Rumbling in yoruba land: There’s only one Afenifere despite alleged breakup plan – Secretary

• Says Adebanjo endorsed Peter Obi in 2023 without telling anybody • Explains how Fasoranti endorsed Tinubu for president despite supplanting his leadership By Dapo Akinrefon Chief Ademola Folarin, a lawyer, is the General Secretary of the pan-Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere. Folarin, who is the Agbaakin Maiyegun of Ibadanland, in this interview, speaks on the leadership crisis in Afenifere, reconciliation in the group, and the decision of the Yoruba body to endorse President Bola Tinubu for 2027 among other issues.

Excerpts: There have been issues in the polity ahead of 2027, parties have been trading accusations; there is mudslinging. Do you think this is healthy for our democracy? Look, adversarial politics is one of the hallmarks of democracy. You have to destroy one party in order for you to rise. It’s one of the pitfalls of democracy that we can’t avoid, which is why some people say democracy is not the best form of government.

But we haven’t found a better one. I think we are just being dishonest. There is a better one, it’s not necessarily democratic. We can see it in China, we can see it in the Gulf states, a combination of constitutionalism and monarchy. In China, there is no monarchy, but they have a system of evolutionary leadership, and it is working. The trouble spots in the world are the democracies.

Just look around you, everywhere you see a problem, it’s democratic. That’s because it has to be like that. If you want to see the downfall of someone to rise, you can’t have peace, you can’t have stability. The bastion of democracy, Europe and America, are on the decline. It’s consistent with the aims and objectives of the founding fathers of democracy.

It was foreseen, but it was unavoidable. If you choose your leaders based purely on numbers, you cannot avoid obvious mistakes. In our country, with the presidential system, it is the same in America. We have simply imported a corrupt system here, presidential system. If you don’t have money, you can’t do anything. That’s what you have. Mudslinging, everything is part of it.

Nigeria has practised the parliamentary system before. Now, it’s practising the presidential system. Which do you think Nigeria can adopt? Do you think it should jettison the two and have another system of government? It’s a no-brainer which one should prefer between the Westminster parliamentary system and the presidential system. The Westminster parliamentary system is far cheaper and far more representative.

Why do I say so? If I want to be prime minister, I don’t need to do a national campaign or whatever. I go to Eti-Osa local government, campaign and win there. Once I win there and my party wins the majority of seats in parliament, I form government. But in presidential, I have to win the majority of votes in the entire country. Then at least 25 per cent of the total number of votes cast in each of at least two-thirds of the number of states in the federation.

In this case, 24 states. I have to campaign in the entire country. I need the entire country to vote for me; even without corruption, that is a lot of money. Well, there must be corruption. It’s a no-brainer. We can’t just import a system and think it will work without any modification. We’ve seen groups, opposition parties, throwing their weight behind preferred candidates.

Has Afenifere adopted a candidate for the presidential election? We announced it about a month ago. We supported President Bola Tinubu in 2023. We have no reason to change our mind now. We have also endorsed him. Look, as far as any discerning, objective person can see, there is no alternative. There is no viable alternative. There are alternatives, but they are not better and they are not viable.

On what basis would we jettison the person we support? In any event, personally speaking for myself, I would score him on two fronts. When you combine the scores and find the average, you can decide whether that’s a pass or not. On macroeconomics, I score him 80 per cent. On micro, I score him 40 per cent. Now, 80 plus 40 is 120. Over 200, that’s 60 per cent.

On security, we can see progressively there’s improvement. We’re not there yet. On many fronts, what this government is doing is resetting the entire structure. I mean, laying the foundation for a new Nigeria. Now, it comes with pains. No pain, no gain. It comes with pains. Obviously, the macroeconomic aspect of it is still evolving. But you cannot deny the success of the macroeconomics.

You cannot. The numbers are there. You cannot dispute them. There is still a lot to be done. You can point out a few things that they haven’t done right. But show me a government that has been perfect. What’s the alternative? What is the economic policy of Atiku? Do you know? What is the economic policy of Obi? Do you know? Their policy is just to be consistent with adversarial politics, destroy Tinubu.

That’s all. Atiku goes to America to probe Tinubu’s certificates. That is what will put food on