A chieftain of the Coalition of Northern Groups, CNG, one of the strongest voices in the region, Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, in this interview with Kassim Omomia and Ebute Matthew, speaks on the Northern Agenda for 2023, power shift, insecurity, among other issues.

Tell us about the “ Northern Agenda in 2023” and whether it is true that the North will no longer vote on ethnic, religious lines?

We do not actually find it realistic to view 2023 politics with an extremely high level of optimism given the prevailing circumstances. The volatility of the situation in the country at present does not encourage an optimistic calculation for the 2023 round of general elections. Be that as it may, the new thinking in the North is one that heavily tilts towards a generational shift of power as against the current debate over oscillation of power among regions.

We are disturbed that an old political order of entrenched cronyism, nepotism and godfatherism that perpetually hoists incompetent and insensitive leaderships on Nigeria has prevailed for too long. The result is that a certain elitist order has perpetuated a system of revolving power around itself and continue to monopolise the total available activity in the country in its entire independent existence.

Power has thus ostensibly revolved around the same set of elderly people in their 80s who apparently lack the ability, durability, grasp, and capacity to cope with the dynamics of today’s fast-phased world order. This trend unfortunately, is sustained at the expense of available young, resourceful Nigerians whose inherent productive potential and resource amply qualify them for effective leadership at all levels.

In the prevailing global reality for great changes with the old order crumbling everywhere and emerging new systems of life and activity, younger generations of Nigerians owe the vital task of ensuring a new order of leadership recruitment based on competence, capacity, and integrity.

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With the relegation of the youth who constitute an intimidating majority of our national population, we must rise to demand a radical review of the prevailing leadership selection process to give young people and professionals a chance to salvage this country from the bankruptcy of moneybags and political spent forces, who dominate the available space for participating in elective governance positions at all levels.

Certainly, the North shall cease to vote along ethnic lines which is why the zoning arrangements by political party would not be relevant as far as the North is concerned.

Notwithstanding this position, President Muhammadu Buhari, a northerner, by 2023 would have ruled for eight years. In your view, between the South East, South West, and South/ South, which zone should get support for presidency in 2023 after Buhari?

Like I pointed out to you, there is at this point, no question of a region deserving of support, especially from the North to ascend leadership in 2023 or in the future because the unfolding scenario is one that is fanning greater mistrust. The North as I stated above is no longer going to be disposed to regional or ethnic power shift but a radical paradigm shift to a new order.

Then, how do you situate the worsening insecurity in the country and that of North, especially with a Northerner as President?

It does no good to recall that in 2015, Nigerian voters trusted Buhari to lead our nation through and out of its limitations, into a future in which we will lead secure lives and pursue livelihoods in a united Nigeria whose resources will be protected by leaders.

That election was about the possibility that we could look to a future without Boko Haram; that our young people will get good education, acquire skills, and get jobs; that corruption will be arrested, contained, and eliminated.

To the utter disappointment of all Nigerians, they are ending up with a citadel of poor governance, indifference, insensitivity, and unprecedented plunder that is the Muhammadu Buhari presidency.

The northern region from where the Buhari administration extracted most of its votes feels the most disappointment, having been virtually abandoned at the mercy of a rampaging insurgency, regular banditry, kidnappings and sacking of communities that continuously weaken it politically and pauperize it economically.

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The North in particular, is today humbled by its role in bringing about this administration that turns out to operate on the back of the most gratuitous insults to justice and fairness wrapped in the crude cover of crass political opportunism and breath-taking ineptitude.

We are humbled by the material support and sacrifices we made towards the emergence of this administration that has acquired the reputation of being the worst in the history of our nation in terms of any capacity to generate confidence in achieving credible national goals.

Northern communities are today groaning under the burden of a widened religious and ethnic crack, worsened by the burden of the shared legacy of the Buhari administration in a dangerous security situation, and the deteriorating standards of living, as a close-knit circle of friends and family members fleece the poor of resources to develop.

However, can there be a link, in your view to the creation of various regional security outfits and agitation to break away from Nigeria. We have IPOB and their militia unit, the ESN. Then, the call for Biafra, Oduduwa republics and the almost general calls for restructuring?

We certainly do not see anything wrong with anyone agitating for self-determination, provided it is done according to our laws and applicable international conventions and treaties to which Nigeria is a signatory.

The way the agitations for Biafra and Oduduwa republics are carried out recently, with killings of our people in some places in the South West and South East, are certainly matters of serious concern which quite unfortunately, though overlooked by a section of the northern elite and most of those that call themselves northern leaders.

As a group we see the regularity of the attacks on northern communities in the South going far beyond the civil pursuit of the right to self-determination and unfolding as part of a wider agenda that has its roots in our history.

We see the resurgence of separatist agitations especially by the IPOB and its ilk in the South-East and the Oduduwa republic exponents as representing a much wider conspiracy to divide Nigeria by first bringing the North down on its knees by incapacitation and balkanization.

We are also convinced that other agitations for restructuring, true federalism and resource control are strategies employed to achieve the results that the coupists of the First Republic failed to realise, namely increase the weight and relevance of the regions to the detriment and expense of the central government, thereby gradually paving the way for complete separation from Nigeria.

The violent agitations and disturbances that have been ongoing since 2015 and escalating with the approach of the 2023 elections are certainly aimed at rendering the country practically ungovernable and ushering in of anarchy and instability, thereby occasioning a shift of power to the South by whatever means and tactics.

Everyone can see that the southern strategies are solely aimed at diminishing the viability of the North and rendering it incapable of standing on its own two feet and competing favourably with other parts of the country. This informs the targeting of the North and northerners living elsewhere in the country and singling them for attacks and irreverent treatment to cause inter-regional crisis possibly leading to civil war or general unrest that could portend towards the breakup of the country.

Regrettably, the section of the northern elite that has monopolised the total available activity in the region since independence is so blinded by their quest for fantastic wealth and personal political ascendancy as not to see that in the unfolding chess game for 2023, it is a vital task to stand and speak out in the protection of the rights of the northerner in the North and where he lives as minority elsewhere.

We strongly believe that this farce called Nigerian unity that has not worked for more than 60 years is negotiable which is why we at the CNG finds it essential that the North anticipates and checkmates the manoeuvres of the South in all possible and likely scenarios that may arise now or soon. For us at the CNG, if this cannot be achieved through peaceful persuasion and reasoning, we strongly believe that the only remaining option would be to move for a referendum to decide the future of the country.

With the agitations here and there, does it not show signs of a failed state, a failed Nigeria in the hands of President Buhari?

It appears you are lumping two issues with this question. The CNG has long ago warned that Nigeria is drifting into a failed state under Buhari. We pointed out that apart from the comatose economy, the erosion of legitimate authority to make collective decisions and inability to provide public services were all indicators of failed state that have manifested in Nigeria. With all the symptoms of a failing state manifesting such as the loss of control of its territory or of the monopoly on the legitimate use of physical force therein, no Nigerian would be deceived into believing that so many things are not wrong.

Our economy has been so endangered that we have had to slip into two major recessions in just five years which is unprecedented. Regardless of whether we choose to call it fragile, failed, or failing state, Nigeria is plagued by overwhelming problems with few solutions in sight. Nigeria is today unable to provide fundamental societal requirements and basic services to its citizens such as health, education, housing, welfare, employment, security, justice, governance, and human rights.

Buhari and his men appear not to see the need to do more than taunt victory in the face of failure with all the economic and political indicators based on demographic pressures, poverty and economic decline, state legitimacy, security, human rights, rule of law, and fractionalised elite pointing at a failed state. With regard to the other segment of your question, I do not believe there are agitations here and there, they are solely from the South, the South West and South East, while the North which is not agitating for anything is yet bearing the brunt of those southern agitations.

The agenda is that if the ultimate objectives of the South are not met through agitation, propaganda and clamour, resort will be made to more violent means, starting with instigation to more unrest and fanning the embers of religious and ethnic discontent into raging fires of carnage and destruction. Then troubles would be spread in Kaduna, Taraba, Benue, and Plateau States where the fissures between ethnic and religious groups are much more accentuated and troublesome already.

In such an event, the North would suffer the most and it would be held up as the real culprit and the cause of the breakup of Nigeria. You can see that already unrest has been instigated in volatile parts of the country such as Oyo, Ekiti and Ondo where attacks on Northerners are being organized by Yoruba militias such as OPC, and particular in Edo and Rivers in the Niger Delta by an assortment of militant groups.

In the South-East, the agitations for separation and the cry for Biafra have become louder and the agitators supported by their politicians, are becoming emboldened to act in more radical and violent manner, hoping to spark off retaliation in the North with subsequent attacks to be perpetrated against Northerners in the South-East, thus making it even more likely to insist on dividing the country.

All the above scenarios have begun playing out in this 2021 and are likely to be played out fully by 2023 and probably to prevent a successful conduct of elections unless southern politicians are guaranteed the return of power.

This year’s First Northern People’s Summit has few personalities from the 19 northern states attending, what is responsible for that?

I do not think that is correct. With the Covid-19 safety protocols in place, the summit was certainly well attended with representatives from more than 50 organisations across the region.