Princess Funke Adedoyin was initially the running mate of former Governor Bukola Saraki of Kwara State before she was changed and appointed as minister by former President Olusegun Obasanjo. She served as Women Affairs Minister and Minister of Youth. Adedoyin, who holds a PhD from a United Kingdom university is Igbomina from Kwara South Senatorial District and onetime the head of Atiku Abubakar Policy Team. The politician, who is now a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), in this interview speaks on sundry political issues. Excerpts:

You’ve obviously been involved in the politics of the state since the era of former President Olusegun Obasanjo. How has the journey been?

It’s been an interesting time. It has been a dozen or so years of challenges, wonderful opportunities and the usual tumbles and fumbles, topsy-turvy of politics in a developing nation. To go back a little bit, as you know, when we were thrown out of the Peoples Democratic Party in 2005/2006, we all formed the Action Congress of Democrats, which became the Action Congress, then Action Congress of Nigeria and which has now, with other parties, become the All Progressives Congress. I remained in the ACN until the last general election. We, in the South of Kwara, have been agitating for power shift for many years because we had Governor Mohammed Lawal, who was from Kwara Central, he had done a term from 1999 to 2003; and we then had Governor Bukola Saraki, who was also from Kwara Central, he did two terms. And since Governor Lawal was not in our party and the PDP merged with the Saraki faction of the then All Peoples Party, Dr. Bukola Saraki emerged as the gubernatorial candidate, from the Central, that was what led to the Bukola-Funke ticket in 2002, before I was elevated to the federal level and an alternative deputy governor was found after we had concluded the primaries. As I said, when we were deregistered in 2006, we helped form the ACN. So we entered into negotiations with the PDP for a gubernatorial candidate from the South and a brilliant candidate from the South emerged in the PDP in the person of Abdulfatah Ahmed, who won the election. 

So, it can be said that you played the ethnic card?

No, we did not. As I said, we have to play the politics of what is in the interest of the state in general and our zone as well. And though we take a lot of credit for the emergence of the current governor as the gubernatorial candidate, of course, it took the entire state to ensure he won the election. 

Does it mean you have not pitched your tent with any political party yet?

Let me say emphatically that we have moved our entire structure, our supporters in both the PDP and the ACN to the APC. APC is, of course, the more progressive party. And in terms of my own personal ideology, I’m more of a social democrat and the policy position that lifts people out of poverty, that ensures the greatest good for the greatest number, that places the greatest resource of this nation - the people - at the front and centre of its policy thrust, is one that I subscribe to and that is what APC represents.

Was there any specific reason why the South was agitating for power shift that materialised with the electoral victory of the incumbent governor?

The reason for pushing for power shift to the South was because of the challenge of the less developed areas of the state. The idea is that when the governor comes from the capital, the rest of the state may not get much attention. People would come and they would talk about how a state capital has become a small London. And we would know that it has not spread across the entire state. But I believe the reason for the principle of federal character, even in institutions, is to engender a sense of belonging and focus attention on every part of the state and not that just one part of the state would be developed. We believe that while, certainly, there has to be merit in terms of the person and his or her capacity to govern and administer the state, a transfer of power from one zone to another would engender better and more even development across the state. One of the things that I find very worrisome in the Igbomina-Ekiti zone is that a lot of the men are not there. Our towns have become towns populated mainly by women and children. Most of the able bodied men have gone out in search of greener pastures. So we felt that it was important that opportunities for job creation and employment generation, that will draw our people back home, so that we could reduce what I call employment migration and develop the state, must be provided. The South has been developed largely by town associations and wealthy individuals. 

So how much of your aspirations would you say have been met?

Government is ongoing. We have seen more infrastructural development. Some of the development that was started long before the civilian government, even some of the projects started by previous administrations are being completed. New projects are being commissioned and brought into use. More of the major state roads linking the local governments in the zones are getting attention.

Are you satisfied with governance in Kwara State?

For me, creating jobs and getting our men to move back home, fostering real development and stopping the rural-urban drift is critical. I would like to see a focus on that. But I must also say again that at least people are now moving from the rural areas to Ilorin as opposed to moving to Lagos and credit must go to former Governor Bukola Saraki for opening up the state capital, attracting investment and industries. We have seen a considerable reduction in the distances people move. So people are around to contribute their quota to the development of the state. 

Do you think that your state government, having left the PDP for the APC would be able to bring the benefits of employment opportunities coming from the government at the centre to your senatorial district as you aspire?

My understanding is that some of these things are statutory in the sense that statutory allocations must come, the police will recruit from the state, through the state government. The federal civil service and the army will recruit with input from the state government. And I keep saying: all politics is local. When Governor Lawal was in office, he was in the APP and the government at the centre was PDP. The Federal Government related with him. He was then the governor of a state in Nigeria. You deal with the statutory bodies, as constituted by law. So I don’t see that being an impediment to people in the state benefitting from the Federal Government.

Would you say that the birth of the APC, which brought about a two-party structure in Nigeria, is good for the polity?

I think it is fantastic. I think that the tendency for one dominant party and for many little ones was not very healthy for Nigeria. Two strong parties with a national spread will engender better governance. APC administration in most of the states have demonstrated strong governance and fantastic service delivery to their populace, so it would provide an alternative, spurring complacent administrations to do more and engendering healthy competition to the benefit of the generality of our people. I would have also liked the inclusion of independent candidature in our constitution. Maybe at lower levels such as the local government. Independent candidature would have been useful for the purpose of bringing true representation because people will vote for what is available. I mean if the popular candidate does not win the primaries in the main parties, because we know the right candidate does not always win the primaries, in such cases the provision of independent candidature would, I believe, aid better representation. We belong to the APC and that is where we stay. The decision is collective.

What are you looking at for 2015 politically?

There are so many structures that we put together. From Kwara South Initiative to The Kwara Project, the Kwara South Professionals, the Princess Olufunke Trust that is focused on the resource enhancement of women, and the many youth groups and so on. We are not newspaper politicians,  who will say they are this and they are that and will not get more than 200 votes in a general election. Politics is, literarily, as Yoruba puts it, ‘the people are my covering’. Without the people, you are not a politician. Our people were in both parties - the ACN and the PDP. We will consolidate our people into the APC and take it from there. We will work with all our people across the state for the APC to win the elections at all levels.

Ahead of the national dialogue, some of the decisions taken by Yoruba leaders included that the Yorubas in Kwara State should be moved back to join their tribesmen in Osun State, which will mean that Kwara South, where you come from, will go to Osun State. Are you aware of that and where do you stand on it?

I have heard that but there are several other positions. Well, we mustn’t forget that the previous delineation of state borders was a mess. The logic employed in the process of state creation was arbitrary at best and the South of Kwara illustrates this so clearly. In the Zone, there are the Ekitis, most of whom are in Ekiti State. There are the Ibolos, some of who are in Osun State. There are the Igbominas, some of who are in  other parts of Osun. So the truth is that we need a holistic rearrangement. You can’t just say the Yoruba speaking part should go to Osun because there are parts of the Yoruba speaking areas that naturally belong in Ekiti. Some part of Ilorin is also Yoruba speaking. Where do they go? In terms of land mass, Ifelodun Local Government Area is probably the largest local government area in Nigeria, and may require division into several local government areas, the majority of which is Igbomina. Yet the farthest, northern parts of Ifelodun Local Government Area may belong in Niger State because they share a native language. Yet, they are part of Kwara South. I’m also aware that there are meetings going on where some of Kwara South and the Okuns in Kogi State are saying: “Give us a new state. Why can’t we have it? We are big enough! The South of Kwara and the Okun in Kogi State, we are enough to make a state, without even fresh local government delineation.” I think together there are 12 local governments and they are banking on Ifelodun Local Government Area, which I mentioned earlier, is being broken up by permutation into several local government areas to swell the numbers of local government areas in the proposed new state. There are so many proposals and suggestions. In any case, how much input did the people of the state have in these decisions or proposals? 

Sorting out Kwara is far more complicated than just ceding an entire senatorial zone to another state. With all due respect to the Yoruba elders, who, no doubt, have the best intentions, Kwara is more complicated than that simplistic recommendation implies