Prince Adewole Adebayo, the Social Democratic Party (SDP) presidential candidate for the February 25 election, has called last week’s protest by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) over President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s removal of petrol subsidies unnecessary. This, he claims, is because the withdrawal of petrol subsidies was one of Tinubu’s campaign promises if elected president and Nigerians were aware of it before voting for him.
In this interview with The Sun, he discusses the protests, the president’s planned consolation for Nigerians, his vow to open the Port Harcourt refinery by December, the Dangote Refinery, and the Senate’s screening of ministerial nominees, among other topics.
What are your thoughts about last week’s protest by labour unions against the fuel subsidy removal?
The issues at stake are of public concern, and the labour unions, irrespective of what you might think of their leadership and their choices in recent times, still have a role in society. The role they are playing is to draw the government’s attention to the interest of their members. However, there are some occasions where the interest of their members may coincide with the concerns of the public. So, members of the public might also want to align with them and express their minds to the government. I think what happened was okay and they appeared to be happy engaging with the President about it. When it comes to ventilating issues, the protesters had ventilated their issues to the president. But whether the protest has ventilated the issues is another thing because the issues are issues of economics. They are issues of the government that has been democratically elected. And when you elect a government, you elect them together with their adverse policies, and when these policies have some effects you don’t like, you can vent back to the government. And you keep the dialogue going on with the government but what we do after the protest is more important than the protest. I think the way the government has responded has shown that the government too understands the issue. They are not taking so many days. You know, in the past, you had protests that will last days upon days before junior people in the government will intervene. The government intervened at the highest level, and before that, on the eve of that protest, there had been a national broadcast where the president tried to make his case. So, it is a democratic engagement. I think each person played his/her role. The role of the labour leader is to remind the government that they represent a segment of the populace. The government also showed that they understood the labour leaders’ options. I think it has been a long time since people protested. Some people have been itching for the protest for a long time, so it gave them the room to exercise that right which could be in doubt sometimes when you don’t exercise them. A right to protest against your government is your right as a citizen. I think the people are hurting, and if the government is quick in response in terms of policy changes as they were quick to respond to the protest, they might make more progress than otherwise.
Do you think the protests were suspended because of the promises made by President Tinubu after he meets with the leadership of the labour unions?
There shouldn’t have been any protest to start with because every adult during the election knew where every one of the candidates was headed during the campaigns. If someone says I am going to eliminate fuel subsidies, unify the foreign exchange; I am going to do this and that, and he gets elected and starts doing exactly what he promised, that is natural. The labour movement could join other stakeholders to speak to the government. They went out, maybe because they wanted the government to take them more seriously. One day’s protest or demonstration is enough. It is not about how long the demonstration lasts but what you achieve out of it. The government told labour that the Port Harcourt refinery would work. Well, it should work, whether there was a protest or not. But, any reason given to restore peace and tranquillity to allow the economy to work and to allow the people to cope is okay by me. I would rather have no protest but robust engagement on policy issues. It is not only labour; I am also engaging them publicly. When they initiate a policy, I engage them. I am not going to them and I let them know that I don’t agree with some of the things they are doing because I want them to correct as much as they believe they can. It is not in anyone’s interest to have a volatile situation. Labour should be very careful so that people will not see it as being too partisan. Everyone behaved maturely at the meeting, and I hope that labour will focus more on productivity and getting more of their members who are in the public service to make things work for the public. It is their members who are in the refineries. They are the ones working there even when the refineries were not working. It’s their members that are in charge of subsidy payments. Labour is very strong in the country. If labour becomes the moral force in the country, then it is good for the country. They can be partners with the government. There is nothing to be ashamed of. If I had been elected as President, I would have been a partner with the labour unions and the workforce because the president’s policies are not going to be implemented by the president himself; they will be implemented through the Nigeria public service and the members are members of NLC and TUC. So, I don’t want us to think they are supposed to be rivals. Sometimes, both of them can agree, and they can be wrong. The public can even intervene if, for example, they think they can increase the minimum wage to an unsustainable level where the government may not be able to pay and it becomes an industrial problem or even leads to inflation. We can speak and say there are other ways you can improve workers’ welfare without a nominal salary increase. So, there are areas where they can disagree and work it out. The government itself is an agent of the public. If you damage the economy, you are not damaging Tinubu’s economy. You are damaging the economy of the whole country. If the economy works, it’s not going to work for the president alone; it will work for everybody.
Some people think the protest was just a gimmick because only a handful of members of the labour unions participated. Others attributed the low turnout to the disconnect between the labour unions and the public; do you share the same view?
The labour unions represent their members. It is not everybody in the public that is a member of a labour union, and it is not every member of a labour union would agree with the position of the labour leadership. It is also not everyone who agrees with their perspective or point will agree with the method of enforcing it. The important thing about the protest is drawing the attention of the authorities. The labour did well yesterday with their protest. Moderation is good. They played their role, and they didn’t overdo it. And if the president is sincere about what he said he would do, that will take the country even further. It doesn’t mean it will solve all the problems because they are micro-economic and they need time and a basket of policies coming together for us to get to where we are going.
Unlike before, labour had direct contact with President Tinubu regarding the protest; would you say it is positive for the country? Do you think the people should trust the government and labour?
Every government has its method or style of reaching or relating with stakeholders. Some might be doing it in front of the TV. Some might be doing it at the highest level or middle level. Some do continuous engagement. You cannot govern in a democratic space without engaging stakeholders and getting feedback. What the government has done is one way to do it. That’s the Tinubu style. You know the man Tinubu, with due respect, came from the street; he didn’t come from the barracks. So, he is part of the leftist movement, but he has moved right now in terms of policies. He used to be a social democrat. They used to be the National Democratic Coalition (NADECO). They used to be the people behind those who protest. He has a constituency familiarity. But, we should not assume that labour is the mediator between the government and the people. That is not correct. Labour is a mediator between its members. They are going to the presidential villa in Abuja to talk about the welfare of their members, and there are some areas where the interest of the labour and the public might coincide. For example, the average motorist would want cheaper and lower-cost fuel. So, if labour is discussing cheaper fuel, the public will be happy. If labour is discussing higher minimum wage for its members, that’s not in the interest of the public. That is in the interest of their members only. Government policies will have consequences. Some intended and some unintended.
Some people believe the removal was done in haste because the president did not think through it before his pronouncement on the day of his inauguration. What would you have done differently if you were in his shoes?
The president had the authority to do what he did because he told the public that when they elect him as president, he would remove the subsidy. There is nothing anybody can do. I would rather not be in that office than let it last one more day. He also said you can protest as long as you want, I will remove it.
And the people said go ahead and do so because the majority of the votes went to him. He had more votes than I had. So, whatever the merits of my argument, I can’t raise it now because the public has voted for him to go and remove it and he has kept to his words. He never said it was not going to be difficult. That should be very clear. I don’t want to over-politicise it. The time I would want to reopen this would be three years from now when we are going back to contest. Then, I hope and pray that the country will be far better than it is now, and I hope the president succeeds in whatever he is trying to do because his success is good for the country. But, whatever shortcomings they may have at that time, we will go back to the public and review them, and say four years ago, all of us came before you and we said we are going to proffer different solutions to these problems. You gave your mandate to the APC and President Bola Tinubu; are you happier now? While they have the mandate now, we should allow them to implement the programmes because sometimes something may be difficult at the beginning.
You said Nigerians voted for Tinubu even with all he said he would do during the campaign. Are you saying they got what they bargained for?
That’s democracy for you. That is why you have to be 18 years old before you can go and vote. It’s an adult decision. If you decide to take a particular road, whatever traffic you meet on the road is your choice, because you were given different roads, which you could have taken. It is too early to cry because there are more difficult decisions that the government will have to make. Having taken this part of neoliberal economic policies, there are many choices they have to make along the way. Not all those choices will make the people happy, but the people should bear in mind that it is a social contract they have signed with the government, and if they face any difficulties along the way, they can bring it to the attention of the government. But they should not assume that they have no role to play in it. That’s democracy. That is how we learn.
Going by the pronouncement of President Tinubu that the Port Harcourt Refinery would be running by December, and the Dangote Refinery also scheduled to start operations this month, do you see the fuel price coming down?
Dangote Refinery is a private entity. Although NNPCL has a minor stake in it, it is a private company. They might have allowed former President Muhammadu Buhari the honour to commission it but it doesn’t mean it was ready. They just wanted him to have that sense of achievement that the refinery took place during his time. I can tell you that I don’t see that refinery producing anything this year; maybe early next year, but before it can fully become operational, it will be 2025. They have been trying out the readiness of Port Harcourt, Kaduna, and Warri refineries. I think we should try and get them to work but they will need not less than two years before they can work, though the president told the labour that it will be operational by December, that’s a mere aspiration and I think it is good for the president to have that aspiration, and to mandate whichever minister he appoints to facilitate it and make it a top priority, but all of that put together would still not reduce the price of petrol on the streets significantly. What the government is doing is that they are going out of the price guarantees by saying that whatever the market offers, that’s what you will buy; the same way for other products. So, all those calming down talks are just a way of calming people down. So, there is no longer price control. What happens now is that we are merging with the international market in terms of the pricing of petroleum products. Even if we produce locally, the only way we can reduce the cost here is if the logistics is easier even though other costs may also increase. So, there is no time when the price of petrol is guaranteed.
You made a comparison between Jonathan’s government and the current one under Tinubu but never said anything about the Buhari administration, was that deliberate?
Tinubu is the junior brother of Buhari. Whether he is a junior or senior, the important thing is they are from the same father. The hope you can have is that Tinubu will be better than Buhari because even Buhari should pray that Tinubu should be better than him. I am praying that President Tinubu should be far better than Buhari because we want to make progress in this country. It is also my prayer that the president that will succeed Tinubu, hopefully, will be far better than him. The idea is that society must make progress. What President Tinubu is doing is too early to know whether he will succeed or not. We can only pray and wish that he succeeds. He needs to succeed for the country to make progress.
You said that even if all the refineries start operation in Nigeria, that will still not bring down the price of petroleum products but the government officials keep telling us that it would crash fuel prices; are you saying that they are deceiving Nigerians?
Government officials are not God because many of them are not properly trained in the area where they are manning. Sometimes, it is just an innocent error or negligent error. They don’t know it.
Is there any breach in the number of ministers President Tinubu has put forward so far based on the constitution?
We are running a presidential system of government where the president himself is the executive. Therefore, if the Nigerian people can trust him with their mandate to be their president, they should trust him with the prerogative to select his team. He should know why he is selecting the person who will start with the Tinubu administration and end up with the Tinubu administration. Concerning the constitutional requirement, he is supposed to name his ministers within 60 days. I didn’t expect that he would wait till the last hour of the 60 days. I also expected that he would have the complete list of the ministers already sent out because by law and by our constitution, there must be a minister from every state and FCT before the Federal Executive Council (FEC) can be said to have been properly convened. I hope they use the remaining time they have left and comply. I guess they have an internal struggle, maybe politics, which is playing a major role in their process.
Are you saying that until the names of the ministers from all the states, including the FCT, Abuja, are complete that the President cannot hold the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting?
He cannot because he has to comply with the Constitution. It is not too long ago he took the oath of office that he would abide by the constitution, and the constitution says there must be a minister from all states of the federation. By implication, there ought to be a minister from the FCT as well. It is easy to comply with the law in this kind of case. Why would you want to violate it? The quality of who he wants to choose is his choice provided that they must be adults. They must be persons who are qualified to be elected to the national assembly. It is his choice because he alone knows how he wants to lay his bed, and he would lie on it. That is why the election has consequences. The cabinet should be a mirror that reflects the face of the president. The cabinet members he has chosen look very much like him because many of them are his foot soldiers, so it is his right. The advantage you have of being the president is the fact that you get to choose ministers, and those of us who lose elections get to talk on TV. That is all we can do. It is his choice to look at his renewed hope that he wrote, and wants to implement, look at the oath of office he has taken, look at the constitution of Nigeria and then look at the circumstances going on in Nigeria, and realise that he has to get people whom he thinks are the best for him from every state of the federation. So, I don’t see why we worry too much about what he does because very soon, the results will show. He would start to work, and the ministers would start to work, and it is when that happens that Nigerians can know whether he has made the right choice or not. Scanning through the people he has chosen, they look to me as meeting the requirements, and I have seen some even remarkable people there that even I would have chosen if I were president; people like Professor Pate, who is a national asset, and nobody can deny that. He is not that partisan, and he is willing to serve in any capacity. I know Musawa very well. He is a very energetic and smart lady.
Some of the ministerial nominees are in their 40s, 50s, and 60s. Does that look like a balanced team?
You can never know. With due respect, the ministers are like cattle; the president is like a herdsman. He has to direct them to where they need to go because every authority is vested in him. He is the one to assign them to offices. So, if he puts a square peg in a round hole, then he is already in trouble. If he puts a square peg in a square hole, it is okay. Somebody like Lateef Fagbemi is a very sound lawyer. The president will know why he brought him there because he is a very conservative person. Dele Alake is like a carbon copy of the president himself. He knows what he is doing. We would only know when they start to act.
There are critical areas in the polity that need urgent attention and capable people to handle them. Is there anyone you have identified that could help Tinubu?
Yes, I can have them in my mind. But, the nature of the presidency is this. You don’t get to tell your opponent who to appoint because he knows what he is looking for. So, please let him lay his bed himself, and I think he is beginning to lay the bed slowly. The president is a politician who doesn’t want to have a political crisis because in the ranking of problems for politicians when they are in office, political crisis, governance crisis, security crisis and economic crisis, the one they feel the most is the political crisis. But when the work starts, Nigerians wouldn’t care whether he used this or that because the economy is getting better, security is getting better, inflation is coming down, and people are getting jobs.
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