Dear I Go Dye,
I read your post on Instagram. It was hard to miss it because it was
on every major news website. I would like to say that you were mostly
right. The questions you raised in your post are similar to the ones I
have been asked by other young people on social media, so I am replying
this not just to you as a person, but to all young Nigerians who have
asked similar questions.
I tell people my age that for young people, there’s a difference between Nigeria and Naija.— Atiku Abubakar (@atiku) December 8, 2017
I’ve tried to explain the difference in my letter to @real_igodyehttps://t.co/xld1fz4ett pic.twitter.com/PVdfXpB0JZ
Firstly, you are right. The Nigerian youth have often been taken for
granted, and almost every leader in our history has taken young people
for granted. But it’s important to point how this started – for people
like me who saw Independence; our leadership was mostly driven by young
people. Then came the coups, and the civil war, and then more coups.
Nigeria ended up with a long period of military dictatorship for many
decades, in which time; those young leaders aged, but still remained
leaders. Fela, Gani, Enahoro, and Beko were young leaders, yet remained
leaders until their demise. That was because of the instability brought
on by decades of instability.
By the time we got to 1999, the young people of the day had not been
prepared for leadership, because there was no leadership or
apprenticeship process under dictatorships. This is one of the reasons
the age of leaders has continued to rise. That was because of the
leadership stagnation brought on by decades of political instability.
Imagine a school that did not graduate any students for 5 years, by the
time the top class finally graduates, you will have a backlog of
undergraduates.
Our young people are not to blame; we need to remedy this national
failure. Last week, there were local government elections in Akwa Ibom
State, with over 60% of the seats won by young people, less than 35
years old. That’s how progress can be made. Young people need to
participate from the grassroots, all the way across board. Appointments
are good, but getting elected is even better. I also understand the
issues around funding elections which keep women and young people out,
and I will address this in an article I am publishing soon.
I do understand your frustration on the issue, however. I tell people
my age that to understand young Nigerians, we need to understand the
difference between Nigerian and Naija. Naija embodies the hopes and
dreams of young Nigerians, the country they love and long to go home to
when they are abroad. Naija is the country that brings them pride in
music, film, comedy, fashion, and technology. It is the country of Wiz
Kid, Asa, David O, Tuface, the Olympic bobsled team, Iwobi and Don Jazzy
Again.
Nigeria on the other hand, is the country of their parents, the
country where leaders are constantly failing them, of Boko Haram, of
herdsmen violence, of recessions and joblessness. Our young people need
us to make our country live up to the aspirations of Naija by fixing the
problems associated with Nigeria.
I think it’s important to address the accusation about my tenure as
Vice President, that I did nothing for young people. Firstly, as VP, I
can only be judged on the responsibilities I was given. A VP obviously
is not the driver of government. For example, you can’t blame Prof
Osinbajo for all that is going on with the current government. He can
only do what he’s allowed to do.
But let me speak about what you can judge me by, my assigned
responsibilities. As VP, I assembled what is arguably the best Economic
Team ever in Nigeria. It was made up of young, world class
professionals, who came home to work. Some of those professionals are
now political leaders, governors and world leaders in their own right.
If you ask what our first task was, coming into government in 1999,
it was to bring stability to the economy after decades of military rule.
For example, between 1999 and 2003, oil prices then were hovering
between $16 and $28 yet we managed to pay up salary arrears from decades
back, clear up our national debts and built up foreign reserves. Our
GDP grew at the fastest rate we’ve seen since the return to democracy.
You mentioned that I never brought young people into leadership, but
my record speaks differently. I have a proven record of bringing young,
unknown professionals into service. Many of the professionals and
ministers I brought in were in their 30s and early 40s. Some of those
young leaders have become governors in their states. I went to the World
Bank and met a bright lady, convinced her to come back home, and she
became a star in our government. To show you we had effective
leadership, the same lady could not replicate her exploits under a
different government.
I was also in charge of privatization and I have witnesses that I
never interfered with the process. I never bought anything belonging to
the government. I was quite wealthy before coming into government, with
declared assets worth hundreds of millions of dollars in 1999; so it was
understandable that many of the wealthy Nigerian business people who
participated in the privatization programme were my friends. Did I use
my influence to get them better deals? No. As the then DG of BPE
testified under oath, I never used my position to interfere with his
work.
My legacy as Vice President, I would say is the banking consolidation
process, for which I gave political backing for. Many big people were
putting a lot of political pressure to not change the status quo, but we
knew that if that consolidation was not done, Nigeria could not grow.
Because of that banking consolidation, Nigerian banks don’t fail anymore
the way they used to.
I oversaw the telecoms revolution, which is why young people like
you, I Go Dye, now have a flourishing career. Under our tenure, we
witnessed a large repatriation of Nigerians back to Nigeria, driven by
the hope of the recovering economy. It is sad that many of those young
people are heading back abroad now – this is to show you that leadership
matters.
I know many of these have been forgotten because it was a long time
ago, and successive administrations did not follow up on the progress we
made. But that is also not to say we were blameless. I was largely
frozen out in the second term of our tenure, and I regret that we had
that disagreement with my boss. Some say I was disloyal, but I looked at
the events in Zimbabwe recently, and it gives me confidence that I did
the right thing fighting the attempts to elongate the presidential
tenure beyond eight years. If I did not win that fight, do you think we
would be having a discussion on young people getting into leadership
today?
Intels. I want to address this because you mentioned it. It was the
Shagari government that started the Onne Port and later abandoned it. In
summary, my business partner and I saw an opportunity to build
Nigeria’s oil industry using world class infrastructure, but driven by
Nigerians. We went out and took loans to build the facilities, but as we
went on, more opportunities opened up, which allowed us access to even
more capital. We ended up borrowing hundreds of millions of dollars,
mostly from Europe, to build the port, singlehandedly charting the
course of Nigeria’s oil industry.
Honestly, I did not ever think we would be that successful, which was
why I kept my day job, when we started it. It was just what you would
call, a side hustle, but it grew so big, and I had to quit my government
job to focus on it. Today, every oil major uses the facilities we
built. The government only became clients after the oil companies. Our
company has expanded to several countries in Africa. Even the FG has
seen that that company is the most competent logistics company in
Africa, which is why it gives Intels the most complex operations to
manage.
But Intels as a corporate citizen is loved in the locations it
operates. That’s because we invest in scholarships, hire young people
from the community and train them to become world class technicians. As
CSR, we have gone into partnership with the NFF to train young Nigerian
footballers, and provide support for the local league. We are loved by
the youth in our local communities.
In my home state of Adamawa for example, I’ve created over 50,000
direct jobs and 250,000 indirect ones. We are the largest private
employers of labour in the state only second to the state government.
It’s not a lot, but it does help reduce unemployment. Who do you think
are holding those jobs? Yes, young people.
I Go Dye, I’m not a messiah. I do not promise Eldorado or $1 = N1.
But I always ask to look at the economic progress we made under my
leadership and what I am doing in private business and judge me by
those. People say I became rich in government. It’s a lie. I had
hundreds of millions of dollars in assets declared in 1999. My
businesses (my shares of which were held in a Blind Trust while I was in
government) continued to grow since then. I was able to personally
bankroll the PDP back then, so surely I was not poor. But I understand
it is politics. So it’s normal to be called names. But how come in all
these years, none of my opponents has found any evidence to indict me?
The people who are afraid of me changing the status quo they enjoy will always try to frighten young people about me.
Some people believe youth empowerment is giving handouts to young
people instead of building a strong economy. They are wrong. They want
to give handouts so they can control young people. But how long can we
continue like that? Our country is borrowing to pay salaries, yet we are
still holding on to outdated models just so we can control young people
for elections.
The success of young Nigerian entrepreneurs in IT & technology,
retail, music, and arts shows that given the chance, they can run
anything. My job is to be a bridge, which supports our young people
achieve these ideals. I will never say only I can do this. I can’t do it
alone. I need your support, I Go Dye, so help our economy grow, to
ensure that within 10 years, our young people can take over completely.
In summary, I Go Dye, I am not a person who says what he cannot do or
show proof. I am giving you an invitation to sit down and ask me any
questions you may have. I would also like to take you around, show you
some of the businesses I have built, and let you speak to the young
people who run those places. It is good to try to convince you that I
can do better by our young people, but it is even better to show you.
Send me a direct message on Twitter, and we will take it from there