What are your expectations this year?

The year 2008 has opened with a debate on the future of the anti-graft war in Nigeria. We have seen (Economic and Financial Crimes Commission Chairman, Mallam Nuhu) Ribadu being sent on study leave. And like somebody said, why there is so much noise on the issue is because we can no longer trust the government. (We have) a government that keeps sommersaulting and reversing itself on major policies. Many people would not have even raised an eye brow but for the Attorney-General of the Federation, Chief Michael Aondoakaa. He has been counsel to some of those accused of corruption by the EFCC. And now you have seen the attempt to take Ribadu to Kuru. The question is, why must the IG address a press conference to announce that Ribadu is going to Kuru, if it is really a regular course? Yes, by virtue of what the EFCC is doing, its operatives and even lawyers ought to be trained, because corruption is a white collar crime, and those who are engaged in it are smart people. But what has NIPSS (the National institute for Polic and Strategic Studeis, Kuru) got to offer? Who are the products of NIPSS and how have they comported themselves thereafter- the Tafa Baloguns, the Obasanjos and the Abachas and the rest?

We want to see how whosoever Yar'Adua appoints to succeed Ribadu will handle the various cases. That will tell you clearly the true test of Yar'Adua's commitment to the anti-graft war. But from what we can see, it appears from the selective prosecution of the Obasanjo years, we have moved to the non-prosecution of Yar'Adua. Obasanjo wanted Ribadu to prosecute his enemies and spare his friends, Yar'Adua does not want Ribadu to prosecute anybody because of his friends. So, that is the dilemma.

There has been some rumbling within Afenifere following some issues that came up from the recent Ganiyu Dawodu memorial lecture. Some allege that the serving PDP governors are not Afenifere by virtue of the outcome of the IITA, Ibadan meeting of the Yoruba leaders. What is the situation?

That issue has really taken much time and attention, but it is a very simple and basic truth. There is a school of thought that says Afenifere is for all Yoruba. And we say that Afenifere is a political organisation, an ideological group that defends progressivism and the core values of the Awolowo political school of thought. And therefore it cannot be for all Yoruba. It can only be for the majority of Yoruba who are progressive in ideology, and who believe in the core values of Awolowo and are ready to practice it either in or outside government. And nothing explains what I am saying than what happened in Ibadan a few days ago, when a governor pulled down Awolowo statue and replaced with an unknown soldier. So, it is so clear that if there are people who believe that the unknown soldier is more of a hero in Yorubaland than Awolowo, it is clear we are not operating at the same wavelength and they cannot understand what we are talking about.

But for Awolowo, who banished ignorance from Yorubaland through his free education policy, a good percentage of these people would have been nowhere today. The governor of Osun State today, Oyinlola, is one of the first set of students that enjoyed Awolowo's free education programme. Even Alao-Akala puts on Awolowo's cap. But when you look at what Awolowo stood for and what they stand for, is it the same thing? I raised an issue recently about Osun State – that if Oyinlola says he is one of the first set of people to enjoy Awo's free education, why is he charging N265,000 school fees in the state university? If Awolowo had charged such an amount, would he have gone to school? He has no answer to that. Akala increased the school fees at LAUTECH from N6,000 to N75,000, the students went to protest and he asked soldiers to shoot them. In Olabisi Onabanjo University, fees were increased by about 400 per cent. Awolowo was committing about 40 per cent of the Western Region's budget to education to ensure that people were liberated from ignorance. He built industrial complexes all over Yorubaland, today they are selling all these industries. But for the noise we made, they would have sold Airport Hotel. So, it is so clear that the fact that you are a Yoruba man does not make you Afenifere.

So, for that reason you don't believe that the South-West governors presently are not Afenifere?

No, they cannot be. In any case, anybody that claims Awoism and is in PDP is certainly a synthetic. Prof Bolaji Aluko paints the scenario very well – he said if you were a Christian, a deacon, and you want to become a bishop and the church says there is no space and you now say you are now a Muslim and got converted; you are later made a Chief Imam and you are still saying you are a Christian, where do you stand? We are not saying that the conservative wing of Yoruba politics does not have the right to exist. They do.

Even if we have a Yoruba nation today, it won't be a one-party state. What we are saying is that you cannot be in PDP and say you are an Afenifere. PDP today does not have any ideology known to its members other than grabbing power do-or-die basis.

What created your problem with Governor Daniel? Were you opposed to his invitation as guest lecturer or the vituperation he poured on Afenifere?

Let's just leave this issue at the level of principle so that we don't start attacking any individual. We have set the parameters for anyone who wants to be Afenifere and anybody who fits into that will definitely be into it.

But the Daniel issue generated much concern and you are at the centre of the hoopla.

Let's forget about that issue for now. There have been appeals from well meaning Yoruba and I don't want to personalise this issue at this stage anymore. I have just stated broad parameters and that there are ideological divides in Yorubaland and there is no meeting point between PDP and Afenifere. In any case, in Afenifere tradition, an occasion will even come when they will invite an Nzeribe to come and speak on an issue because they want to hear his own perspective. There is no problem about that.

But the issue we have raised are very clear about what it is to be an Afenifere. And I think the fundamental issue that also came out of that lecture was the attempt to redefine Afenifere to suit certain people's image to say that Afenifere should be apolitical. It cannot be. Afenifere has always been political and anybody who is not comfortable with that can go to Yoruba Council of Elders (YCE), which is apolitical. Ab initio, Afenifere was simply an alias for the Action Group. So, the view that Afenifere should be apolitical and should be an all comers affairs is not acceptable.

The Yoruba are talking of unity. How could that unity be achieved when you have already excluded some people from Afenifere?

It is even the attempt to lump everybody together that will lead to confusion. When we have identical purity, we know those who are in Afenifere, we know those who are in PDP. At the end of the day, we are all Yoruba people; we can still meet at a non-political level. At the level of Afenifere, there are issues that divide us and that have to do with what affect our people.

An Afenifere will tell you that education must be free, the Yoruba conservative will tell you people must pay. So, the ideological issue is divisive, no doubt about it.