Hon Uche Azuka Okwuosa is an All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA) chieftain in Anambra State. He had served in various capacities in government. He served as executive chairman of Old Nnewi North Local Government council and later commissioner for works and transport under Governor Chinwoke Mbadinuju administration.
A Knight of St Christopher in the Anglican Communion, Nnewi diocese, Hon Okwuosa, in the April 2007 election contested for the Senate to represent Anambra South senatorial district under APGA, an election he described as a charade.
He analysed the political landscape of Nigeria and identified corruption as the bane of the entire political system.
Okwuosa blamed electoral fraud on crop of leaders the country has, who he said are bent on selfish interest and personal aggrandisement.
Electoral fraud
This is the major problem facing Nigeria today. The anti-corruption crusade of the Federal Government appears to have failed in this area. We have witnessed series of electoral fraud to monumental proportion by the last PDP Federal Government. It is a well known fact that those who make peaceful change impossible, also make violent action inevitable. Look at what happened at the April 2007 polls. It was a clear evidence of corruption of the highest order. The system has not failed but the leaders.
There should be stiff penalties for all electoral fraud to serve as a deterrent to future offenders, otherwise the survival of democracy is not guaranteed.
Moreover, the electoral body must be made independent to avoid executive abuses which Nigerians witnessed in the April 2007 charade called elections.
Judicial system
The legal system in this country has not failed and I believe that it will never fail.
If you take the judiciary as an entity you are being most unfair, but generally, it is a typical Nigerian problem. Within the confines of this decaying system called Nigeria I believe that we still have a ray of hope in the judiciary.
It appears to be the only arm of government which has distinguished itself from the corrupt system. We have seen series of cases of fraudulent practices by judges and we have seen how they are penalised by the judicial system in this country. One must give them kudos, not that it does not have elements of bad eggs, it has a system of sanitising itself and come out with the best. I can still doff my hat for them for playing an exemplary role.
If the executive and legislative arms of government can follow suit, Nigeria, in no distant time, will be a better place for all of us.
I want to believe that the tribunals handling elections petitions will do justice to the cases before them. We do not have problem with the judiciary. The problem lies on undue interference by the executive, undue gagging up. But if the tribunals can stand firmly, history will vindicate them. They should resist every iota of inducement and lobbying by the executive and go ahead to dispense justice without fear or favour.
We want a situation where we see the symbol of justice as that of blindfolded maiden and not an old woman with her eyes wide open.
We want to see impartiality of the judiciary. That is the only thing that can redeem this country from its present mess.
Senatorial aspiration
Well, I definitely have no regrets. I have no regrets in the sense that if well meaning citizens like us did not come out, then we wouldn’t have had the opportunity of exposing the ills and illegalities of the Olusegun Obasanjo administration. That’s why they are uncomfortable.
You saw what happened. No election took place. In 1979, we heard about rigging, slightly, may be 10 to 15 percent, when Obasanjo, as a military head of state handed over to the Alhaji Shehu Shagari administration. In 1983, what did we have? landslide." We still had about 40 percent fraudulent practices. In 1999, though we had the military handing over to civilian administration, there were still pockets of rigging here and there. It was never on a monumental proportion.
The problem we have is transiting from one democratic government to another. We have never inculcated that habit of free and fair in any thing we do.
Most Nigerians, from the leadership down to the bottom, have the impression that nothing comes easy except through fraudulent practices. I am an apostle of do it right and get to your destination. It is on that premise that I decided to offer myself to represent Anambra South Senatorial district at the National Assembly.
If you go through my manifesto you will find out that I was aware of these things before they happened. No matter the way the April polls were manipulated, I still believe that people like us have something to offer this country for effective leadership devoid of fraudulent practices, devoid of corruption and devoid of selfish interest. Since we have square pegs in round holes, how do we expect to get it right?
I have no regrets for participating in the election and we are poised to fight the injustice to a logical conclusion and we will get justice at the end of the day. I am a strong believer in God as God of justice.
Our political system
The problem with Nigeria, for the sake of emphasis, has never been whether we have a confederal system. The problem has been the operators of that system. You can bring the best system from America or Britain, if the operators of that system are fraudulent or corrupt, you can’t get it right. We have tried the parliamentary system. We failed. We are experimenting the presidential system now without success. It has nothing to do with system.
Be that as it may, it has been my intention to help in initiating bills which will strengthen the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), to make it independent, at least to enable it dispense justice the way it ought to. When this is done, there might not be zero corruption but something closer to it.
I would have also gone there (to the Senate) to initiate a bill that will ensure a complete autonomy of the electoral body, INEC. When it is truly independent there is need also to have a corresponding punishment for offenders even when you have left office. No offence should go unpunished. Unless we start punishing these offenders, we will never get it right.
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