Pat Utomi, a political economist and chieftain of the Labour Party (LP), has called on the political class in Nigeria to do more in advancing the common good rather than playing games with power.
Utomi threw the challenge in Lagos during an exclusive interview with BusinessDay.
Reacting specifically to the recent declaration by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) that Julius Abure has served out his tenure as chairman of the Labour Party, Utomi said: “Well, I think that it was just clarifying something everybody knew a long time ago. Unfortunately, in Nigeria, politicians; for some reasons – I don’t understand it, play games with people. Our politicians should be straightforward, transparent, seek to advance the common good rather than play games for the purposes of power.”
Tracing the history and formation of the LP and how it came to the limelight in 2023, the Professor said that the party was foreseen as a special purpose vehicle to give Nigeria’s working class a voice of their own in the political arena, adding that some interested parties within the system misbehaved.
“So, suddenly all the small boys in Labour became big men, and people began to scramble for them, and then they behaved badly,” Utomi said.
On the failure of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) to win any seat, he said that those who had been saying all manner of things about the Coalition in relation to the by-election may have decided to dwell on politics rather than face the reality of the fact that it was the legacy ADC that went in for the elections and not the ADC in coalition.
Read also: ADC asks Tinubu to declare state of emergency in Katsina, Zamfara
“Well, as far as I know, the Coalition is not even in place yet. There is a legacy party, the ADC, and the idea is to use the ADC as a platform for building this broad coalition. And so, it does not seem to me appropriate to begin to talk about the Coalition when it hasn’t really come alive. But more importantly, from what I hear, I mean, honestly, I didn’t pay much attention to the whole thing.
“From what I hear, I think those who abuse the electoral process did their utmost best to use it to show, you see, we’ve told them they’re going nowhere. I wish people could focus on governance in Nigeria instead of this permanent politics, which is corrupt and not honest. They’re killing the country,” he said.
Utomi also assured Nigerians that the process of selecting the coalition’s flag bearer for the 2027 presidential election will be self-evident, if the policies are clear, transparent, and the processes are followed.
“So, I don’t see why there will be a crisis because of a process of choice. That’s what political parties are about. Well, as rightly said, it’s a coalition that is still forming,” he said.
On Nigeria’s target of a $1 trillion economy by 2030, Utomi said the actual target should be on the quality of life for Nigerians.
According to him, Nigeria has one of the lowest productivities in the world on all dimensions, hence the need to focus on real productivity as an indicator of economic growth that leads to quality of life.
He said: “It’s when people are employed as a result of production that they have income that leads to quality of their life. How many jobs have we created?”
Utomi also expressed disgust at the seeming elevation of politicking over governance.
When asked if he thought politicking came too early in the current dispensation, he said: “It means that no governance takes place in Nigeria. I will liken it to how we used to deal with the problem of the budget cycle in Nigeria back in those pre-SAP years. Most companies that run in Nigeria actually had a window of less than six months to operate, because first of all, they will announce the budget January 1 or whatever day or year they did that. Then for three months, the Customs will be trying to determine, is that what they said in the budget? So, companies won’t be able to take any action. They are still wanting to see what Customs and Co. are like; three months will pass. Then they move. Then discussions will start about the next budget, three months to the end of the year. So, companies had only six months to actually do anything. And, imagine what that did to competitiveness in Nigeria compared to, say, Ghana or somewhere else.
“We’ve brought it to politics now. We campaign, campaign, then this charade that we typically call election takes place. Then we’ll spend the next one year going to court. Then as soon as we finish the last court selection, we immediately go into the next election. Look at Nigeria, poorly governed, and people are paying the price, but they don’t seem to realise it.”
