Olisa Agbakoba, a senior advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and pro-democracy advocate, recently addressed a state-of-the-nation conference where he spoke on various socio-economic and political issues. Agbakoba, who noted that Nigeria was grappling with self-inflicted pains, blamed the opposition for lacking the drive and narrative expected of them. He also spoke on the newly signed Executive Order (EO)9, the Electoral Act 2026 and their implications: ZEBULON AGOMUO brings the Excerpts:
For a start, can you scan the socio-economic and political situation of Nigeria from your own perspective?
Let me say that we are being distracted by 2027, which is very unfortunate. Because you agree that things are not good. Am I right? Yes. Generally, things are not good. The type of work we do as lawyers is not something people see. What we do is very intellectual. It’s very intangible. So, what we do is called development law. And people don’t understand. Even economists don’t understand the link between law and economics. So, the link between law, as you know, constitution and economics is something that our economic planners don’t understand. So, for the last, maybe 20 years, we have been advocating.
Everyone knows that. We have been talking about how to upgrade our laws because the key thing we have in Nigeria that drives an economy or development, is first of all, a leader. So, we are hoping that in 2027 we will have competitive politics because it is only by competitive politics that you get the best results. But one of the key things we lack is revenue. So, on the monetary policy side, I am prepared to give Yemi Cardoso very high marks. He has steadied the economy. He has lowered the rates.
Strengthened the Naira. And kudos to him. But what about the fiscal side? The fiscal side is not doing well. Because we are borrowing. And when we borrow and we are making an income of, say, 100 Naira, and paying debts of 90 Naira. It leaves 10 Naira. So, 10 Naira for 200 million people is not enough. So, we need to strengthen our income. That’s why I’m excited about the Executive Order 9. Because we’ve been shouting for a long time. And we said, is it that people in government don’t read Section 44.3?
Section 44.3 makes us owners of our oil and natural resources. I know we have plenty. But for some funny reasons Our government decides to mortgage it. We have the crude oil sovereignty. Oil sovereignty belongs to me. Just like I’ve come from a house. My house is my sovereignty. You can’t come and invade it. Why is it that we have abdicated our oil sovereignty to two actors- NNPC and the IOCs? If you read the EO very well, you will find that NNPC was gulping 70percent of our crude oil resources. 70percent! So, we wrote something about clawing back our sovereignty. Taking ownership of our resources. Following it word for word, I was absolutely thrilled. It is the most foundational piece of policy ever. Because we need money. So, that’s one thing why it is supported. There are few problems. But those can be addressed either by the Supreme Court or the National Assembly.
I want to ask your view about the recently conducted FCT area council election. Again, there was an alleged assassination attempt on Peter Obi and other ADC chieftains when they visited Edo State recently. How do you react to that?
The problem is with the politicians, all of them. The problem with politicians is that they don’t play the game correctly. To be quite honest with you, I put a lot of blame on the opposition. The opposition claims that people are decamping. But it’s like me saying, why is my wife dating another man? Who do I hold responsible? So, if governors are leaving the PDP and going to the APC, who is to be blamed? It’s the PDP. All I see the PDP do or the typical Nigerian politician do is that they visit people who lost their relations or you find them at weddings. There are lots of issues to talk about to win over Nigerians. Like this issue of, don’t you want good housing – Margaret Thatcher did it in the 1970s. She told the British people, don’t you want to be a house owner? Do you prefer to be a house owner or a rent payer? That’s what made her win. Why don’t we hear it in Nigerian politics? Why? The quality of Nigerian politics is so low. It’s about vandalism, fighting, bribe-taking, all sorts of things. No issues. In spite of all the challenges, they’re not hitting the big issues. That’s the problem. So, politics needs to improve. We need to have people like Thatcher in the opposition. If I were them, I’ll be telling the government, this is what you’re not doing. Then I go to the people and say, do you see them doing anything? All right, let us wait for 2027. So, I tell the people, you see what I’m going to do for you? But they’re not saying it. That’s the problem. I’ve never heard any serious policy discussion from any politician. Not one. Going and engaging the people, like Obama did, house-to-house campaign, telling them this is what I can do. That’s politics. That’s not happening. About the FCT election, it’s part of the “mago-mago” of our politics. It’s part of the lack of ideology. So, people now see rigging, vote- buying, stealing, stuffing ballots, and all the negatives.
There is a big issue of housing deficit in the country. That was the problem that Thatcher identified in Britian in the 70s that made her to win election. How many Nigerians can afford their own houses today?
But this would have been very easy if the mortgage was working. We have written a proposal which I hope the President will use to create a mortgage market. Now, when you create a mortgage market, you are looking at 1.4 quadrillion. I know you are used to million, you are used to billion, you are used to trillion, but you are not used to quadrillion. The Nigerian property market is a quadrillion property market, 1.4 quadrillion, but it’s dead. It’s not playing a role in capital formation. So, these are the ways in which we have the potential to be a great nation. How can countries like South Korea, Brazil, like tiny countries, even UAE, be the bigger players? That should not be the position. The law has to be created.
When the law is created, then you can go to your bank and say, ah, I work in so-and-so place. This is how much I earn. I’m interested in getting a house. Then the bank will give you the conditions. But no bank will give, even me; I have not got a mortgage, but I have got mortgages in the UK. But here they will tell you, all right, this loan you want 300 million, how do you intend to pay? I have a property, about 34 acres. They said, okay, where are your papers? I said, I don’t have them. They said, why don’t you have them? It takes 15 years to get a paper. And do you know, in our experience, in our dispute resolution team, we found that some of these C-of-Os are forged. They are fake. So, a lot of work needs to be done.
That is another area that the government needs to work on. So, we’re hoping that the president of Nigeria in 2027, whoever it may be, will be an absolutely foresighted person. And if that happens, you will say, ah, why have we been suffering like this? Because of leadership. That’s the only reason.
Now, the issue of insecurity is still not going away. A few days ago, we heard that some people were rescued in Niger, and it was alleged that the government paid about N2 billion. It’s not confirmed yet.
The U.S. Congress has submitted a report to President Trump, listing a lot of things. So, how concerned are you about the ongoing issue of insecurity, and how it has attracted global attention now worsening our image and how we are being perceived?
But the first thing to ask would be, what is our security policy? That’s a starting point. Incidentally, when I was at the NIIA in 1980, I was specialised in intelligence policy. So, we have a number of elements that would make up a perfect architectural framework for security. So, where is it? Okay, what special thing are these U.S. forces going to do that they are now on ground? Because they’re not fighting forces.
They’re mostly specialist forces who have high intelligence. They have human intelligence. They have communications intelligence. They have photographic intelligence. They bring all these things. You know, there was something that Atiku said that struck me. He said he’s surprised about this Sambisa, because “whenever I’m landing into Yola, I see it. That’s from the aircraft. So, why is it that this thing suddenly sounds abstract?” It’s there on the ground. It’s there. Just go put a couple of drones. You’ll see everybody. Americans use it to great effect. They put a drone. They see the car. They pinpoint it. They put the coordinates and bomb the hell out of the car. So, what’s the big deal? These rag-tag terrorists and bandits, they are the easiest to chase out if we are serious. So, that’s why I asked the question. Do we really have a security challenge, or is it the fact that our security architecture is not in place? That’s the question. It’s the same question about money. We have money, but we don’t know how to gather it. So, is it that we can’t find these rag-tag people? I remember that there was an American stranded somewhere, American forces landed and took him out. How did they do it? How? And this problem is not only isolated to Nigeria. It’s also even in Mexico. And that lesson in Mexico where they killed the drug warlord should be ringing in our ears. You have a man who had so terrorised Mexico, who had dominated, and that’s why the thing is going on.
But what did America do? They just came with footprint. Their footprint, they just showed the Mexican soldiers, look at where he is. And then they killed him. That was all. So, we have to ask, what is the basic element of our security architecture? I’m not sure it’s modern. If it were modern, these rag-tag people who just carry AK-47s would not be a problem. Yesterday, I was watching on TV, I could not believe that Nigerians are in the condition they are in; those IDPs. I don’t know whether you saw it. A so-called powerful nation. We are harboring about eight million refugees, homeless. I was shocked. And we can’t deal with this? So, I think the thing to say about all these challenges is really we need to make 2027 a year of dramatic change. What should be the issue in their campaign? They must connect with Nigerians. Nigerians are waiting. It’s like someone who has been in hospital for three, four years, sick or something.
And they tell you, ah, there’s somebody who can cure you. You’re very happy. Nigerians are absolutely waiting for a miraculous doctor. This is the easiest country to take if you know what to do. It’s the easiest country, but you have to be organised. It’s not about going to weddings. That’s what our politicians are masters of. You see them at weddings, they gather, they laugh. They are not planning. They are not planning. Even if they made me director of policy planning of any party for two billion, I wouldn’t accept.
If you were to chair electoral committee today, what three radical changes would you propose, or prioritise?
The way I see the Electoral Act, I don’t see that a petitioner can actually win anything. Because you’re actually required to produce primary evidence across 170,000 polling units. Each polling unit is presided by a presiding officer. So, for the court to hear evidence that the election was rigged, I need to hear that polling unit, presiding officers of 170,000, where do you get them? So, that’s unfair. What should happen is what we did in the Uwais Commission. Bless the soul of the late President Umar Musa Yar’Adua, who recognised that the election that brought him in was flawed, and he set up a panel, the Uwais Commission, and I was on it. Go and read it and implement it. We said the man who should be held liable for the proper or improper conduct of an election is the referee. If you allege misconduct, am I going to prove the misconduct? It is the referee who will say, look, this is what they said about you. So, INEC ought not to be an active defender of a winner of an election. Do you know INEC defends election petitions more than the respondent? So, when the court tell INEC, someone is alleging this against you.
What do you have to say? That’s all. They’re the ones to prove it. Not me. Not me who ran for say, governor of Anambra. INEC will shut its mouth and will be told, defend your election results. You are the referee. That will change the picture. But right now, what happens is that the respondent hides under INEC, and INEC becomes the active defender. So, we said, no, no, no. That must change. Once the petitioner alleges something that looks like a fraud not frivolity. Somebody will have only two votes and say; I should have won. I’m talking about people who you see made a good attempt and everybody can see it. That’s what happens in Kenya. Then you begin to see a better process. But until you do that, because you ask me all the while, what would I do? What I would do is to implement the Uwais report.
Then I would also activate the Electoral Offenses Commission (EOC), so that those who misbehave, they’re going to jail. But since we recommended the Electoral Offenses Commission in 2006, I think, nothing. Because the beneficiaries of the wahala are the men in the National Assembly. Look, everything I’m saying, you can switch it around. The same way I’m saying NNPC cabal. You can’t break a cabal. You can’t break this electoral cabal, except the president puts his foot down and says we’re going to break it.
The way that President Yar’Adua said, I’m breaking the cabal. But unfortunately, the man died. If he had not died and we had implemented the report, we had passed, I believe, I think four major amendments.
The only one that saw the light of day was to make INEC on the first line in terms of their money which is not working. Because INEC still goes to the president. If you have a process that is free and fair, you will then find people willing to come.
A woman, Tulip Siddiq, resigned as a UK Treasury Minister in January 2025 because of her link to her aunt, former Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who has a corruption case. The only reason she was asked to resign was that she was a distant relation of the prime minister Bangladesh? That was the only reason. She’s English. She’s not connected with her at all. So, we need to have a very powerful and neutral electoral process so that we can raise the game. That’s how you get the people. But right now, people just think if I want to make money, all I do is run for the House of Reps. I go to a local constituency and say, I’m going to organise. I visit my office. Who are the boys? We get the boys. Share money. On the day of election, they do the thing. And I win.
But can you speak directly on electronic transmission?
So, in the current format of the electoral act, does it answer the aspiration of the electorate? It doesn’t. It doesn’t. You know there are two different things – let me be clear. E-voting is different from electronic transmission. E-voting was introduced in the Nigerian Bar Association. I can tell you the power of e-voting in NBA. It immediately made us, the council of past presidents, redundant. Before, all these people campaigning, they would be bringing whiskey and everything to us. Now, nobody comes because you can sit anywhere you like and vote. I voted from Malta. I voted from London because it is open and transparent. That is where we should be reaching. We haven’t even started. So, let’s just talk about transmission. That’s number one because somebody has rigged the damn thing. But let me say my name is there. Then I put that thing. What do you call it again- BVAS? It doesn’t work. Then the man say wait. I wait, and nothing happens. But at the end I cast my vote. Am I going to the collation centre with him. Are we going to follow him? So, in between, he changes the damn result. He changes it. And when he gets there, he says 10,000. But meanwhile, I got 100,000. They record it. For me to now prove that I defeated my opponent whom they allocated 200,000, I have to go and get that paper, the original. That’s the problem. When I bring the evidence, they say no, not admissible. That’s the problem. But if you transmit, it goes up. Everybody sees it. That was why Professor Mahmood claimed glitches because it was manual transmission. Remember? It’s forgotten. That was manual transmission. They were writing it. By time somebody saw it, ah, this man is winning, they canceled it. But we’re not seeing the result. So, transmission simply means seeing the result. That’s all it means. Right now, they hide it. Then by the time they go from ward to now local government, to state, ah, by that time, it has changed. That’s the problem. That was why when the House of Reps passed it, when it came to the Senate, there was a problem. They didn’t know what to do. Eventually, they didn’t pass it. So, we’re waiting to see what the president will do. But what it is, is that the old manual way will prevail. That will make our election results susceptible to manipulations. And I don’t think that’s good enough. What it means today is that we don’t have a perfect electoral act. So, the “mago mago” will continue.
