Senator Barnabas Gemade is a former National Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party and current Senator, representing Benue North-East Senatorial District at the National Assembly. In this exclusive interview with The Point’s HENRY IYORKASE, in Makurdi, the Benue State capital, Gemade speaks on his defection from the People’s Democratic Party to the Social Democratic Party and other issues of national interest. Excerpts:
What is the position of the Senate on the time frame for the 2019 general elections as it seems there is a disagreement between The Presidency and the National Assembly on the matter?
Our position at the National Assembly on the Electoral Law, which, I believe, is what you are asking about is very clear. We make laws for good governance of the country, and these laws that we make, regarding the electoral process, are meant to be in the best interest of those concerned, both the electorate and those who seek mandate for the various positions that they want to be elected in. And the so – called disagreement between The Presidency and the National Assembly resulting into three vetoes of the Electoral Amendment Law by The Presidency were, generally, issues that usually have been discussed and resolved, but for the grey areas. Those issues were really not the kind that can stop the electoral law from being signed by Mr. President, and assented to by himself.
The most contentious of these issues from the beginning was the sequence of elections which sought to put the National Assembly elections first; the governors and state assembly elections second; and the presidency last, which The presidency felt was not proper. They should have their elections first and others afterwards, because everybody worries about band wagon situation and an incumbent government believes that the commanding position of the presidential election is the item that is most likely to create bandwagon, that bandwagon being positive will be very good for the ruling party. So, all the advisers of Mr. President in The Presidency advised strongly against this order of elections. To me, it was neither here nor there; it makes no difference, once the electorate believe in a course, they will exercise that course irrespective of what is actually happening in the system. Of course, that is a fore – gone issue now because that particular amendment has been dropped by the National Assembly and therefore, nobody should debate that anymore.
The other issues to my mind, very central, even though, not so significant, which The Presidency objected, but I think with the last amendment that the joint committees of the Senate and the National representatives made, they should have no problems whatsoever of assenting to that law . One of them is to actually institutionalize card reader as part of elections process. Before now, it was only referred to under administrative arrangement by INEC as part of the accreditation process, and it was not written expressly in the law, but now it is written expressly in the law, which means, there is no card – reader, there is no elections, which is good because the card reader is really what brought the present government into power, because it stopped any form of abuse of voting by the government in power at the time, that had the machinery of electoral process from simply thumb printing of many ballot papers where there is no card reader.But now, we cannot see that. There are noble ideas that should be included into the law and accepted. I believe there should be no further issues with these things.
There is this insinuation in some quarters that over 25,000 voters refused to collect their PVCs after the last registration in the state. What is your take on this?
This seems to me as one of the low rates in the entire country. There are many states where we have over 40,000 and more yet to be collected, it simply means that either there were mistakes in the registration, were people were not captured properly, and therefore their identities are questionable and therefore unable to attract them to come forward and collect . I don’t think any person should lose sleep over issues of uncollected voters cards, registrations. Voters cards, as far as I know, 77 percent of registered voters in Nigeria have collected their voters cards and I think that is reasonable enough for any election.
Your party, the Social Democratic Party is relatively a new platform in the state . How do you hope to achieve your second term bid in the senate on the platform of this relatively new party ?
Politics generally is a local issue. It’s the local environment that determines which party the people belong to and how prepared you are depends on the local environment. As far as my own political interest is concerned, my own Local Government favours my membership of SDP, that is why I am there, and the party is fully prepared for it.
A fortnight ago, you were said to have accused Governor Samuel Ortom of betraying the confidence between both of you. May we know what led to your sudden departure from the People’s Democratic Party?
The people accusing me of that are doing so from their own interpretation of what has happened. I don’t think I have been betrayed by anybody. My exit from PDP to SDP is purely out of my own political calculations. I could not function properly in the PDP as far as my candidature is concerned, so it was not out of betrayal by anyone. I think even some people went to the extent of quoting me in the paper when I didn’t say that I was betrayed by the governor. The governor has not betrayed me and I have no grudges whatsoever with anybody, and of course I have no problem with the governor, we are still friends, we relate very, very well indeed and I don’t see that there is a problem at all arising from my exit. I said already from Abuja when I was submitting my form that in every trade, in every activity, there are huddles, and there are disturbances and if you want to succeed, you must clear these disturbances, you must remove the disturbances in your way for anything you want to do if such disturbance is irremovable, then you remove yourself and that is exactly what I have done. I found huddles in the PDP regarding my own election, which I could not remove, so, I removed myself and that is the truth, I did not produce any structure in the party, have been away from it for three years, and under normal circumstances, it should be the harmonization of a political structure in order to accommodate people who are joining or people who have re- joined, but weighing such a matter, it could not happen. There was no reason why I would stay there to live with the disturbances. It is a political suicide for any sensible politicians to do that. No one can set structures and then call you to come and compete with him within those structures. You will be doing so as a political novice and I am not a kindergarten in this business. I already understand it well enough.
You got re- elected in 2015 on account of your constituency projects. What are those areas that you would like to touch if re-elected.
You should have asked that what have I done for the past two terms that I was elected? What I have done representing the people of Benue North- East senatorial district is what all these senators that came before me put together did not do. I have to my record over 250 MDG projects. There are developmental projects on community level that I have done in all the local government, spanning from supply of hospital equipment to supply of I.T system for secondary schools, building of class room, building of skill acquisition centres, provision of motorized boreholes, and hand boreholes for water, supply of transformers and electricity supply to villages, issuance of scholarship to both college and university students, help for medical services for a host of my constituents, name it. Apart from that, in a grand time, I did an empowerment for young people, providing for them generators, for their independent private work in their own villages, providing sewing machines, provision of grinding machines for women and so on and so forth. And by that system alone, I touched more than 2,000 lives of young people in those areas.And most of all, the encouragement of our people to go to school has been one of the greatest achievement that I have achieved. One of the star projects I have been able to foster is providing a federal government institution in my zone, that is bringing a Federal Polytechnic in Adikpo, Kwande Local Government.There is no Federal presence in that Zone apart from community of course. A secondary school in Vandeikya nothing in the water and agricultural industry, nothing in the manufacturing industry, no tertiary institution in the area, no tertiary Medical Service in the area. The very first one would be the Polytechnic that I have been able to attract that is coming to Adikpo, in Kwande Local Government . Going forward, I think there is a lot and a lot that we can do.
With the likes of former governor Gabriel Suswam, Mimi Adazakpe and others jostling for the same senate come 2019 in your zone, how do you hope to realize your ambition?
Well, I don’t know what you really mean by array of these people you have just called, what is the factor really that should threaten somebody? Is it the money they have? Election is not really about money, election is who you have and the ideas you
have, and what you can do. For the former governor, it’s not a new thing, we have contested before and I was the victor, so if when he was the incumbent and I was the victor, what of now when I am the incumbent, so I don’t think there is anything to be threatened
about.
How about the immediate past chairman of the revenue board who is also eyeing the senate. Are you in anyway threatened?
Oh! they said that people who collect revenue have a lot of it. But I am not a kind of person who will be afraid of revenue because most people in my zone will vote for me even by self recognition. Election now is no longer based on your platform, election today is based on who is standing, so I think platform is unimportant, I will be voted for on my own recognition.
As we look forward to the general elections, what is your advice to
the people?
I have always been an advocate of peaceful elections and I am known to be soft. That is why people think they can always defeat me, that is why when they try, they find out that winning is not by how many things you have in the field. I don’t think I need to say anything further to my supporters than to tell them to be peaceful and calm and they will always win. The race is not won by the strong or by the swift, but by the grace of God, and when God has anointed things to happen, they will
happen.
