings that run systems. If you are human beings with good social orientation, the conscience of many Nigerians are dead, what runs the nature of our social orientation in today’s Nigeria is money.
I concluded that I did not contest against the APC candidate that I contested against INEC; that is the reason my mandate was hijacked at gun point through collaboration of INEC officials. INEC sets rules and allows the rules to be compromised.
Are you saying if INEC is not reformed no hope Nigeria’s democracy?
Was INEC not reformed with the beautiful process INEC put in place? That process was so beautiful to encourage a dog to say he wants to contest in Nigeria and he would be sure of winning.
The new Electoral Act is part of it, but I’m talking about the people INEC put in place, but the people they recruited they are the ones who make it easy for election riggers to make it difficult for some of us not to get our certificate of returns despite that it was clear we won the election.
INEC is a social body, is a social system run by human beings, it is these guys that are frustrating the system and bringing the name into disrepute.
Design a system puts Nigerians to run it, how he would short-change that system for personal gain is what he would be looking for.
He would now rubbish that system for personal gain. At the end of the day, he would not rubbish that system because of his interest.
What changes would you like to see going forward in the electoral process?
I have lost hope in the system because INEC has already reformed the system. The past government reformed that system and everybody applauded it for being the best system.
That Nigerian factor, those in charge spoil the whole thing because they saw it as an opportunity to be rich. Satisfactory amendments have been done to the Electoral Act, it is the people that run the system.
I’m not the only one that has given up on the system; a lot of Nigerians have given up.
The way INEC ran the last election disappointed a lot of Nigerians and actors. If not for that system, the Labour Party would not have won that number of positions.
In those areas where we won, Nigerians insisted that their votes must count and the candidates did not take anything for granted in their relationship to INEC people.
Some of the LP lawmakers in Lagos have lost their seats in the tribunal. Are you surprised?
That is to let you know that it is not the votes of the people who determine who get the mandate in Nigeria. Firstly, it is INEC, if they want you to get it you would get it.
Secondly, it is the judiciary, if they want you to get you would get it.
If the judiciary does not want you to get it, no matter how good your case is you would not get it. If judiciary wants you to get you would get it.
