Jonathan Silas Zwingina, professor of political science and former Senate Deputy Majority Leader, is a witness to the annulled June 12, 1993, presidential election saga. A confidant of Chief MKO Abiola, winner of the annulled poll, Zwingina was the director general of Abiola Campaign Organisation.
In this interview with Sam Akpe and Ayo Esan, Zwingina recalls the trying moments of the June 12 period. He also does a kaleidoscopic analysis of the current era, reviewing the friction between the Senate and the Executive arm of the Federal Government, especially as it relates to the recently approved 2018 budget.
Excerpts.
Your days in the Senate are remembered with fond memories. How does it feel to be out here?
Well, it is a very different experience to be out, in some respects. It becomes a different learning period because things you did not know; now you know them. It is like being on the top of the mountain, you know how the surroundings of the mountain look like; you know how cold it can be, and how warm it can get; it is different from if you were in the valley. Now, comparatively, if you are not on top of the mountain in government, you are right there in the political valley. The environment is clearly different, you are with the people and you can see clearly what those in office ought to do and what they are doing now different from what you would do if you were on top there. It is entirely not the same. I would say that unless you have been in and out, you hardly become a complete politician. So, I would say it has been a worthy experience; it has given me the opportunity to try my hand on business. Because you have been in politics or classrooms all the time, the moment you come into business, there are so many people around you who pretend to be your partners but who are around to rip you off and if possible, defraud you. And anybody that jumps from politics to business suffers that; the difference is a matter of degree. So this experience becomes what you earn by not being in the political limelight.
Suddenly, you moved from the Peoples Democratic Party to the All Progressives Congress, what informed that decision?
Well, a number of factors. Politics is a local activity and in my local area in Adamawa State, we woke up one day and discovered that the head of the government who was the governor was unhappy that the party in power did not find it possible to extend the ticket to him. That affected his morale and that of his supporters. And they began to engage in anti-party activities by moving their support to a party other than the PDP. And the party practically committed suicide and when the party committed suicide, there was nothing left. It was like when the owner of a house has committed suicide, the children migrated to uncles and cousins.
What did you mean by ‘the party committed suicide’?
If the party chairman, party executives, all leave for another party, is that not suicide? So, from controlling 23 members of the state assembly, after the election, it controlled only two out of 25; for the House of Reps, only one out of 18; for the Senate, none; governorship none, presidency none. Is that not suicide?
How are you finding the environment in the new party?
I would say I am still learning the ropes and I am trying to understand the complexity of the new party. The party itself is still learning how to be a viable party because it is a conglomeration of various interests; or if you like, of various parties and interests. They are also learning to be together; to be a harmonious entity. And you can imagine somebody coming in newly; it means the learner is learning from a learner.
Does that affect the performance of the party generally?
It would affect naturally. A learner is not as efficient as an experienced person and is not endowed with expertise of one who has seen it before. It would affect the performance of the party normally. Maybe things which would have been sorted out through diplomacy are now being sorted in a much longer time; and sometime, some people who were left out but who should have been carried along would now be sorted out. The good thing is that, in terms of governance, it has not really had disadvantageous effect because the people that formed the APC know what governance is; they have been in government before and so the performance of the government has not been adversely affected by the party’s inexperience. You know the presidential system of government is not a party government.
Why are the National Assembly members almost constantly at loggerheads with the Executive?
There is no way the parliament will not be at loggerheads with the executive. That is the way the Constitution wants it, whether we like it or not. Go and read the Constitution carefully. The fact that you want to operate checks and balances means that there may be excesses and there will be possibility of jurisdiction and interest. So, the conflict is important so that somebody does not become a dictator; whether parliamentary dictatorship or executive dictatorship or even judiciary dictatorship. Conflicts are in-born in democracy generally and in a system of checks and balance. The concept of separation of powers is like, when you see that two boys are fighting, what do you do? You separate them. If you don’t separate them, the fight will continue. So in democracy, separation of powers means you are intervening among two authorities. Separation of powers is designed to harmonise conflicts. It holds that there will be conflicts. The only thing you can do is to harmonise the conflict so that it is not bloody. So the conflict between the legislature and the executive is expected and natural. The only difference is that, there should be mechanisms to resolve them harmoniously all the time. Now if the mechanism is not respected, that is what brings a problem. And I think the problem in this setup is that, the mechanisms for resolving the conflict are not being respected or even understood by the practitioners or some of the practitioners.
For example, it is expected that the executive will bring the budget and the reason politicians call it proposal is that, it is not a finished product. Who will make it final? The parliament; of course! Is it supposed to rubber-stamp it? No! What is it supposed to do? Look at it critically and make amends here and there; increase or decrease it; that is the purpose of laying it before the legislators. So, you cannot complain that the thing has been increased; they are just doing their job. If the wisdom of that increment is in doubt, then you can now call their attention to it. And that has been in existence for a long time, even in the days of Obasanjo. I have been saying it and the relevant people are not listening. If you want to do budget, before you call up the proposals, call up the proposal from the National Assembly too. Don’t just call up proposals from directors or even the permanent secretaries who are just unelected and have no responsibility to anybody. The president doesn’t have the capacity to know what is going on in all the places across the country. It is these people that bring the advice and they can be self-centred. You find a Level 10 officer bringing up a project from his village and a senator who is elected cannot. You can see the problems. So, if you do call-up letters for proposals and include the parliament, they will now bring their own proposals. Then you now set up in the Director of Budget Office a harmonisation group to look at what can be given to various proposals. Once you have settled that, the National Assembly will not begrudge it because they took part in it. The budget will not last three months in the parliament because the executive will only bring what has been agreed on.
But if the executive thinks budget making is just for itself, whereas the approval is not their own, there will always be debates and delays. You can do the budget, but when you bring it, we can approve or not approve it. Even when the president brings an amendment, it is not compulsory for the parliament to approve. The best thing to do is to set up this harmonisation body right from Day One, so that elected members would be accommodated right from the submission of the proposal and they would not come and start inserting some unrealistic items.
You were the Director General of Chief Moshood Abiola’s campaign organisation in 1993. June 12, 1993 election has been revisited. What’s your feeling?
I was very surprisingly pleased and it is one thing that has brought Buhari as a mature and thoughtful person who has a forgiving spirit. Most people would not know what I mean by forgiving spirit. This is because his relationship with the principals of the June 12 election was such that nobody expected him to extend to them this kind of recognition. And those who were expected to give that recognition and refused to do it, being the principal beneficiaries (of the June 12 logjam) either forgot it or did not consider it necessary. I think the President surprised the whole nation and me in particular. In fact, the respect of so many of us changed dramatically for the better with this sort of posture.
Secondly, Buhari put his fingers on a pulse of the nation, because this was an injury done to our psyche; that the decision of the whole nation, 14 million people, during an election was just set aside and there were attempts to just forget and ignore it. He brought it back and put a soothing balm on our body. He even apologised and brought the pain out of our deliberate historical amnesia. He has done the needful. We are very grateful and proud of what he has done.
Some people said he did it because of desperate political interest
What is wrong with that? What is not political interest if you are elected? Why is it that people are talking of politics as if it is a criminal thing? It is a legitimate enterprise. Why didn’t other people do it? Are they not politicians? If Buhari is doing what he has done because he is a politician, then he is a successful politician. Politics means dancing to the rhythm of the community you are representing; that is politics; and that is what he has done. Most of the people that voted for him are the people that voted for Abiola and they were not happy that that matter had not been revisited, and so, he revisited it. So if it is a political decision, then he is a very wise politician. Why didn’t others do it? Are they not politicians?
The conferment of GCFR on Abiola means that he has been recognised as the winner of that election though he was not allowed to rule. But some other people are saying the result of the election should be formally declared. Is there any need for that?
I wouldn’t say there is need for that because formal declarations are usually done by those who conduct elections and are done at the right time. There are also other technicalities involved. When you declare the result, you should have an inauguration and a swearing-in ceremony. I think what the President has done now is substantial. It would also be adequate if certain steps are taken in order to put Abiola in perspective. We have talked about national monuments in his name; we have talked about certain benefits that come to former presidents that can go to him. It is not his fault that he was not inaugurated, it was the fault of the government of the day. We can do something that if he had been inaugurated, he would have benefitted. We can do that for his family. We can also restore and honour Kudirat Abiola who also died in the process and all others that lost their lives. There should be national honours for those who stood up for the election. There were people who made June 12; I am one of them; then there are others who defended the June 12. It turned out that those who defended June 12 are more legitimate in the eyes of the public than those who made June 12. If we didn’t make June 12 possible, there would be nothing for anybody to defend.
In 1993, you ran an impressive campaign for Abiola. People still ask how you were able to make your candidate win in almost all parts of the country and with a Muslim-Muslim ticket.
I would say that it was not very difficult to sell Chief Abiola for he was already a national figure and he had impacted so many communities in all parts of the country. He had contributed to the building of schools, hospitals, mosques. In fact, I know he put money down for church fund-raising activities in many places in the country. So, he was already a household name. Only what was needed was to turn a business philanthropic household name to a politics philanthropic household name which meant organising the structure that will bring votes. That was what I would say the SDP (Social Democratic Party) organised, not the campaign. We also worked hand-in-hand with state governors and civil society groups. It was really a conglomeration of support institutions that brought us the victory. And I would say the managers of the election were also transparent. Professor Humphrey Nwosu was very transparent and the initial intentions of the president then, Ibrahim Babangida, were also transparent in the formation of the two parties. The only disadvantage was that after primaries, IBB would just cancel the primaries and ask for a new team. That is why people started reading meanings as to whether the government wanted to go at all; otherwise, the freedom to build the party and campaign freely was allowed; and that was why Chief Abiola won nationwide. Even out of 30 states, he had one third of the votes in 28 states and we were well spread. He even defeated Tofa in Kano, his home state. Abiola had 8.2 million votes, Tofa had 5.8 million votes. We had a total of 14m votes freely contested; not a single petition was received anywhere about the conduct of that election. The results are available, they are still in my file and I am sure Professor Humphrey Nwosu has all of them. This is because results from all the collation centres were with us. In fact, all the state electoral officers were in Abuja. What Nwosu was doing was calling them one by one and writing the results on the board. Professor Nwosu was in that process, when he got to the 14th state, some judges said that the election should not be recognised. We also didn’t worry because the Constitution that was in use had stated that no court had the power to stop an election. So, we just said this is one of them, let’s just go ahead and declare the result. Then Nwosu was prevailed upon under coercion to stop the collation. However, writing on the board and just announcing the final results is the duty of the Chief Returning Officer of the Federation. It is a constitutional duty; otherwise the results were known to all of us.
How did you get involved? How did you get into the campaign as the head?
First, I had worked with Chief Olu Falae as the DG, Campaigns, and I believe that Chief Abiola got to know of me when I was with Falae but I also had some friends that highly recommended me to Chief Abiola; like the late Pascal Bafyau who was a close friend of Abiola and my close friend too. But Abiola is not somebody that would act on sentiments because a friend recommended you. He set up an interview panel which I appeared and obviously topped the list. I passed all the procedures for screening that came into play. And of course, those who want to remember positively would realise that I didn’t do a bad job. Even at Jos during the primaries, we played our own role effectively. The leaders had their role but those of us who mobilised people to vote also have our own role to play. During the sorting of results, I didn’t wait for the counting. I picked people to count when the sorting was going on. So, as they were sorting, I had somebody counting the votes of Chief Abiola, another one counting that of Kingibe, another one counting that of Atiku. So, by the time sorting was finished and baskets were being put aside, I had known the results and I quickly alerted my principal. We didn’t wait for counting. I know a candidate whose agent or DG was waiting for counting and lost many hours.
How were you able to sell the Muslim-Muslim ticket to Nigerians?
I don’t think many Nigerians, strictly speaking, looked at Abiola in religious terms. This was somebody who was kind to both Christians and Muslims. This was somebody whose philanthropy cut across all ethnic groups and religious groups. So Nigerians saw him as a businessman and sportsman and philanthropist. He did not bring himself out in religious toga, you did not hear him in so many contentious religious debates. Also those who know Kingibe and had worked with him in SDP never saw him as an extreme religious person. The whole environment was not really charged along religious line. So, the populace were looking for a patriotic Nigerian that would treat everybody equally. And when they saw Abiola, they said even before he got to the office, he was treating people equally, so he would do same when he gets to government. So, we were not looking people within the realm of religion. It is only today that we have brought in a lot of religious sentiments. I know the late Bishop Benson Idahosa of blessed memory was leading the Christian group in Lagos and each time I attended their meeting, they had no problem at all. They were not even discussing the Muslim-Muslim ticket but programmes and projects that they were to present for execution and they didn’t have any doubt that the programmes would be executed.
People believed that Kingibe should not have been given the GCON because they regard him as a betrayer, for refusing to leave the Abacha government. What is your position on this?
There were misconceptions. I like to make a correction here. Kingibe did not join Abacha government as a personal decision. We took a collective decision. I was there. We took a collective decision based on discussion with our principal that we should work with and cooperate with Abacha government in return for the restoration of June 12 mandate. This was the assurance we got. Kingibe did not walk away to be a minister. He was not the only minister. A list was brought from SDP and from the NRC (National Republican Convention) as well. And Basorun Abiola personally convinced many of them to join the government, including my being a commissioner. It was a package. So for all those who came after the making of June 12 and are misrepresenting what happened and are calling people names, it is very unfortunate. But it was largely because they didn’t know what actually happened. We were convinced we were doing the right thing and I remember Chief Abiola would say, ‘Egbon, you need to be with them; Adamu Ciroma is coming, this and that person are also coming; if you don’t join and participate, who would speak for me if they are talking about June 12?’ Each time he made that point, people became weak and accepted; because we were convinced, but apparently with the benefit of hindsight, we were deceived. Deception is something better seen at the end than at the beginning. That is why it is called deception. But at that time, we didn’t know. That was the spirit, but people actually misunderstood what really happened. And there were many people in government because the government gave the impression that they would probably not last more than six months or at most a year. We took them as officers that they were and that they would be very faithful to their pledges and promises. And I know Dr. Olu Onagoruwa, very respected elder statesman who was my mentor in many ways, was convinced that his joining the government as Attorney General of the Federation was to be the prelude to whatever agreement and constitution that would be necessary to recognise June12. That is really the truth; that was the spirit at the time of joining the government. So people are largely making mistake and that is why I draw the difference between those who made June 12 and those that defended June 12. Those who later defended the June 12 did not know how we made June 12 and so I cannot really blame them. They were acting or talking based on the pieces of information that were made available to them.
But we learnt that at a stage, Abiola asked them to leave the government but Kingibe and others refused?
If I may ask you, those who withdrew, how long did they last? So, it is a matter of safety and security of individuals. A few who tried to leave died, some lost their children. It was a totalitarian government and let me tell you something: we had never experienced such a situation in our national life. We never had a government that would declare election and annul it. So the issue of revalidation was a new thing and people approached it in many new ways. We cannot wake up and be wiser after the act. The few that stood up and said they would do the right thing, most of them do you know how they ended up. Majority of our citizens have to run abroad and live deplorable life. Even abroad, they were hiding from hired assassins allegedly sent by the government. No one has the propriety of judging people; it is not fair.
What do you think was responsible for the annulment of the election?
A number of factors were responsible for the annulment of the election. I think there was a
You had a colleague in the Senate-Arthur Nzeribe. He played a significant role before, during and even after the June 12, 1993 election. What has he told you?
Well, Association for Better Nigeria was his creation. For whatever reasons, he chose to be a spoiler, which is very unfortunate. He has been a very controversial person all his life but that controversy was one too grave because there were national impacts. And I believe there are times he must have been tempted to regret that happening. I really never discussed that matter with him when we were in the Senate. We got along well as colleagues. He respected me and I respected him. Sometimes he would come and discuss with me the motion he would file. He is a more sober man than people would attribute him to be. Most times, he is a team player except when his interests are greatly trampled upon. But he is a pleasant gentleman and I respect him outside the anomaly of the role he played in June 12 election.
What are you up to in 2019?
Well, right now I am an aspirant for the Senate for the southern senatorial district of Adamawa State, a district I represented in the past. I have been busy going round to reach stakeholders and leaders of the party and supporters to see if I can get their mandate to go back. I have prepared a scorecard of what I did while I was there because memories are very short. I have a list of what I did, community by community and when I go there, I show them. And so far, none of my opponents has a file that is as big as mine. So, I am hoping that will bail me out.
Do you believe in restructuring?
Yes. Of course, Constitution amendment is restructuring. Some people are using the word ‘restructuring’ anyhow and they are confusing even me. But restructuring is nothing but constitutional amendment.
