Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu, erstwhile national
chairman of the defunct All Nigeria
Peoples Party, ANPP is a chieftain of
the All Progressives Congress, APC.
In this interview, Onu bares his mind
on how he was shortchanged at the 1999 national convention of the
defunct ANPP in Kaduna, his role in the
emergence of APC, he assesses the
Jonathan administration, the security
challenges in the country, among
other issues. A chemical engineer, an administrator, Onu was the first
executive governor of Abia State. BY HENRY UMORU, ASSISTANT
POLITICAL EDITOR You left the Government House a long
time ago. How has it been?
We have done many things since I left
Government House Umuahia. We have
played national politics and we are
interested in making our country a better place. It’s been quite a
challenging period and also very
rewarding. What happened in 1999 in Kaduna
when Chief Olu Falae was declared the
Presidential Candidate of the then
APP? What happened was that I aspired to
be president of our great country and
there were so many other people
which is a normal thing. The party at
that time, if you remember the parties
had just been formed; there were only three parties: APP, AD and PDP. So APP
decided to form a screening committee
to look at all those aspiring to be
president. The screening committee did its work
and brought out three names and my
name was one of the three. So the
three names were now sent to the
national executive committee of the
party and there during the NEC meeting there was voting. I emerged
the winner because I had the largest
number of votes. So the party in line
with its constitution still decided to
summon a national convention, which
was held in Kaduna. Then during that convention my name was now
presented for ratification and the
whole convention ratified me, so I
became the legal flag bearer of the
party. But at the same time, the party wanted
to enter into an alliance with the AD. So
all of us felt that at the particular time,
the APP had or controlled nine states
and the AD controlled six states. Now
the APP controlled states in three geo- political zones, whereas the AD
controlled in one zone, and then in
terms of vote that APP got, there was a
local government election that had
taken place and even governorship
elections. And the number of votes almost doubled that of AD. So most people now felt, if the two
parties entered into an alliance which
was to enable the alliance defeat the
PDP, the two parties had a total of 15
states, whereas the PDP had 21, so
coming together will make it easier to challenge and defeat the PDP in the
presidential election. So the thinking that most people
thought the APP would now be given
the presidential slot because of its
strength, but when we got into Abuja
nobody told us that a committee was
meeting and I was not consulted and that a decision has been taken on
Chief Olu Falae, my good friend
because he had emerged as the AD
flag bearer, that he was now going to
be the joint APP-AD Presidential
candidate. It angered so many people. Many people even decided to leave the
party, that is the APP, because they
thought it was not right, but I felt that I
should stay because I didn’t want to
be an instrument to abort that match
to democracy in the country. So the then national chairman, Sen. Mamoud
Waziri publicly apologised to me,
letting Nigerians know what
happened, that I was never consulted
and there was nothing like I stepped
down as some people reported and withdrawing like some others did. On
the basis of that, I had to accept it for
the best interest of the nation. Onu: ANPP leader Subsequently all other personalities,
those who held positions in the party
including even the national secretary
also kept saying yes, that the way I
was treated was not fair. But I just felt
look, in life once you have faith in God things like that happen, by my own
religion, you thank God and then keep
hoping for the best. What role did you play in the merger
of ACN, CPC, ANPP to form the APC?
In 2004, August 3rd I believe, the
caucus of the ANPP, APP had then
become ANPP, which comprised about
23 Senators, about 96 members in the House of Representatives, invited me
the first person ever to be so
honoured to speak to them. I used the
opportunity to emphasize the need for
all the opposition political parties to
come together in order to challenge and defeat the ruling party. I also used the opportunity at that time
because the ruling party kept saying
that they will be in office for up to
60years and nobody challenged them
to show that that cannot or shouldn’t
happen in our country. The same year by December 2004, the Lagos State
House of Assembly invited me to
speak to them and it was the same
thing; I said that opposition political
parties should come together so that
we can form two dominant parties that can now give you effective
competition in the political arena. Now when I became national
chairman, end of September 2010, I
now requested from the ACN, I said to
the ACN that I would like to come and
talk to you. They didn’t invite me, I
requested. Now they invited me and the meeting held at the Lagos
Governor’s Lodge in Asokoro, Abuja
and then I talked about our coming
together. It was on the basis of
coming together and working
together, it was on that basis that they set up their committee under Chief
Tom Ikimi and we set up our own
committee under then Deputy
Governor of Bauchi state, Alhaji Gauba
Gadi who later moved to CPC. If you remember at that time, it was
very close to election period that was
why we didn’t make much progress
because shortly after that, the
parties had their conventions and it
became difficult who would step down for the other. But shortly after that, all parties went
into the general election. Then Gen.
Buhari went to court, the candidate of
ANPP, ACN and SDMP didn’t go to
court. So I waited. As soon as the
Supreme Court gave its final ruling in February of 2012, by March 3rd I
believe, I wrote a letter to all the
national chairmen of opposition
political parties that control at least
one state; APGA was involved, Labour
then ACN, ANPP, CPC. We kept meeting and the essence was
just to develop trust because you
know if you trust one another, you
can easily do business together. Then
we now moved into formation of a
large committee whereby former governor Ibrahim Shekarau of Kano
was chairman for ANPP, Chief Tom
Ikimi was chairman for ACN and then
Garba Gadi who was chairman initially
for ANPP became chairman for CPC
and it was a large committee and that was how they started meeting. And
from there, the name, the logo, all the
details came up and we are about the
first to indicate and said, look, we will
surrender our position in order for this
to work. So that was how we gave up our positions to make sure that the
merger worked. And are you are still not given that
recognition as one who initiated the
merger?
I didn’t do it so that I would be given
recognition. I did it because it is
important for our country and I am so happy that we have two dominant
political parties. Your reason for having the APC is to
challenge and defeat PDP, how realistic
is this?
That is not the reason, our aim is not
just to go and challenge and defeat
PDP, that is not that. Our reason is to provide Nigerians the alternative. The APC was formed not just to defeat
PDP, but to provide Nigerians the
opportunity to now have a
government that will always realise
that if they don’t do well, they will be
removed and for that reason they will start doing well so that we can build a
new and a modern Nigeria. Is there any difference between the
PDP and the APC in terms of ideology
and members?
Of course there are lot of differences. I
must tell you, I have always believed
that we should not have a one party system in the country and that is why I
never changed and it is very difficult to
be in the opposition particularly if you
have risen to a certain level. It is
extremely difficult, particularly if you
are in the opposition in your state and at the federal level. But the APC is very different from the
PDP. One, we are committed to internal
democracy and our constitution is
very strict as far as I am concerned up
to the point that the constitution has
said even where you have a consensus candidate, there will still be
voting, that is one and you know that
if you have internal democracy, then
you can now project. Also we are committed to reduction of
corruption. You can see the level of
corruption that is in the country and it
is very worrisome, it can be reduced.
There are some many differences. As a
matter of fact, the difference between PDP and APC is clear, it is almost as that
between day and night. Is it true that APC is going to run a
Muslim-Muslim ticket?
No. I must tell you that that matter has
not been discussed and there is no
way that something as important as
that will not be discussed. www.vanguardngr.com/2014/07/truly-difficult-opposition-politician-ogbonnaya-onu/