Alhaji Lasis Ayinla Kolawole Jimoh, is a Political Scientist and grassroots politician in Ilorin, the capital of Kwara State. The author of "The History of Ilorin: The journey so far", has held various positions at the State and Federal levels at different times. In this interview with PEOPLES DAILY's Correspondent, Olanrewaju Lawal, in Ilorin, the Octogenarian politician bares his mind on various issues bothering on the crisis within the ruling PDP, local politics and other sundry issues. Excerpts:

Are you satisfied with the level of development in Ilorin?

How can I be satisfied? Look at this area now, Balogun-Gambari, we had pipe bourne water last about ten years ago. This area till Awodi market, it is ten years now since water ran from pipe. There are other areas in Ilorin where water will run for few minutes before it stops. On electricity, we read it in newspapers that we are having 24 hours electricity in Kwara because Bukola Saraki had constructed Independent Power Project (IPP) in Ganmo. The project was done by the Federal Government and not the State or by Bukola Saraki. You journalists, when you are sending the news of commissioning of IPP, we knew you sent your news through generators, then why are you saying there is 24 hours electricity in Ilorin? There is need for you journalists to change.

Secondly, the press declared Bukola Saraki best governor in agriculture in Nigeria. Yet, go to Ministry Agriculture the whole Ministry has been sold off. The whole land belonging to the Ministry has been sold off to private individuals. All the agriculture nurseries of the Ministry have closed. The land of the nurseries at Oyun and Tuyil areas has been sold off to private individuals. There is no single tractor at the Ministry again. Agriculture Training School along old Jebba Road had been closed down. Yet, Bukola is the best governor in agriculture in Nigeria. Someday, truth about Shonga Farm will come out. Today, they are suppressing the truth, it will explode one day. Go to Osun, Oyo and Ogun States and see what their governors have done. They are talking about over-head bridge which could not accommodate five tonnes lorry. The bridge added more to traffic problem we are experiencing in the State capital. And they are using journalists to propagate their agenda. I hope one day, the truth shall explode.

Few weeks ago, we witnessed what people referred to as Sallah tragedy where many people of Ilorin origin died in Saraki's house. The number of victims and death could not be ascertained even though PDP confirmed that only four died in the stampede. What is your reaction to this considering the fact that this is not the first time of such occurrence?
I am happy you say that is not the first time people are dying either in Bukola Saraki's campaign office or his residence. It happened in 2011 while more than 50 people were sacrificed and confirmed dead. It happened again a week ago in his residence where more than 50 again were stampeded. The tragic incident that happened is unfortunate and those in authority allowed it to re-occur in a recurring decimal. If something happened three years ago, people died, nobody was held responsible and nobody was punished for it. It happened in 2011, nobody took action against those involved. So, I am not surprised it happened again this year because it has become an annual ritual and coincidence; it will either happen on the Eid-Kabir day or second day. How can more than 50 people be strangled to death without anybody being charged with criminal negligence for it? If those concerned issued a statement that only four died, did our Police investigate it? What about other security agencies? Did they find out that four people actually died? What have they done about it? I have the lists of all the compounds whose families members were affected in the stampede. The list is up to 40 people now. People are not asking about what happened and that is why this kind of thing continues to re-occur. A day after the incident, Dr. Bukola Saraki traveled outside Ilorin without sympathizing with the people or show sense of remorse. This is the situation we are in Kwara State where some people acted with impunity and always go away with it. I hope that there will be divine intervention one day.

But some people attributed the stampede to poverty that is pervading the State. How do you react to that?

It pains me a lot when people are saying that this incident was caused due to poverty. Is poverty restricted to Ilorin alone? Is it limited to Kwara State alone or Nigeria alone? Does such incident happen in Kano, Lagos, Kaduna, Rivers States? If poverty is a common denominator, then why is the incident exclusive to us in Ilorin? It is not a matter of poverty, it is more than that. It is normal thing that people go to greet their leaders during the Sallah day or during any festival day. Why must they be allowed to die in hundreds?

This has nothing to do with poverty as far as I am concerned. May be those concerned should tell us why the incident has to be so ritualized in their own house or campaign office? Why didn't it happen elsewhere except Dr. Bukola Saraki's place? To cover up, they created impression as if Bukola was not there. Dr. Olusola Saraki is dead now, he was no more and the only Saraki that we know is Bukola Saraki. This is because Dr. Olusola Saraki did not host Ilorin people from his grave. This is kind of deceit we are receiving from all sort of sphere of life with regard to Bukola Saraki. So, this incident has nothing to do with poverty at all.

Corruption has become so endemic in Nigeria, what is your take on this?

Corruption, yes, is endemic, did it start today? When you don't nip something in the bud, it will continue to grow big and bigger and eventually go out of hand. As far back as 1975, when I was a columnist in Nigerian Herald, I wrote about it. As at that time, corruption was becoming epidemic and I wrote then that I don't expect Nigeria youth to behave differently from the way they are behaving now. The youth of 1975 are now adults or parents today. So, what they learnt from the elders is what they would be practicing today. We didn't tackle corruption earlier enough in this country and Yoruba adage says that "if you don't curb Iroko tree right at germination, when it grows, it will demand sacrifices". They didn't curb it at earlier stage and it has become a Herculean task. In the past, there was X- squad. It was ex- expatriate that introduced it in Nigeria and it started at Alagbon. This is to check-mate corruption among the police. If the police is corrupt and the judiciary is not corrupted, we may be able to curb corruption. If police arrest corrupt people and charge them to Court, the judiciary would do its work as expected. But we are now in Nigeria where some people have wrecked a bank through mass looting.

Today, EFCC will invite them, tomorrow they would be out walking the streets freely and in the end, nothing concrete will come out of it. They will give them clean bill of health and declare that nothing went wrong whereas, we all know in reality that, there was massive looting, inflation of contracts here and there. Some projects done by local government were claimed by them. Even federal government projects were claimed to have been done by them. So, you can see duplication and triplication of projects in order to defend themselves. So, we have lost the opportunity to curb corruption in Nigeria. May be it is better late than never. If federal government and those in the authority are not playing lips services to anti-graft, may be, the situation could be safe. We can still do something tangible about corruption. But if government knows that people are corrupt, doing it with impunity and get away with it without being prosecuted, others will copy them. So, we have to make a lot of sacrifices, we have to show the ability to deal with some corrupt people. Look at the current Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Mariam Muktah Alooma, she is doing the right thing. Look at her efforts now but I can tell you that if anyone has the experience of dealing with Nigeria Police and judiciary, then you will agree with me that CJN could only do her best and leave the rest.

Recently, Nigeria was elected a non-permanent member of United Nations. What are the likely benefits for Nigeria?

It is a good omen for us. You know our agenda is permanent seat. So, if we can get non-permanent member, we are getting closer. The international community will respect us because if many were called and few were chosen, we should thank God and I believe the future is brighter for us. The prestige of the country will be high, our network will be strengthened and I believe that all Nigerians should be happy about it.

What is your view on the proposed National Confab? Don't you think the reports and recommendations of the conference would go the way of past conferences?

There is a problem with National Conference whether it is going to be Sovereign National Conference or not. If we are to go by our constitution today, a Sovereign National Conference is out of the way because we have National Assembly on ground. I think we are putting the cart before the horse. What we should do first is to amend the constitution and insert a provision that will accommodate SNC or by having National Conference that would be summoned by a National Assembly which would comprise of all ethnic nationalities, Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and students unions. Such things should be inserted in the Nigeria constitution. But now, I don't know the legality of this National Conference because I am a Political Scientist not a Lawyer and I don't know the legal effect of this confab. It is because of this that they are saying that the recommendations of the confab will be sent to the National Assembly for adoption.

Why is the President wasting time by roaming roundabout instead of going straight on the road? There is no law binding the National Assembly to accept the conference recommendations. To me, that conference should be a national dialogue not national conference. Instead of a town hall meeting where people and citizens would express their grievances and opinions through National Dialogue which could provide that avenue for Nigerians. If government is sensitive to the feelings of the people, they ought to have felt the direction Nigerians are going. As for the impacts, I am skeptical about it.