BARRISTER ADEBAYO SHITTU, a former Minister of Communication under the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, and the Pro-Chancellor and Chairman, Governing Council, David Umahi Federal University of Health Sciences, Ebonyi State, Speaks to GBENRO ADESINA, about his political journey in Nigeria. He candidly discusses the struggle for true legislative independence amid party politics, the lack of ideological training for lawmakers, and the uneasy balance between the executive, legislature, and judiciary. Excerpt.
Q: Barrister Adebayo Shittu, you said earlier that Nigeria is a work in progress. What do you mean?
A: Because we keep having challenges at every tree and thorns. However, Nigerians of goodwill do not lose hope that things will continue to improve. So, for me, Nigeria is a work in progress.
Q: Could you briefly share your journey – from being a lawyer to a politician and public servant?
A: I thank the Almighty God. He is the owner of all gratitude. He deserves all our gratitude and we’ll continue to thank him. I qualified as a lawyer in 1979, having graduated from the Nigerian Law School. Before I graduated, I had contested election into the then Oyo State House of Assembly. It was the bigger Oyo State, comprising of the current Oyo and Osun States. We got into the House on October 2, 1979. On October 8, the then governor of Oyo State, late Chief Bola Ige (SAN), sent one letter to the speaker of the Oyo State House of Assembly, saying, Dear Mr Speaker, please, get the House of Assembly to approve the following names as members of the Oyo State Cabinet. The speaker read the letter to us. My sense of knowledge of constitutionalism told me this should not be the procedure because if you are asking us to approve a list, we should have information about everyone on the list, particularly, the curriculum vitae (CV), of each of them. I raised my hand. That was my first legislative activity. I said this is a wrong procedure. The letter should be sent back to Governor Bola Ige and ask him to forward the CV of each of those on the list. In the tradition of party politics, it was felt very strange that a member of the same party, UPN, would criticise the leader who had sent a list. I blew all the grammar that I could about separation of power, the independence of legislature, and about doing things rightly. The book concepts. Unfortunately, the speaker, when he recovered from the shock, he said, as the speaker of the House, I over rule. That was it. My problem in the then House of Assembly started from there. At the end of the day, sometime in 1982, after about three years, I brought in a motion for the setting up of an investigative committee to probe a contract that had just be awarded for Oyo-Iseyin Road. I felt it was not properly packaged. I succeeded in convincing the House. By the second day, a new motion was tabled, saying that my motion should be over ruled. It became a very big problem for me and for the government at that time. That led to my dismissal from UPN, which was supposed to be a progressive party. They harassed me. At the end of the day, I was dismissed. That forced me and some other people who have been similarly sent out of the party like late Chief S. M. Afolabi, who was the deputy governor at that time, Busari Adelakun and a few others to join National Party of Nigeria (NPN), which eventually led to the ouster of UPN, from the governance of Oyo State at that time. I became the Oyo State Commissioner for Information, Culture and Home Affairs in Dr Victor Omololu Olunloyo administration in 1983. Unfortunately, the government lasted only three months, between October and December 1983. It was the military that shortened the lifespan of the government. After that, I went into my legal practice. I supported Senator Rashidi Ladoja governorship ambition. So, when he won and came into office, as a governor in the state, he first appointed me as a member of the Judicial Service Commission. He later got impeached. Then, legal battle started for him to reclaim his mandate. At the end of the day, the Supreme Court ruled that he was not properly impeached and reinstated him, as the governor of the state. When he came back, he appointed me as the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice. In 2011, I contested as the governorship candidate for the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC). I lost the election. I contested again in 2015, I lost. President Muhammadu Buhari appointed me as a Minister of Communication in 2015 and I served in that capacity till the end of Buhari’s first term in 2019. That was the period I got transformed into a national political actor unlike before, when I was a local political actor. In all of these appointments, I have faced a lot of challenges because my perception is that politics is the most important profession that anybody can participate in, because, it is only through politics that you can impact and transform the lives of hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people. My experience is that at every stage, people don’t want the truth; at every stage, people prefer compromises than facing reality in governance, at every phase, you discovered that the wrong choices are what political leaders get engaged in. I pride myself as one of the very few students of Awolowo school of politics, believing in the ideal that Awolowo taught. The ideal thing is look; life must be more abundant for the masses. If you are in government and you can’t engage in impactful programmes of governance, then, you are not fit to be there. He believes in life more abundant for the masses. He believes very strongly that governance must be about ensuring a life of abundance for people. That is why I believe anybody who calls himself a progressive, must also be like Chief Awolowo. Awolowo, believes in free education at all level, and free health services for the masses. Those two should be basic benefits that the masses should enjoy. Unfortunately, nobody is talking about those two benefits.
Q: When you were elected as a legislator, was there any training regarding what you can do or cannot do in the House of Assembly?
A: Unfortunately, there wasn’t any such training. Everybody relied on whatever knowledge you have, intuition and so on. For me, politics has been a matter of intuition. Things you think are the basic needs the masses should expect from elected officials.
Q: You just made me to know that being critical could get legislators into problem. Looking at our politics, legislature seems to be an appendage of the executive?
A: Unfortunately, there has never been any ideological training for legislators. I am a member of APC. I have had interviews on national television when the interviewer will ask me what is the position of your party on certain subjects? Because I’ve never participated in the formulation of the standard of the party for each of these subject matters, I don’t know of any position. It is only what leaders pronounce in the course of their governance that is adopted as the position of the party. That is not the right thing for us
Q: Are you saying that legislature is just a tool in the hand of the executive. What is the practicality of the separation of power in the Nigeria’s political landscape?
A: This is a very difficult question to answer. The truth as I’ve earlier said is that there are no training grounds. A lot of people come into the legislature, and virtually, they don’t have anything upstairs, by way of a procedure to adopt subject matter on governance. Again, you want to ask, people who go to legislature, do they really have an ideological orientation and what is the aim of going into the legislature? People just go as a matter of advancing their personal interest. It is not about being committed to specific ideas on issues of governance. In the absence of any ideological orientation, in the absence of any specified and documented position on issues of governance, everybody is on his own. In that situation, the executive will have great advantage, particularly, because for people to get elected into the house, they need the patronage of the party leadership. At the state level, you need the governor to approve you to be nominated and at the national level, party leaders in the various zones and regions in the state, will have an influence. If you rely on a party leader to get elected into the house, it will be very difficult for you to kowtow to the wishes of the party.
Q: So, it is correct to say that Nigerian legislature is a mere rubber stamp institution?
A: Because of the quality of many of these legislators, who perhaps have not had proper orientation, they unwittingly, become weapons of the executive.
Q: Can you assess the judiciary in the government?
A: I’m a lawyer. It will be very difficult for me to comment on the position of Nigeria’s judiciary except we hope that they will continue to be patriotic and ensure that their performances of their judicial duties fall in line with the best national interest of our country.
Q; So, it has to do with the conscience?
A: Yes, because, nobody can force any judicial official to misbehave, but it is easy for a judicial official to submit himself to the dictation of anybody because of finance or political emotion.
