Alhaji Ahmed Ali Gulak is the Special Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan on Political Matters. He spoke on the recently conducted Kogi State gubernatorial election, the bills being proposed by the president and the need for Nigerians to continue to support President Jonathan. Christian Okeke brings the excerpts:The gubernatorial election inKogi State has come and gone.How did you see the conduct of the election'The PDP has done it again in Kogi State. PDP has won the election free and fair, having scored over 62 per cent of total votes cast. The credit to the peaceful conduct of the election in Kogi, first and foremost, goes to Almighty God, then INEC which has tremendously improved on the processes, then the police who maintained peace and order and the electorate who turned out in their numbers to elect the candidate of their choice. At the end of the day, the governor-elect, Captain Idris Wada, emerged victorious followed by Prince Audu Abubakar and the ANPP candidate.I wish to state clearly here that the president is opening up the political sphere for everybody to participate on a level-playing field, both within PDP and at general election involving other political parties. If you witnessed the Kogi election, any complaint is just the ranting of a politically-dying person. The election was peaceful, it was transparent, credible and a victorious person emerged. The PDP may have its own internal crisis but I assure you that at the end of the day, PDP will always come out stronger and the father figure played by Mr. President did the magic because the President, after the rally in Kogi State on the 28 November, summoned all the PDP stakeholders to Abuja and reconciled them.Part of the problems that people complained about is that at the collection centres, there was some kind of scientific rigging. What is your take on that'I read in the papers that the chief political strategist of Prince Audu, in the person of Dino Melaye, said there was scientific rigging. Some people are not good losers. Politics should not be a do-or-die affair. If you don't get it today, there is always another time. If you know election was done in a transparent manner like what happened in Kogi, you are supposed to come out and congratulate the victorious person than to concoct excuses for your failure.What he termed as scientific rigging is just a concoction of excuse for their failure. But I assure you that that election was transparent and an improvement on past elections by INEC. All the electoral materials arrived on time; accreditation was done on time and voters queued to vote on time the votes were counted and results announced there and then. Every party had its own agents and the agents had copies of the results at the polling units. So where was the scientific rigging' The so-called scientific rigging was just a concoction to raise excuse for their failure which is bad politics. We should always not be bad losers. We should be gallant losers and congratulate the victorious person. That is how our political culture will develop.Did you say the president begged aggrieved stakeholders in Kogi' What of Jibril Echocho, who is still in court claiming to be the authentic candidate of the PDP for the election'He pleaded with everybody. It was not as if Mr. President went down for everybody. He pleaded that these are reasons why PDP should work as a family and everybody agreed. Jibril Echocho, you said, is still in court and I assure you that he was there at the reconciliation meeting. He spoke his mind and at the end of the day, he agreed to work for PDP in the state, mobilised his supporters and voted for PDP. You know court processes, there are ways of withdrawing them. In the meeting he agreed to work for PDP and instruct his lawyers to withdraw the matter from court. So the bottom line is, all the stakeholders have been reconciled and PDP is working as a family in Kogi.There are allegations that PDP's outgoing governor in Kogi performed poorly in office'The allegation is always from the opposition because if you go to Kogi State, I can name more than 10 projects, very important projects that have been completed by the outgoing governor. For example, the new Lokoja water scheme that Mr President went to commission is a very important project that will impact positively on the lives of people of Kogi State. There are roads constructed by Ibrahim Idris scattered across the length and breadth of the state. Even the new Government House is an edifice.The politics by opposition in Nigeria has reached the level that people just sit down to criticise somebody for the sake of criticism. Even if you come and confront a lion, and with bare hands kill the lion, your opponent will come and say, 'oh, he didn't try.' So we have to look at that in proper perspective. The outgoing governor has done his best and his time is up. The mantle has now fallen on Captain Idris Wada to continue the journey.Is it not right to say that the current insecurity in the country is weighing the president down'The current security challenge is not limited to Nigeria. I plead with Nigerians who voted overwhelmingly for Mr President to continue to support him so that he will country. This country would be taken to the next level of development. Without peace, there can never be meaningful development. Whatever any body says about this government, Nigeria, to us, is still the best in West Africa. Our democracy only started in 1999 and is growing. We can only reach our destination when there is peace and there can never be peace in this country unless all hands are put on deck to achieve that peace.Mr President, as you know, is a sincere, committed Nigerian who is committed to the development of his fatherland. And until peace reigns in this country, that developments will remain elusive. Let us, as a nation, emphasise what unites us and deemphasise what divides us. Elections have come and passed. Some have won, some have lost; some have gone to election tribunals, some elections have been confirmed while some have been upturned. Let us play by the rules of the game. Let every arm of government play its sincere role. I call on the opposition that it is now time to partner with President Jonathan in order to achieve development. We have to differentiate between opposition in partisan politics in a democracy and our position as a nation. We cannot, because of political differences, bring down our country. We cannot because of religious and cultural differences bring down our country. This country belongs to all of us irrespective of where you come from; irrespective of your political belief and irrespective of your religious belief. And all of us can aspire to occupy the highest position in the land. The support of Mr. President ought not to have ended with the election.Do you think the proposal of a single term by President Jonathan is not a distraction at this point'I don't believe this should take everybody's attention away from the major national issues. This is one of the many proposals of Mr President to Nigerians through the National Assembly. The president, in his wisdom, and considering the report of the all political parties summit, believed that one single term of seven years could do away with problems associated with second term for presidents and governors. You will agree with Mr President that the moment one is sworn in for first tenure, some people will begin preparing the journey for second term. It detracts from good governance; it detracts from real attention to governance and development and I agree with Mr President completely. Time is now to lay this proposal before Nigerians whether to accept it or not. Don't forget we are operating constitutional democracy. The president, on such matters, doesn't have the final say. That is why it has generated national discourse and when it comes to National Assembly, Nigerians will speak through the National Assembly, whether to accept the proposal or not. Other proposals like removing from the constitution joint account between local governments and states are also Mr President's heartbeat. It is not only the single tenure that is the burning issue. We have a lot of issues that we believe that if we have to progress democratically, we must address them now and resolve the issue, one way or the other. I will call on Nigerians to show interest in the discourse. We must make things happen, not watch things happen.
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