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What would you suggest as way out of the current leadership crisis?

AS at today, Nigeria is in a state of political stalemate. It is in a state of standstill. One has the impression that Nigeria is heading towards a state of anarchy. And if care is not taken, we may find ourselves in a state of diarchy.

So, one may concur that where we are now is a serious stage of comatose, where a country does not know where it is going - a country without a leader and Commander-in-Chief for over a period of 70 days!

This is not the kind of democracy we all prayed for. When we fought against the people that annulled June 12, we did not have this kind of democracy in mind. But nevertheless, we took it upon ourselves that even if we do not have a normal democracy, there is civil rule. The civil rule that we have today is not an encouraging one. If there is a proper democracy, Nigeria will not be in this mess.

What is the way out?

This can be possible if only there is a government of the people; one that is elected and accepted by the people.

Everything that we engage in this life begins to manifest from the spiritual realm. When the people vote for leaders of their choice and later they change the result and give it to those who were not elected, the spirit of the people would not support that government at any level and therefore that government will not be able to achieve any meaningful objective. This is because the spirit of the people will be working against the government.

The second aspect is the issue of the structure of the country. The structure that we have can never give us good leadership and governance. If Nigeria were not properly restructured, she would continue to lack a lot of things in terms of development and governance.

And for that, there is every need to hold a conference. Once that conference is in place, we would from there determine the kind of system that should be in place.

The Presidential system of government is too expensive and it gives room for serious corruption. What should be good for this nation is a parliamentary system. This would cost less and is easier to manage during times like this.

The system equally gives room for leadership to come from the grassroots. And unlike a situation when somebody who does not even have a crowd in his local government or state would be appointed as a minister because he is the friend of the President would not arise. This is due to the lopsided structure that we are using now. And again, this is a country that is full of injustice. In such a country as ours, the Almighty God can never support us. And He never gives leadership of such country divine opportunity to perform.

So, what we are witnessing in Nigeria, the operations and governance is full of injustice. It's only when we work against injustice that we can say we have a nation. A nation can only be built based on justice, truth and fair play.

But in a situation, whereby everything that happens in this country must favour the power that be, or the people in the corridor of power, definitely, there must be a problem in that system. And when there is a leadership problem, invariably, there is a problem in the nation.

What type of restructuring are you talking about?

A country like Nigeria, multi-ethnic and multi-linguistic, can never survive under a unitary system of government. At present, what we are practising is a complete unitary system despite the fact that we claim to be federal.

The system claims to emulate that of the United States. But it is not properly practised like in the U.S. While states of the U.S are given autonomy, states in Nigeria cannot operate without going to the Federal. A state cannot get a foreign company to come and build a power station. A state cannot develop an idea of building a high educational standard. She cannot have her security without dealing with the federal.

In the United States, they have the FBI, the state police and the county police, which is like a local government police. In Nigeria, we have only one structure of the police. There is no security competitiveness. If there is no serious competition in anything in this world, there is no way that you can have a very good standard.

Now, the major problem of Nigeria is security. None of the many gruesome murders have never been conclusively prosecuted. This is due to the fact that those who perpetrate these evil activities know their ways to wriggle out of the security apparatus at the end of the day.

But the case would be different when you have about three different levels of security, so that local government or state police could concentrate on crimes at the two levels, while the Federal police focus on crime at the federal level.

The National Assembly and the Federal Executive Council (FEC) are still dilly-dallying on Yar'Adua's absence; what is the way out?

Really, I commend the Senate on its position on the matter. I used to think it is the House of Representatives that are more radical.

Really, we do not need to waste time. And there is no need to play with the future of this country because of one person. And at the same time, there is no need to set a very bad precedence. This is because anything that we do today would be useful for the generation that is coming.

What is happening is a serious issue. Section 145 is very explicit. What is happening is very dangerous. If the army decides to plan a coup, do you think Jonathan has the power to stop that coup?

The kind of authority and influence he would have on the Army, Navy and Air Force cannot equal that of the President. We cannot say that we love one person and allow that person to destroy us.

The internal challenges are still manageable. What happens if there is external aggression? The truth is that Jonathan does not yet have the power to defend this country, unless in the capacity of acting President. There is limited power that he can exercise as Vice President.

And the funny aspect is what the judiciary has done with the pronouncements of Justice Abutu; the judge twisted the whole matter. And with all these, if care is not taken, the future of jurisprudence could be affected because we are setting precedents. There is every need for our judges to be very careful to the extent that, they should not allow the powers that be to manipulate them to give unpopular judgments that can cause problem in the polity.

It is also shameful and embarrassing that out of more thirty ministers, none of them has information on the health of the President. They were not allowed to see him, yet they have been defending him just because he granted a one-minute interview. And when you heard the voice of the President on BBC, it was clear that this man is truly sick. The interests of the country must be paramount to all of us. So, my advice is that for Nigeria to move forward, to be able to heal the sickness we have on hand, for Nigeria to have a vibrant leadership at this juncture, Jonathan should be made acting President. And if certain people believe this man cannot be sworn in, I can assure you that Nigeria will break; you do not need a soothsayer to tell you that Nigeria will break. Already, Nigeria is sitting on a keg of gunpowder.

The situation in the Niger Delta was highly volatile before the sickness of the President. The only strategy they were using was the granting of amnesty.

And even before the President took ill, most of the militants had been disappointed. This is because the amnesty package was given to politicians and most of them played politics with it. Now, the militants are no longer convinced of the sincerity of government since the President abandoned the programme to attend to his health Saudi Arabia.

Reluctantly, the boys accepted amnesty and the person who initiated the idea has been away; their son now has the opportunity to lead Nigeria because of the unfortunate situation. But we are now saying he cannot lead Nigeria because he is a Southerner. But do not forget that within a short period, the Niger Delta can decide to go their way.

There is every need to know that you do not underrate a region that is surrounded by water. We should not be under the illusion that they have surrendered their arms. They can always get them back.

Even, we Yoruba can decide to break away. I can assure you that if justice is not done, we would have our own nation. Do not forget that the issue of Oduduwa Republic is still very fresh in our memory. But what we feel is that, we can still have a nation called Nigeria if only there is justice. But by the way things are going, I can see a situation that we cannot have a very good and united Nigeria. The more we continue as Nigeria, the more the people who destroy Nigeria are having more power.

Look at what is happening from various elections in this country. Hardly, do you see free and fair elections being conducted in this country anymore. And a country that continues to rob its people their mandate will expect catastrophe at the end. We are not praying for catastrophe. But we are saying it so that politicians should learn from the lessons of what happened in 1983.

The politicians should remind themselves what led to the Buhari/ldiagbon coup. We do not want to witness another military rule.

So, my position and that of my organisation is that, without wasting time, Jonathan should be sworn in as an Acting President, so that he can move Nigeria forward.

What do you envisage could be the agenda of acting President Goodluck Jonathan, given the enormous challenges he would confront?

For now, we are not talking of an agenda. What we are fighting is to ensure that they do not play down on the Constitution. If the Constitution is being played down, that will be the beginning of problems.

And what we are fighting for as human rights and self-determination activists is justice. We are not talking of capacity building of Jonathan. We are talking of justice. If he gets there, people of very good intellectual capacity will work with him.

Before PDP brought him to contest the position of Vice President, they must have known that he is capable. And moreover, he is a technocrat, a lecturer of the highest repute. So, I do not doubt his capability in terms of performance.

We are talking of a situation where we have a vacuum that we urgently want to fill so that problems would not arise. And the resolution of what we are talking about should be on the basis of justice and constitutionality. For the few months that they would be in power, let Jonathan be the acting President. After the end of these four years, they can choose their own candidate. But for this little time that the President is so sick and cannot continue to lead, let Jonathan take over and finish the race.

Nigerians should wake up from their slumber. This is a trying time. We have no other nation than Nigeria and the whole world is watching us.

As a matter of fact, we should not make ourselves the laughing stock of the global community. We should make sure that the right thing is done at the right time. A very good support should be given to Jonathan. We are not talking based on sectional interests. There are many personalities and groups that base their arguments on the Constitution. I read a statement from the Arewa Consultative Forum that Jonathan should be sworn in as President. Also, at the meeting of the Northern Forum, the governors and the Emirs agreed that Jonathan should be sworn in as President.

So, this issue is beyond sectional interests. We are talking of the kind of nation that we want Nigeria to be and be proud of. And again, do not forget that any bad precedent that happens in Nigeria will serve as example to any other African nation.