Excerpts from Tunde Bakare's Interview in March 2013.

http://nationalmirroronline.net/new/nigerian-governors-are-richer-than-their-states-bakare/

I have quoted his thoughts on the his VP bid in 20111, fortunes/future of APC, 2015 elections and Jonathan's emergence as president after the death of Yar Adua.

So, you are not sure if you will participate in the 2015 elections?

With who? The collection of rogues, right, left and central?

Even with the progressives?

Who are the progressives in Nigeria; mention their names? Are you persuaded that they are progressives, progressive where, taking you where?

The progressives who formed the All Progressive Congress (APC).

If the devil becomes a pastor, Nigerians will attend his church, because they don’t know the true church and they cannot distinguish it from the synagogue of satan. Some of these governors are far richer than their states, because they are looting their states dry.

I read in the newspaper that former of Lagos State, Bola Tinubu do not own Oriental Hotel, Shoprite and others.

Who is interested in this in a decent society? Something is wrong; do they say Obafemi Awolowo owns the Cocoa House in Ibadan?

Has anybody alleged that? Do they say that his wife owns the Premier Hotel in Ibadan? The reason why you have to deny this is that your hands are not clean.

In the build up to the 2011 presidential election, there were reports that the leaders of the ACN gave a condition to back General Buhari; that you should write your resignation letter as vice president even before the election. Would you now be comfortable with the same group of people in the merger arrangement?


My dear friend, anybody can ask you to do anything they considered in their own best interest and it is left for you to see whether it is in your own interest. It is true they asked me to sign a letter resigning the post of vice presidential candidate of CPC and Vice President of Nigeria. And I prepared my own letter and I said to General Buhari and the CPC, if you don’t want me to be your candidate any more, you are free any time.

But I am not going to resign as Vice President of Nigeria, because I have not occupied that office. And they said that is what they want. I said, look this man will not bend his rule; I don’t want to join the perjurers who are no longer electable in Nigeria but want to destroy the opportunity of other people.

Sitting on the table with these people means nothing to me. I am not part of the merger committee. If the merger is being put together for the development of our nation and our people, may God let it succeed, but if is to continue this foolish, crazy, greedy aggrandizement, God will overturn it.

If merger has been put together by good people, it will deepen our democracy, at least we will develop a two-party system in Nigeria. But I don’t see the difference between the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governors and the so-called progressive governors. You can ask question how much is the kilometers of road awarded as contract in Oyo State and who is doing the road. It is not Bayelsa where you will say there is too much water there.

Where are the progressive governors? These ones who are fruitful and everyone wants to buy his own private jet once he is out of office, how much were they worth before they came into power?

And how do they come by their massive wealth now that they are bragging all around?

I desire to see in my life time, a nation that works and I pray that God will give grace and opportunity to people who can make it work. I am not saying if a person like me is not there it won’t work. There are thousand others who are better than I am in this country, God will bring those ones into power.

Do you think Nigerians are prepared for a change?

It depends on what change we are thinking about. We can change for the worse. We are miles away. We are dancing into the lagoon and into the woods everyday. The blind is leading the seeing in Nigeria. But why will the seeing allow the blind to lead them? The moment they get there they change.

Even you now interviewing me, the moment they make you a Commissioner for Information, it is an opportunity for enjoyment. All the things you have written against me you will change. Ask Reuben Abati. Men have lost their honour because of temporary power. Must you sell your birthright because of a pot of porridge?


General Buhari recently foreclosed INEC under Attahiru Jega, conducting free and fair elections in 2015. Do you share the same sentiment?

Has Jega conducted a credible election? INEC had always been in the pocket of the sitting president. But a time is coming when people will say enough is enough. Mubarak was in power for more than 30 years in Egypt. He did not envisage that one day they would carry him on a stretcher to the court. Muammar Gaddafi thought he had conquered Libya and the rest of Africa was his next agenda. They found him inside a water tunnel where they shot him.

You have seen what happened to the Tunisian president when the citizens decided to say enough is enough. Anything will happen any moment from now that will let these people say it’s over. Unfortunately they cannot see the handwriting on the wall.

After the 2011 post-election violence, the Federal Government constituted a panel on the crisis. The panel had submitted its report, but nothing has been done on it.

Because they were targeting Buhari, Bakare and CPC, that was why the panel was constituted. They had to bury the report in shame because they didn’t find anything that indicted us. The people who reacted to the daylight robbery after the election were not CPC.

They were poor people who were angry and that was the only way they could vehemently release their anger. It was not good, we didn’t support it but you don’t expect anything good to come out of that panel other than they have been truthful and the government cannot publish it because of shame.

Let them publish it and take action. I have never sponsored violence in my life and I won’t because vengeance has no foresight. That was why we went to court to ensure that nobody takes the law into his own hand.



But you couldn’t get justice in the court.

The Nigerian judiciary is compromised. Justice Ayo Salami tried to do what sounds like justice but was immediately removed. His tribunal quickly packed up and the next panel said they were not bound by the order made by his court.

And they didn’t allow us to bring the ballot papers to the court for forensic investigation because they said there would be breach of security. Those who did these things in the past, we knew where they ended up. So, let them keep on dancing to the same tune. They will end up the same way.

You once led Nigerians to protest in Abuja that Jonathan should be made the acting president. Are you satisfied with what his government is doing?


I didn’t go to Abuja to make Jonathan acting president or president. We went to Abuja collectively to uphold constitutionality and we will do it again if a goat is there. You are to blame yourself for allowing a goat to sit on the seat of the president not the constitutionality; what we went to Abuja to do was to uphold constitutionality, it does not matter who the president had been.

And as for his government, at the appropriate time SNG went to meet him and we exposed, gave him a mirror-image of his government; what it was all about and we were saying goodbye and he thought we could be bought. He was trying to bribe us with $50,000. Shame!

Is this why Buhari uses pastors ar his running mate?

k

Didn't this man say God told him that he would be the Next VP?


I can't understand how a pastor would be negotiation and working with Politicians (Known thieves) in public.