President of the Ugwumba Leadership Centre and former governorship candidate, Ugwumba Uche Nwosu, have said that the success of the 2023 elections depends on the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
In this interview, Uche Nwosu discusses and highlights INEC’s role in the 2023 general elections as well as other pressing issues bedevilling the nation.
Excerpts;
How are you training young Nigerians to be able to man leadership positions?
Of course, leadership starts from home. If you cannot lead your home, you cannot lead your family nor can you lead a nation or state or local government. So what we are trying to do is to start with them from their tender age, especially those of them in secondary school, and those of them that are graduates the university.
Most often at times, the issue we have in the country is leadership our brother late Chinua Achebe said if a country is not doing well, don’t blame the masses, you should blame the leaders at the top. So what we do here is to mentor them. And young people, their major problem is mentorship and role models. They often see those who are corrupt and those who have no genuine means of making income as their mentors.
So here we reorganise and tell them it does not matter who becomes your mentor, a deputy director can become your mentor. Here we train them. And we have trained so many of them who are now doing very well in their different professions. We’ve trained over 5,000 of them. We also allow them to do enterprise challenges where we also empower them with some cash. One of them who was doing the changeover was employed by PHCN and he is doing very well with them.
A lot is happening in the nation, from insecurity, to healthcare, what’s your take on this sir?
There is no nation that does not have insecurity and problems. There are nations that are at war, there are nations that are facing hunger problems and flood. We should pray for our leaders and for them to see how we can try a variety of options to solve our problems. But when it comes to insecurity it is not something that’s left in the hands of one man, whether the President, Governor, Local government Chairman or anyone it is a collective job.
Security should be part and parcel of everybody’s life because if you do not report bad people in your society, how do you expect the government to know who is bad and not bad? So security is a collective work and not meant for the government alone.
You said we should pray for our leaders, there are nations that are neither Muslims or Christians and they are doing very well, should we continue praying for our leaders or search for leaders that will transform the country?
Prayer matters, but when it comes in searching for a leader that can move the country forward, now is the time. But when it comes to elections, the person that complains most on that day will be the person that will not vote. So if we want to get it right, vote for a leader that you can trust and think can change this country, we have so many of presidential candidates. It is not after the elections we should start praying.
Our prayer works when we start to do the right thing and the right thing now is to select the best among all of them, I don’t know who is your candidate don’t know who is my candidate but what we should do along with prayers, is to ask God to direct you. This is the time to choose the best man for the job. All are not prayers, we are also doing our own part by using our Permanent Voters Card to elect leaders.
Do you have any concerns about the 2023 elections?
I don’t have any concerns but the only thing that will mar this election is the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC. If INEC does the right thing, believe me, people will be happy. If the election is free and fair and people’s votes are counted, there would be change. But where there would be a problem is when people’s votes are not counted and when people vote and at the end of the day it’s useless.
The issue of security before the elections, by God’s grace Nigeria, should have come to that stage where people will be allowed to go and vote without fear. We don’t see any problems, the problem is the electoral empire that will conduct the election. For us the masses, we are ready it’s just for them to guide us.
And our security agencies should also step up. In my interview with Radio Nigeria when they asked me about the Peace Accord, I told them that the Peace Accord is between candidates, INEC must be made to come and join and be part of the Peace Accord. Where all the candidates sign, INEC too should sign. They should learn to sign so that if anyone from INEC does anything wrong, they would bear the consequences.
Do you think the Nigerian voter is equipped enough with the relevant information on each candidate to be able to take a decision?
For me, you don’t look at them as people who came to run for presidency, you look at who they were before now. What have they given to the society? From there you start tracing it down to the present day, so if somebody today comes out and says he wants to run for President, and I don’t know about the person’s background, you don’t expect me to just rush and vote the person.
So the type of young people we have now, are so intelligent and very talented. Before now, in 2015, their thinking is not the same in 2015 as it is now, they are more intelligent now. And they are looking at each candidate one after the other, the mistake you make, they record it.
I think Nigerians, both the young and the old, are well equipped and informed to choose among these our Presidential candidates and the best person that fits this country. What matters is the person’s ability to know the problem of the country galvanise it and solve the problem.
What are your thoughts on the issue of the same faith ticket?
When it comes to the issue of same faith ticket, there has been a lot of noise about it. For me, I think on the day of election, I should be able to vote according to my conscience. If my conscience tells me same faith ticket is the way to go or it’s not the way to go, I follow my conscience.
So it’s between you and your conscience, ask yourself, same faith ticket is it good for Nigeria? Whatever your conscience tells you, do. So for me, I am voting according to my conscience.
