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Why They Hate Me -Nasir el-Rufai

September 5, 2006
Q: How are you planning for the presidential race? We hear you are interested.

A: I suspect what is happening is that politicians are widely speculating, since they have been unable to read the President. Since he has refused to anoint, they?re just speculating widely and thinking that he?s about to spring a surprise on them. I can assure you that there?s no iota of truth in it, as far as I know.

 

Q: Maybe some politicians want to anoint you on behalf of the President.

A: Don?t mind them, they only want to anoint themselves, but we?ll see.


 

]Q: You?re popularly known as Mr. Bulldozer. A lot of people have accused you  of demolishing buildings in Abuja, in places that perhaps should not be  touched. Why do they call you Mr. Bulldozer?

A: I don?t know why they call me all kinds of names. You know, once you?re in public office you have no control over what people decide to call you, or what task they give you. But we?ve been trying to clean up the FCT for three years, and what I can tell you is that I?ve never climbed a bulldozer. I don?t know how to drive one, so I don?t know why they call me Mr. Bulldozer. We have removed many buildings that contravened the law, because we believe in the rule of law. We believe in Abuja, which is the only city in Nigeria created by law. That law should be complied with. The master plan should be respected. If we are to change the master plan, let us sit down and discuss and say we?ve found something wrong with it. But we?re not going to be adjusting it to suit the whims and caprices of people just because they feel they?re important enough to do it. And all the buildings we?ve removed ? we?ve been doing this for three years ? we?ve not been found to have made one mistake. All the buildings that we have removed deserved to be removed either because they had no documentation at all or they ought not to have been built. Either they?re on water supply lines, sewer lines or under high tension cable and so on.  We?re very careful because we know that putting up a building is an event in anybody?s life and people do this with their own hard-earned wealth.  So, before you take a decision to deprive a person of his property, you have to be very careful, check and cross-check and be sure that it deserves to be removed. We are not as callous as the newspapers or people try to make us seem. This is because, if we have removed about 900 structures in three years, and not one was a mistake, it is because we check before we do it.

 

Q: You enjoy demolition?

A: No, there?s nothing enjoyable about it. It?s the duty.

You do it because it is in the public interest. I?ll give you just two examples. Recently, there was flood in Kubwa. Many people nearly lost their lives. Why? Because some people built on flood channels and blocked the flow of natural water. Now, we started clearing up Kubwa last year,  which even led to me having a problem with the House of Reps. But  clearly, we didn?t go far enough. And people?s lives nearly got lost.  These people are now in our primary schools; we are rehabilitating them because they lost their houses and all their belongings. Now, as a public officer, you have to make a choice. Do you want to wait until such a disaster happens and lives are lost or do you want to prevent it from happening by removing those structures?  It could affect other people that are innocent, that just built their houses in accordance with the rules. Another example was our market in Abuja, Wuse Market. It was designed to have 1800 shops, but 13,000 illegal shops were added. And the market was such a mess; no fire-fighting vehicle can get in. This was a market designed to have a car park ? you can drive in, shop and get out in five minutes. But the greed of people to sell space in the market, instead of building another market, led to this situation. And we looked at it and asked: are we going to wait for a fire disaster which would burn down the whole market, where everyone would lose his property, the innocent as well as the guilty, and lives lost before doing anything, or are we going to just remove these attachments? And we did. It took us four weeks. We shut the market.

We removed 13,000 illegal shops. But today, the market is safe. You can go in, you can park, you shop, and you drive out, whereas other markets are burning down. Maiduguri got burnt down some weeks ago; Sokoto got burnt down some months ago. They have sent delegations to come and learn from us what we did. We didn?t do anything?, it?s not rocket science. The market was designed using some parameters. Why can?t we just stick to the parameters? Why do we have a tendency in this country to just throw away everything that will bring some order? You live in Lagos; you know what I?m talking about. Lagos represents disorder.

I don?t know if you enjoy living here or you enjoy the disorder and spending four or five hours everyday in traffic, but that?s not how life should be? And we took a decision in Abuja that Abuja will not be a city of anarchy. It will be a city of rules and order. And no matter what it takes, we try to do that. And in doing so, we think we?re promoting the public interest.

Some critics say there are some buildings that contravene the Abuja master plan. For example, the Federal Ministry of Works in Abuja and even the Aso Villa itself, and that you disobey court orders.

As for the Federal Ministry of Works, we have removed it. First, let me say this. We?ve never been served a court order and we did not comply.  You see, what people refer to as court order is, we mark their building for a violation, they go to court and they want the court to grant an injunction. The court says ?no, I will not. I will listen.? After all, the Minister of FCT is in Abuja. There?s no need for anyone to give an exparte order against me since I live in Abuja.

And while the case is going on, without injunction, we go ahead and remove the structure; they say that we?re violating the court order.

We are not. If the court feels that your interest is threatened, if you go to the court and you show them Certificate of Occupancy, approved building plans, yet we?re going to demolish your building, the court will listen to you and will give that order. But when you go with flimsy papers, suspicious papers and the court knows that you don?t have a good case, they will say no, let?s hear both sides. And often, before both sides are heard, which can take up to 5 years, we remove the structure.  Then they say we?re not obeying court order. If you get a court order served on me as FCT minister not to do something I?ll not do it. I believe in respecting court decision, because at the end of the day, the only protection we have when we leave this job is the court themselves.

Right now, I?m minister so I have some protection. But when I leave this job, whot will protect me? Only the courts. So it will be funny on the part of anyone to disrespect courts. I?m a Law student. I know the importance of respecting court orders. All the people that say that ask them to produce the order that was served on us and we didn?t comply. And the question of Aso Villa being illegal structure is wrong. The presidential complex was supposed to be somewhere else and it?s there, the Shagari Villa under construction. During Babangida?s regime they decided that it was too exposed and decided to relocate it in Asokoro district. Asokoro is a residential district.

Where the villa was built is actually plots of land that could have been people?s houses. So it cannot be called an illegal structure because you have residential land there. The only possible violation you could say is there are offices there in a residential area. You can have a house in any residential area. So, wherever we have a building that clearly violates land use, we remove it. We?ve removed the Ministry of Works.  There were four blocks; if you go there you?ll find there are only three now because we removed it. We said if we removed the buildings of individuals that violated the law, governments must not be spared. There is nothing that my brother Ogunlewe did not do to save that building. We said no. We insisted, went to the President and he agreed. He said we cannot have two standards, one for government and another for Nigerians, because the government belongs to Nigerians.

 

Q: Still on this issue, it would appear that some of the victims of these demolitions are innocent if one takes into cognizance the fact that some of them got valid papers from some wayward elements in the public service. Somebody is building a house and he gets approval. He?s told he?s been given the nod to go and build a house by somebody who should know. How can that person be said to have violated the law when he went to the appropriate place to get this thing validated?

A: Well, you know we?ve been on this thing for 3 years and I?ve found very few innocent victims. The truth is, under the Federal Capital Territory Act, you need two documents to claim to be an innocent victim. If we remove your house, but you have certificate of occupancy, properly issued and approved building plans, we?re required by law to pay you the cost of what you built, and give you another plot of land. That?s the law; I can?t run away from this.

I will spend nearly N1 billion doing this now ? paying compensation to people that has proper papers. But I tell you, 95 per cent of all the people whose structures were removed in Abuja have none of these papers.  Many of them bring you fake papers, and when you ask them how they got them, they?ll tell you that the man they bought them from is late. I don?t know what kind of English it is to say someone is ?late.? You see, even as they were buying those papers, they knew that the papers were not straight. For me, as FCT Minister I?m interested in knowing which of my staff are doing this or have done this so that we get them out of the system, because as long as they remain in the system they?ll have victims. So it is in our own interest to trace those people and remove them from service. But people don?t want to cooperate. They?ll say the man is late or they?ll disappear. Anybody that brings us these two sets of documents we pay compensation to and we give them attractive land. We took an oath on this job, you know, and if the President does not punish us for not doing our job, God will punish us. At the end of the day we?re all either Christians or Muslims. God will punish us, and I take that really seriously. I?m not worried about what human beings say about me or do to me, I?m more worried about going before God and finding no salvation. We?re not flippant about it or callous. We?re very careful and we?re trying to give everyone his right. But you cannot help a person who doesn?t want to help himself.

 

Q: Do you consider it wise to lay off 33,000 workers in one fell swoop as is being planned in the federal civil service?

A: No, no, no. Let me first explain the 33,000. We have about 162,000 civil servants; meaning those that work in ministries only, not parastatals like NEPA and so on. If you add all those, we have about 2 million people working for the Federal Government. This includes police, the military and so on. The civil servants are about a hundred and sixty-something thousand. Now, the civil service tradition we have is that civil servants are hired by the Federal Civil Service Commission. They post them. During the Babangida administration, he enacted a decree called Civil Service Reform Decree, in 1988, which decentralized the hiring of civil servants from levels 1-6. So the ministries can hire levels 1-6 without reference to the Civil Service Commission.  

When they hire they just send the commission the information for them to open files for those hired. What happened then was that Babangida?s  ministers just went to their villages and packed relations and so on,  whether qualified or not. Those that were hired in 1988 on levels 1-6 are the ones that are now reaching levels 14-15. You know the civil service has its own qualifications. If you don?t have a degree you cannot go beyond level 14. If you have only diploma I think you can only go up to level 10 or so. But because the human resource management system of the civil service dropped under military dictatorship, these rules were not observed. In the FCT I found a director with a diploma. Director is level 17. He?s not supposed to have passed level 14. Diploma! He?s not supposed to be in the service. So there are cases like that.

Our civil service is broken down and dysfunctional. When I was growing up, when you wrote a letter to a ministry you got a reply. Today, they don?t even know how to write a reply. These are the results of what you get when the wrong people get into a system.

And this is all over. It?s all over. As I said, in the FCT I found one or two like that. That is one problem.

 Another problem is this: if you fail your promotion exams three times in the civil service, you?ll retire. There are people that fail promotion exams ten times but they?re protected by ethnic or other considerations.  If you have serious disciplinary problems, let?s say you?re caught stealing, in the civil service of the past, a committee would be set up  (disciplinary committee), in no time you?d be dealt with, you?d be  dismissed. But now, a disciplinary case can run for seven to eight years with no resolution. We have all these problems that built up from 1988 and one has really sat down to attack them. President Obasanjo thought we must do it before we go so that the next president does not inherit the kind of dysfunctional civil service that we inherited. And this is what we started doing. This process started in 2004. Anyone that has failed promotion exams three times should go. Anyone occupying a position that his qualifications do not match ? go. Anyone whose cadre or profession has been monetized, like cleaners, drivers, should go. Eight criteria were identified. On the basis of that, all the permanent secretaries were given these criteria to apply in their ministries. That?s how the 33,000 came up. It wasn?t el-Rufai that determined that. These came from each ministry from each permanent secretary.

There are civil servants that have not gone to work for two years,   they?re bed-ridden or they had had a stroke. You should retire them, so that they start earning a pension. You shouldn?t be paying them a salary because they are not doing the work. Somebody must be doing their work or a vacancy be created so that you bring in people. And we have another problem. The average age of our civil service is 43 years old. It?s an ageing civil service. Young people have not been going into the service.  If it continues like this, in 5 to 10 years we?ll not have any people at the top. They?ll have reached retirement age. So there?s a need to find a way to ease out these people on levels 1-6 which account for about 70 per cent of the civil service. Levels 1-6 are those that have no ?O?levels, because if you have 5 ?O?levels you?ll go to university and be on level 8. Levels 1-6 are primary school leavers, or those with 1 credit or 2 ?O? level credits. They account for over 70 per cent of the civil service.

You need 70 per cent to be university graduates and 30 per cent support workers. We have an inverted pyramid here. And no wonder our government doesn?t work. If you relate with civil servants you?ll know that it?s not the same. So this is how we started with 33,000. These are people that ought not to have been in the civil service in the first place. The idea is, when they go, you?ll then create the opportunity to bring in young blood, fresh graduates that have been roaming the streets with no jobs.  That are better educated, better qualified, more adaptable than the people we have in the system. We?re creating more jobs and engaging young people that? all otherwise be a social problem and retiring old people that are too old to be a problem.

The 33,000 is just the first phase. These are people that were not supposed to have been in the system at all.

What political ambition do you have and what is your response to Gbenga  Obasanjo?s opinion that you are corrupt, that Jimi Lawal is your front?

Oh, that?s simple: none. I have no ambition. I?ve never had ambitions. I was in the private sector; it was accident that brought me into the public service.

And I?m grateful to God I?ve had the opportunity. I want to go back to the private sector and make the money that Gbenga Obasanjo thinks I have.  But seriously, on Gbenga?s statement, I?m reluctant to comment on it for two reasons. There?s a law suit going on. But look, I am one of the most visible public officers in Nigeria. Everything I do is under intense scrutiny. I have enemies round every corner, from the National Assembly, to my state and everywhere. If I?m as corrupt as Gbenga says, it would have been an open secret. The truth is, I am what I am. With me, what you see is what you get. There?s nothing other than what I earn. I assure you, others much smarter than Gbenga, institutions more equipped than a rumour monger like him, would have fished me out. Because what I do everyday, from removing structures belonging to big men to public service reform, are difficult assignments that create nothing but adversaries for a person. And those adversaries are rich, connected, and powerful. So, if there was anything they had against me I would have been dead meat long ago. Gbenga is a rumour monger; he?s free to have his opinion. The President is his father and very close to me and I think it?s simply rivalry. I think Gbenga?s problem is the perception that his father maybe loves me more than he loves him.

I never succumb to intimidation or threats. I have been fighting all my life. Everywhere I go I?m normally the smallest man, so I?ve learnt to fight. I?ve never run away from a fight. If you put a gun to my head, I will not negotiate, I?ll tell you to pull the trigger.

I challenge anyone, not only TheNEWS or Gbenga Obasanjo, I challenge anyone to tell me on what Jimi Lawal has acted as a front for me. I?ve never desired material things in my life. If I did. I would have been caught long ago. And thank God I?m a professional; I?ve been comfortable all my life. From the day I left university. By the time I was 26, I was a millionaire in dollars. So, I?ve never lacked anything. When I read your interview, I checked our records. Gbenga Obasanjo has a plot, I revoked it. Since he did not pay Jimi Lawal to get it, it must have been a mistake that he got it. So I revoked it, that?s it.

You know, public service is hard. I?m paid N60, 000 a month to do this job. I?m only doing it because I care about my country and I?m angry that my country is not working. I?m not doing this for money. Since I started working for the government in 1999, my company has spent over 40 million to keep me working for the government. I don?t need money. I don?t need any material thing because I have anything that I want. I?m grateful to God. He has been kind to me in too many ways for me to jeopardize my name and the surname of my children for any material thing. But, you see, time will answer questions. I?m in office now; I?ll leave office and have successors. People are free to investigate me and I challenge anyone to investigate me. Many others have tried it and found nothing.

Don?t you think that the National Tower project is a white elephant? 

No I don?t agree; it is not a white elephant. Every city you go to have a landmark, architectural masterpiece. If you go to Paris, there is Eiffel Tower. Imagine when Eiffel Tower was being built, many people must have wondered why anyone would use 55,000 tonnes of steel to build it. But look at it. How many people go to Paris just to see the Eiffel Tower, and its benefits to the city and the country? Go to London, there is the Millennium Tower. The same thing with Sydney, Australia where there is the Opera House. The argument over the construction of the Sydney Opera house was that it would cost too much, that it was a white elephant etc...

White elephant project? A complex that has a 100-bed hotel, a library, museum where each state in the Federation will exhibit its cultural artifacts, it?s a national project. The federal government is only putting in a fraction of the money. The rest will come from contributions by each state government. We presented this project to the National Economic Council with all the governors and they loved it. The rest of the money will come from the private sector because the shopping mall, the hotel, is all commercially viable standing alone. So it?s not a white elephant project.

 

 

 

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