Ahead of the planned nationwide protest scheduled to start on August 1 by Nigerians, the President of the Middle Belt Forum, MBF, Dr. Pogu Bitrus has said that hunger will increase in the land if the issue of insecurity is not addressed urgently. In this interview with Newspot, he insists that unless the issue of insecurity is tackled and farmers go back to the farm, the 150 days free import duty on grains will not change anything. Excerpts!
The Federal Government recently created a new ministry of livestock to address the incessant conflicts between farmers and cattle herders. Some people have commended the move, while others have kicked against it. What do you think about the livestock ministry?
The name doesn’t matter. The important thing is that there should be ranching, and there should be an organisation that is going to supervise whatever is to be done. Of course, that supervisory body can have whatever name, but the issue is that we cannot have duplicity and multiplicity of agencies, especially ministerial organisations, because we already have many ministries.
So, we cannot just because we want to address the issue of animal husbandry or modern technique of farming, create a whole ministry. That ministry is not supposed to be there; it is a misnomer, and not in the interest of Nigeria. It is creating more bureaucracies, which is not necessary in this country at this material point in time. Our economy is in trouble and to add more bureaucracies to the system is not good for us.
Yes, I support ranching, but such ranching must be community based, so that all the foreign Fulani, who are brought in through the protocol of free movement signed by the former Military Head of State, Abdusalami Abubakar in 1999, will go back to their countries. This will bring about a more peaceful environment; an environment devoid of rancour, and one that is progressive. So, I don’t support things the way it is, that is to have a whole ministry just for ranching.
Are you in any way in support of those calling on President Tinubu to rescind his decision and cancel the creation of the ministry?
Yes, of course. That creation should not stay. It is in our collective interest to cancel it. It is in our collective interest to halt it. It is in our collective interest to stop it. You know, sometimes, things are done for political reasons. We don’t know what political reason prompted Mr. President to do what he did, but I believe he will see reasons and change the whole narrative, so that we can have a department in the Ministry of Agriculture to handle the situation.
Nobody is against ranching, but what we are all crying against is simple; we don’t want our economy to suffer just because we want to address a simple situation. We can have animal husbandry going on without necessarily creating a ministry for whatever reason.
A fortnight ago, the senate raised the alarm over an impending hunger, warning that if nothing urgent is done to address the situation, Nigerians could resort to protest against the government; do you agree with the senate?
Of course, you don’t have to go and ask a witch doctor to answer the question. The issue in the country has now reached a stage where it is in the interest of the government to address the issue of hunger quickly, because a hungry man is an angry man. And unless the issue of hunger is addressed, everybody is in danger. It is not only the presidency or whoever; it is about all of us.
We are all in danger because if there should be any problem based on hunger, it will affect the whole nation. And it is in nobody’s interest that we have such an upheaval coming up. We believe that the President has a listening ear and he will do the needful. But, the senate is quite correct, and there is no reason for hunger to be allowed to linger in Nigeria; it is dangerous.
The senate belongs to the legislative arm of the government; so for the senate to be raising this kind of alarm says a lot actually. Does it mean that they are aloof to the governance of the nation? Are they trying to absolve themselves from the mess; what does their position say about the All Progressives Congress-led Federal Government?
I don’t think the senators are exonerating themselves from anything. What I think is that they have seen a danger that could lead to untold repercussions; a situation that could pull the whole country into confusion and to forestall such a thing, they decided to come out openly to say we need to address this issue or else these are the possibilities.
So, by saying these are the possibilities, they are not trying to exonerate themselves. They are also not trying to paint a picture that absolves them from liability as leaders in the country. The issue is that they have seen a clear danger in the horizon and they have alerted the government by saying look, we make laws but some of the policies have created so much hardship that there could be some upheavals or revolts against the system by Nigerians.
I think there isn’t anything that absolves them from their responsibilities, but rather, we need to take what they said in good faith, and try to address them so that we don’t fall into the pit, which they are saying we might fall into if the situation is not addressed urgently.
What is your take on the 150-day free import duty that the FG granted on the importation of such food items as grain; do you think it will have any positive impact on the hunger in the land?
Some of these things are fire brigade approaches to issues. The real issue is that we have got so many policy statements and issues wrong ab initio. You don’t just say, import duties are lifted. Yes, in the short term, you are going to have some relief, but how long will it last? So, the real issue is that we have some fundamental problems, and those problems are better addressed when we look at the issue holistically. Why do we have hunger in the country?
One, it is because of insurgency. Secondly, it is due to policies that came immediately after the deregulation. Thirdly, we have hunger because of the devaluation of our currency. Things you can buy for N10 yesterday, today you have to spend N20, N30 or even more; so all these issues have contributed to the hunger we are now facing in the country. But, while the policies on the removal of fuel subsidy have brought serious strain on the economy, as the cost of moving goods from one point to the other have increased astronomically, the issue is also that, yes here we are importing nearly everything that we need, yet, the cost of those things have skyrocketed because the currency has been devalued. And while this is the case, we sit down and keep on waiting as if we can resolve the problem by waiting.
Unless insecurity is addressed and farmers can go to the farm to properly do their farm works, the hunger will not only persist, but will also increase, and we don’t know what would happen because a hungry man is an angry man, and may God help us so that we don’t get to the stage where there will be anarchy because of hunger.
Recently, the Supreme Court delivered a landmark judgment with regard to local government autonomy. Some Nigerians have commended the judgment, with some others expressing some reservations; would you like to add our voice to that?
It is a commendable effort by the government to have gone this far, but let them finish the job by ensuring that the election into those local government offices is conducted by the Independent national Electoral Commission, INEC. The National Assembly needs to pass laws and to ensure that INEC rather than the State Independent Electoral Commission, SIEC, conducts elections into the local governments, otherwise we will find ourselves in the same situation, and that will not be good for us. Victory will be assured when the INEC is the one handling elections in the local governments, and not the SIEC, then we can have true transformation in that regard.
Let the government do something quick and ensure that we succeed, so that it will not be while we are getting autonomy in the local government, the governors are still imposing people to do whatever they want and still control the system and subvert the effort of the Federal Government in this regard.
Recently, we all witnessed the emergence of the Labour Party candidate in the United Kingdom election, how free and fair the elections were, how fast and smooth the handover was and how everything was conducted without rancor. Is there any lesson Nigeria can learn from that?
Whenever a group decides to do things its own way, or to say enough is enough against those who try to do things to favour some people rather than the generality of the public, of course, there will be a revolt. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak came in, remember that whether we like it or not, the Conservatives have held power for so long, and they just felt that they could do whatever they wanted.
Unfortunately, that is not how things work, especially over there, and the people have come to tell them that look, you cannot keep deciding things for us, we have had enough, and we are taking back what we feel is ours. So, it has happened in the UK and it can also happen here in Nigeria.
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