Atiku, The Bridge Builder.
By Tai Emeka Obasi.
There’s one very striking thing about former vice president, His Excellency Atiku Abubakar. He’s one of the very few successful people known by their first names. But there’s something more striking – he’s one of the very few detrabalised Nigerians. And believe it or not, tribal sentiments contribute more than any other factor to the stagnation of this entity called Nigeria.
I knew the ex-customs boss fairly well but I got to know him appreciably better through Engr. Ernest Ndukwe, another detrabalised Nigerian. For those who don’t know, Ndukwe was the Executive Vice Chairman, EVC of Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC. Appointed in February 2000, the Oraifite-born technocrat was the man, who increased telephones lines in the country from a paltry 400,000 to over 80 million before leaving after 10 years of maximum two five-year terms.
I got close enough to Dr. Ndukwe when he ran for Anambra South Senatorial election. As his Campaign Director of media I got to know the former NCC boss pretty well. And let me say for the umpteenth time that there are few Nigerians God created with the passion, energy, know-how and the deep-seated patriotism to move this country forward and improve humanity generally like Dr. Ernest Ndukwe.
There are three things I singled out amongst many which he did that made communications the success we enjoy today while power continued to be the failure it has ever been.
1) Holding the most transparent Digital Mobile License, DML auction process that gave operational licenses to four companies, MTN, ECONNET, NITEL (MTEL) and CIL. The exercise was lauded by International Telecommunications Union, ITU and other professional bodies across the globe as the most transparent ever in Africa and one of the most transparent in the history of global communication auction bidding licenses.
2) When Chief Mike Adenuga’s company, Communications Investment Limited, CIL failed, at the last minute, to meet the 14-day deadline stipulated by NCC for complete payment of USD 285 million, less USD 20 million upfront payment to guarantee one of the very strict criteria for participation, Ndukwe refused to budge in giving any concession. Despite pressures from all quarters that eventually got to the presidency, Ndukwe insisted on a level-playing field and Chief Adenuga went home, obviously not believing there were still Nigerians like Dr. Ndukwe. But the multi-billionaire came back more prepared two years later to launch Globacom.
3) Ndukwe insisted that competition and market forces should determine call rates instead of government via NCC fixing any rate for service providers.
There were many more firm decisions Ndukwe and his team made that gave Nigeria her best success in any sector since independence. In my book; NIGERIA’S GSM REVOLUTION – NDUKWE’S TOUCH OF MIDAS (now in the print house), I outlined a journey into all Ndukwe and his team did for dear country.
It was in the cause of research and countless interviews that Ndukwe himself told me how he was recruited and kept on the job. He said he never applied for the job and was rather dreaming of one day becoming the MD of NITEL. He believed he knew exactly how to make NITEL to not only survive but also become a real giant. He had presented countless papers on how to make communications blossom in Nigeria. By then he was the MD of General Telecommunications, GT and the president of Association of Telecommunications Companies Of Nigeria, ATCON.
But one day in the year 2000 his phone rang. He was told by a strange voice that he was being considered for NCC’s EVC and could he meet with the vice president in Abuja within the next 48 hours?
He complied with the directive and met with the vice president in the latter’s office at Aso Rock. The Turaki of Adamawa took less than one hour with Ndukwe to convince himself the then president of ATCON was the man he was looking for. The man the nation needed to drive her to the new world of GSM. By then Atiku was in charge of Bureau for Private Enterprise, BPE and one on whose shoulders President Olusegun Obasanjo placed the burden of unearthing capable Nigerians to steer her fourth Republic on a people-oriented development ride.
When he recruited Ndukwe, Atiku had not met the communications guru on a personal level but Ndukwe guessed the ex-customs boss was monitoring him and had absolute trust that he would deliver. As it panned out, Ndukwe more than delivered.
Hear Ndukwe, “yes, President Obasanjo confirmed and signed my appointment letter but all based on Atiku’s recommendations. He fished me out and kept me on the job. And it wasn’t only me. He unearthed truly capable Nigerians all over the country to build this nation from the ruins of incessant military rule.
‘’But most importantly, Atiku gave me the free hand and independence to pilot the affairs of NCC as I deemed professionally appropriate. It is on record that the Presidency hardly interfered with my job and that was a very very big boost to whatever successes we recorded in the sector.
“If not for the unfortunate incitement from some quarters to the president that his deputy was over shadowing him, which ended up bringing a feud the nation didn’t need, the Obasanjo government would have achieved more if they had ended the way they started.
“Atiku is a detrabalised Nigerian who means very well for this country. He would have made a very good president if he had succeeded Obasanjo,” Ndukwe told me in 2015.
Anybody who knows Ndukwe knows he’s never one who uses the words he used for Atiku lightly.
Today, two years later, I will add that Atiku will still make a very good president if he succeeds President Buhari. In fact, the experiences he has garnered since then will help him to become even a better president.
The problem with Nigeria is usually steering away, wittingly or unwittingly, from a path that truly would lead to appreciable progress. The ugly effects of cancelling June 12, 1993 election still live with us. The design by President Obasanjo to ditch a deputy who served him for eight years in place of a dying man drove this nation very painfully backwards. The rush to oust Goodluck Jonathan and PDP out of power without any progressive plan besides propaganda is now mercilessly devastating the nation.
There is one route to righting most of those wrongs – Atiku becoming president in 2019.
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