I know Tinubu, I know Buhari, they cannot mix – Bode George

By Dapo Akinrefon & Bashir Adefaka
Chief Olabode George, former military governor of Ondo State and
former Deputy National Chairman, People's Democratic Party, PDP, in
this interview, responds to topical issues inthe polity and his party.
Excerpts:
President Goodluck Jonathan, the leader of your party is in the eye of
thestorm over 2015. How do you feel?
Nigeria has come this far because the concept of the PDP constitution
has sustained democracy up till now. Never in the history of our
nation have we been able to sustain democracy from 1999 and we are now
in 2013: thatis talking about 14 years. Never!
So, there is no need to pull anybody down because the man you pull
down will also pull you down and so, where have you gone? And it is
there in Romans Chapter 14 that whosoever that God has given an
authority, he did not get there by his own effort. Let us support
him. He is our leader and it is our nation.
Some of these people who have been given opportunities to govern
smaller states are now coming to say that they know more than we know
they know. When they were in government, they saw governance as a
source of unimaginable income. The amount of acquisitions; the
maddening amount of acquisition of the prime property, the assets of
the state they were given, is mind boggling.
Conversion of land for personal use
Every day people wake up, what you see is unbelievable. Ikoyi has now
become another high rise prime area. Who owns these properties? All
the land in Ajah, lands dedicated for hospitals have been converted to
theirpersonal use. Hotels have been springing up, Local Government
secretariats that had been in existencebefore they were born have been
acquired.
Hostel of the only Nursing School in Lagos State, located on Awolowo
Road,Ikoyi, has already been acquired. And these are the same people
who are asking Nigerians that, "Yes, we can perform! We would govern
Nigeria well."
Is there a semblance of democratic practice in that party of theirs?
So, I chuckle when I see these first class jokers, who have been
tested and have been found to be complete failure, saying that they
want to go andrule Nigeria.
They want to join up with General Buhari. But the General Buhari that
I know; his standing, his personality, his commitment, his belief is
exact opposite to these characters here. So, sometimes I get confused
that GeneralBuhari is sincerely talking to these men. It is like a
movie to me. It is like atheatre house. How can water and oil mix?
What he has stood for in his life and what they stand for; they cannot
meet. They are like day and night.
And they have the temerity to say that they are the leader of Yoruba,
they are carrying Yoruba people. I wish tehy would go back and read
the history of the Yoruba people. Because, they are fake. No
semblance of the real, true genuine Yoruba.
They do not have anything that look like the depth, the norm, the
belief of the Yoruba people. What a huge joke therefore! I wish one
day that somebody would bring him on the television for public debate.
I am challenging him to come on the television for a public debate;
let us talk to Nigerians. Let us debate before the people what they
have done for this country.
You sound angry. Why?
You know people would say yes, Bode George is angry. No! Very soon I
will be 70 years old. What else am I looking for? Am I going to
start all overagain? Can I live another 70 years before I pack up and
go back to my God? No. Mine may be the only voice inthe wilderness but
I will continue to shout at the top of the mountain that this is a
path of perfidy they are going through.
Righteous way
It is not a righteous way. Now they are shouting that Jonathan has not
performed and that they would push him out of government. Tinubu that
was governor of Lagos State for eight years, what did he do?
Even the young man that is still running Lagos now, Babatunde Raji
Fashola has done much better than him. Does he allow him to work?
Theysay he is de facto leader, that is what he calls his name. All
the things about these jokers in ACN are laughable.
The other one in Osun, who no longer calls himself an engineer but
'Ogbeni', what is his performance there? Lai Mohammed is always
talking on top of his voice, talking garbage! I knew him when he came
to Lagos as a Level 6 or Level 8 officer at FAAN. Today he can talk,
tell stories and lies.
He said the Federal Government has done something injurious to the
judiciary and to the psyche of Nigeria by proscribing Boko Haram. Are
these guys genuine? How can anybody wakeup and say the government has
done something injurious by proscribing Boko Haram? Are they alright?
Oh!
Why are you creating unnecessary revolts to chase him out of
government?getnoticed4.tayo@blogger.comLet them come to television and
debate it. How many children of the poor have they benefited?
Jakande established his education for the poor people with scholar
scheme for children of poor people to go to university. He founded
the Lagos StateUniversity, LASU, also so that children of the poor
could access university education at ease. You now pay a minimum of
N250,000 per annum to access education in that same Lagos State
University. That is a quarter of a million! The palm oil seller,
roasted plantain seller, akara seller, can they afford that? So, you
are saying that their children should never have the opportunity?
What these jokers are doing now is for the privileged so that only the
privileged can get there. Fashola also knew how he started. Was his
father a rich man? Today, he is governor. If they had made it
impossible for him togo to school, would he have ended up being a
governor? Let them just think because, if we do not, one day and I
repeat one day, the electorate will decide. We do not want what
happened in Egypt or in Tunisia here. We do not want any Arab spring
here. No. Let there be peace.
More money seems to be going to all tiers of government, but sir, is
there noway that the presidency can monitor the outflow?
What is the president's business with the activities of the governor?
It is the members of the state House of Assembly who can challenge the
governor about his revenue, expenditure and what he is doing withthe
money. But we know that when the man sits down in one room and selects
his surrogates who go to the House of Assembly, he does not allow
people who are being sponsored, supported by their constituencies to
go there. What do you expect?
Like what is happening in Lagos State where Bola Tinubu just hand
picks people who go to the Lagos State House of Assembly and who
therefore cannot challenge him when necessary? They do not even have
congresses like we do in PDP. Tell me any day you have seen them
doing a national convention. The emperor decides and that is the man
who says he is a democrat.
The company which collects revenues on behalf of Lagos State
Government, who owns it?
People who are in charge of highway managers, who are they? Even the
agency that has the places where deadpeople are buried, who owns them?
Now they are sand-filling the Bar Beach. Generations before them had
Bar Beach. Go to what the Alpha Beach has become and see the
environmental impact on those villages there. What madness! What
greed!
Narrowing of channel
Look at Isale Eko here! That is the only channel that takes water from
the whole of Lagos Island into the Lagoon blushed with that nonsense
they are doing there. Go to Parkview, they are sand-filling so that
they would narrow the channel until it would meet Lekki. That Lagoon
is the natural gift that Godgave Lagosians. They have narrowed itnow
out of senseless greed. Someday I pray that when the flood or
earthquake will come, he must be heldresponsible.
Let Tinubu deny it. It is this man that now has the temerity to speak
out of his mouth and say Jonathan is not doing well and so he wants to
rule Nigeria. He? I would cease to be a Nigerian. I am not joking.
I would go to Ghana or Togo and beg for citizenship because they would
destroy this country. The good thing isthat this nation is so massive
for him tocomprehend.
The dynamics of this nation; he says heis carrying Yoruba people to go
and join Buhari and form a national government. They are joking
because where we were in 1999 is where they just want to start from
now. What a joke! What a joke!!
To what extent will the crisis in the NGF affect your party?
I have been away for sometime but myopinion is that, we need to lock
ourselves behind a door and tell ourselves some serious bitter truth.
I am now begging them to admit that all sides are wrong: the party and
the governors. And it is not a blame game now. It is a game for the
future of our nation. So, it is time to calm all nerves. Let us all
come back so that we can have a family meeting. Of course you can see
the oppositions are happy. They think they can use the situation to
destroy our party. Which of them; any of those under ACN of Bola can
talk to him?