The National Chairman of the Young Progressives Party(YPP), Comrade Emmanuel Bishop Amakiri, was recently cornered after his birthday party in Abuja for a brief chat on the state of the nation by MMS Plus Newspaper. Amakiri, with the burden of birthing a new Nigeria, where transformational leadership will usher in a sustainable political order, called for electoral reforms, insisting that there are critical changes needed in the polity before the 2027 general elections. He advocated for a reduced and reformed bicameral legislature , while calling for reduction in number of states. He emphasized the need for reduction in cost of governance, noting that the nation’s Constitution needs a comprehensive review. He further called for ballot revolution and equitable states representations, urging citizens to build ownership spirit in the nation’s political commonwealth. Excepts_:
What is it like celebrating birthday?
It’s a mark of fulfillment and joy. It is an opportunity to thank God who has given you an opportunity to see another glorious year in sound health.
Listening to you, you talked about, facing challenges with the party, coming out of them, and then dedicating more of your life to the party. So would you say you have actually gotten to the point of fulfillment?
No, I will say that the journey is still very far, and my reason is because we’ve not gotten to el Dorado. There is a lot of work out there. You know, the generation that we represent, is still actually under siege of leadership quagmire, yeah, and I think that this generation has the responsibility to see how they can liberate themselves politically, so that we can bring on board purposeful leadership that will save this country. And for me, I cannot say it’s yet el darodo. It is so pathetic that this country is not on the right direction. You know, there’s one thing about life, no matter how fast or slow you are running, if you are not on the right track, you will not get your destination. Yes, you can be very fast. If you take a trip to Enugu and you are going to Lagos, no matter how many kilometers, you are running,you will not get to Enugu because you took the wrong direction. So for me, I feel leadership has not taken shape in Nigeria. I think that people need to rise again. And that’s one spirit that we are driven by. You know, in the Young Progressive Party, you can see, thank God, you also witnessed various people who spoke today. You could see everybody was speaking out of passion. Nobody is paid here in YPP. Nobody is giving any money here in YPP. But look at how people came out. They are still out there. You see, so if we continue to have young men and women that are driven by the spirit of patriotism and volunteerism, I think that this country
will succeed.
Okay, that takes me to the issue of hope.
We seem to be so disillusioned with a lot of things, especially the youth, the economy is not too favorable, and then even the the economic indices are not even adding up to give anybody hope. So what do you think should be done? What should the youth be doing? Should they go on revolution as it were, or what do you think should be the move?
There is a kind of revolution that I believe in. I call it ballot revolution, the ballot revolution, for me sounds more ideological, because the opportunity will always come for you to elect your leader. And now, when people cast aspersions and they don’t do the right thing,it doesn’t make any sense. Now the youth, we say youth, whether old or young, in whatever demography we call it, I will say that the people themselves have not decided that they really want this desired change that they want for themselves. Yes, there is general despondency in the air. People are disillusioned like you just mentioned, but there is a difference between being angry, and not taking the right decision to put food on the table for ourselves and when you are hungry and at home thinking somebody will bring food for you, the food will never come. You have to go out there to search for food, for how you can eat food, even with your money. And if you are hungry and you cannot cook, but you have your money to go and buy food, if you don’t go out to buy that food, you will continue being hungry at home. I think the strategy has to change, and what are the strategies? We’ll just have to say no to the group of persons I call the PPM league. PPM means political power mongers. I Always say there are two types of leadership. There is transformational leadership and there is transactional leadership. Unfortunately, Nigeria today is bedeviled with the transactional leadership, the transformational leadership cant be gotten on the platter of gold; we have to fight for it, and that’s why the business of nation building is a multi-stakeholders based. It is the obligation of every citizen. We have to show what we have. We also have to be part of the solution- drivers.
No matter how good you are driving,if you don’t have a vehicle, you cannot drive.
Yes, now the vehicle is available. But what next do we do? Maybe what we must do is to see how we can change the tires of the vehicle. We can also service the vehicle and then the engine. Make sure the engine is very sound, because the vehicle is available, we fix on it a very loud horn, that when it sounds everybody will hear and react. I think that’s what Nigeria needs now. It must be said that the old generation of democrats cannot take us anywhere. The young people who think that they have the energy must also come out to show that spirit of resilience and optimism for them to get to el dorado. Nobody will take you to el dorado if you do not make a move of wanting to go to there. Nobody will take you to el dorado. If you are waiting for el dorado to meet you at your door step, then I’m sorry you might not get to el dorado. So for me, I think we must change the tactics. We have to begin to look at ourselves as also stakeholders. I think that is one very great thing that is missing in Nigeria. That is, spirit of ownership. People have not displayed the ownership spirit to tell themselves that this country belong to us, and we cannot allow some set of people to capture the system. Nigerians are suffering from state capture, and if we do not dislodge it, I’m sorry, tomorrow might not be feasible for us.
*Okay, all eyes have been on 2027 even when we are still in 2025 but one key* *thing that has been really talked about, is the electoral reforms. We’ve had it before, but it’s like it wasn’t really, seen through.* Now,do you have confidence in 2027,
where are we going without electoral reforms of any sort?
I will be the last person to even speak on this to say there is hope if there is no electoral reform. Some of us in YPP, in fact, had even proposed on several occasions that
the selection of the INEC Chairman should not be done by the President. For me, if electing a president of this country is subjected to election, then the man who superintends the election should be subjected to being elected also, so that we can now have full independence of INEC that we are talking about. The INEC chairman who now sits and announce the president of a country
should also be subjected to being elected.
And that is the only way we can have some form of maybe transparency or independence of the INEC.
Now, how can we be talking about electoral reform without making a legislation or law that enables electronic transmission of results from the polling booth to Irev and it should be a mandatory
If that is not done,
then I’m sorry, my brother, even after Tinubu, the next president that will come will still a two term of eight years and nobody can stop him. So nobody should be wasting his or her time.
*Okay,is there anything you think should be done by the*constitution review committee in place now, at the state level, from the party angle? Do you* *think there are things that should be changed in the constitution to* *deepen democracy or advance democratic values?*
We just talk about the electoral reforms, let us have it enshrined in the Constitution that there must be transmission of results from the polling booth electronically, that will solve a lot of problems.
We have issue with the state delineations. The new states they want to create.That is another
way of creating opportunities. See, what we have in Nigeria today is not leadership but opportunism. These guys there are not leaders, they are opportunists. There is a difference between somebody who was opportuned to be in a place with somebody and the person who has prepared himself for leadership. Leadership is an intentional task. An opportunistic leader falls into the place of the transactional leadership that I spoke about. Transformational leaders don’t want to fail because they are so concerned about their integrity, but transactional leaders don’t care about integrity. It’s all about business as usual.
You talked about state creation,states are not our problems. Creation of state is never our problem. How many of the existing states are doing well in terms of development? However, you are from Enugu State, and I heard Enugu is one of the few lucky states where successive governors are doing relatively well.
But do you know why people celebrate these people? Because of the gullibility of Nigerians, or let me say, Nigerians, are used to substandard products, you know. How can somebody, a governor, who has traversed countries of the world be celebrating
a borehole or even roads built for the people?
These are their core responsibilities?
So , I don’t support any state creation. I would rather even support that they should reduce the number of states. In fact, if you allow me, I will say there’s no reason why we should have even 360 House of Representatives members, 109 Senators. If I have my way, we should have only 36 House of Representatives members, right?
Ideally, we should have 36 senators now. One senator representing each state, and then you can have three House of Representatives members in each state, also, because we have three senatorial districts. So those three senatorial districts should be converted to House of Representatives. And then you have one senator from each state. Now ,you are having four from each state. When you calculate four by 36 it will give you 144 numbers.We’re just wasting taxpayers’ money.
They will not listen to you, because these guys are there making money. Yes, and once you bring this kind of proposal, in fact, they might even want to send assassins to eliminate you, but we’re not afraid of that. What I’m saying is that if I’m given opportunity, I would make such proposal to the entire country. We don’t need 109 senators and 360 House of Representatives. Some states are taking more money than some states.
For example, in Kano, they came up with local governments to get more money from the federal account. All states should have equal numbers of local governments.
So I don’t believe that we should have 109
senators
*These are very important points you have made.*
Also, states should have equal representations.
And states should also have equal numbers of local government.
The state will have equal representation. There is nothing like Kano is having more representation than Rivers or Bauchi or whatever; so that we can now discuss about building an egalitarian society.
It is a critical reform.
This will reduce the cost of governance, of course,
Let me tell you, these people agitating for more creation of states want to go back to their states and become godfathers again. Some of them want to run for governorship so that they will be sharing taxpayers money. Where is the money coming from? The money is coming from the Niger Delta.
It’s coming from one region.
*I was thinking that with this government coming to power, that there would be talking about proper reforms, talking about possibly having some elements of regionalism, where each region will go or state begin to look at areas of competitive advantage, what do I produce to control market in a given area so that collectively we can do less on the oil dependence?*
What happens in that
they are not sincere? I’ve just told you, these people are not sincere to themselves, and they are not ready to serve us. They are there for their own self- aggrandizement. Now, the only revolution that can take place is the ballot revolution,
ballots.
And that is the only solution. So it’s left for the people to go back now. 2027 is by the corner. 2027 will come again. You will see people coming out to celebrate PDP and APC. They will keep celebrating them. When you talk, they tell you there is hunger in the land. I don’t understand and the question I ask is, we have two religions that peoples worship- Islam and Christianity. Now these two religion also believe in people fasting.Yes, do you understand they have seasons to fast? Now, if they can fast for 36 or 30 days or 40 days is it one day of the election that they cannot fast to resist somebody, any electoral inducement? Why can’t somebody reject the money and say, “I don’t need this money for today. I want to vote for my future”. When people give hunger as excuse for electoral inducement at times, I find it difficult to understand the rationale behind this.
